Patrick Barr-Melej, Psychedelic Chile: Youth, Counterculture, and Politics on the Road to Socialism and Dictatorship. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2017. Photographs, abbreviations, notes, index, 362 pp.; hardcover $85, paperback $34.95, ebook $19.99.
Latin American Politics and Society April 17, 2018 Rachel Rapaport
In Chile during the 1960s and 1970s, a youth counterculture emerged that blended psychedelic aesthetics, rock music, and leftist politics, challenging traditional norms and influencing the country's tumultuous path toward socialism under Salvador Allende and later the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet. The book traces how young people used alternative lifestyles, drugs, and art to express dissent and forge a distinct political identity, ultimately showing how this movement both reflected and shaped broader societal conflicts. The author argues that the counterculture was not merely a fringe phenomenon but a significant force in Chile's political and cultural transformation.