Abstract 
 
 
 
Title of dissertation: REASON AND FAITH: A STUDY OF INTERWAR 
CHILEAN EUGENIC DISCOURSE, 1900-1950 
 
Sarah Irene Walsh, Doctor of Philosophy, 2013 
 
 
Dissertation directed by:  Associate Professor Karin Alejandra Rosemblatt 
Department of History 
 
 
 
This dissertation examines how social reform discourse that rationalized gender 
difference allowed Chilean Catholics to play a critical role in the development of eugenic 
science between 1900 and 1950. Building on scholarship relating to the development of a 
modernized, patriarchal system during the 1920s and 1930s and the rise of eugenics 
among scientists during the same period, this dissertation posits that eugenic science in 
Chile was the result of a complex interaction between Catholic and secular intellectuals 
vying for dominance in the reconstruction of the modern Chilean social order. Political 
liberals characterized the Catholic Church as a dogmatic monolith that was antithetical to 
social progressivism and disconnected from the realities of modern life. At the same time, 
Chilean Catholics used the social disruptions caused by capitalist industrialization to 
 
assert their social, moral, and scientific superiority. The dissertation asserts that anti-
 clerical discourse popular among progressive actors served to obscure the scientific and 
social contributions, both conservative and progressive, of the Catholic Church and its 
supporters in Chile. Each chapter in this dissertation examines how Catholics responded 
to secular efforts to oust them from their traditional places of social influence ? hospitals, 
orphanages, schools, charities, and family life ? through the application of eugenic 
science. Secular reformers contrasted their own presumably rational, scientific responses 
to social problems while feminizing religious practice and Church or Catholic 
perspectives. Chilean Catholics responded by asserting the compatibility of science and 
religion, particularly in the field of eugenics. Catholic scholars suggested, for instance, 
that they had to be involved in eugenic practices to ensure the most ethical application of 
scientific principles. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
REASON AND FAITH: A STUDY OF INTERWAR CHILEAN EUGENIC 
DISCOURSE, 1900-1950 
 
 
 
by 
 
 
Sarah Irene Walsh 
 
 
 
 
Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of 
Maryland, College Park in partial fulfillment 
of the requirements for the degree of 
Doctor of Philosophy 
2013 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Advisory Committee: 
 
Professor Karin Rosemblatt, Chair 
Professor Eyda Merediz 
Professor Erika Milam 
Professor Mary Kay Vaughan 
Professor Barbara Weinstein 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
? Copyright by 
 
Sarah Irene Walsh 
 
2013
  
 ii 
Acknowledgments 
 
 The process of writing a dissertation can be a very isolating one. Days spent alone 
in archives or in front of the computer stretch together into an indecipherable block of 
time that seems to have no beginning or end. I feel especially fortunate to have so many 
people who have contributed to this dissertation and protected me from what could have 
become a very bleak period of my life. The best parts of this dissertation are the result of 
their combined support; the shortcomings are entirely mine. 
 First, I would like to thank my advisor Karin Alejandra Rosemblatt for all her 
work, efforts, and time. Karin graciously took me on as a student after I had already been 
in graduate school for three years. It has turned out to be the most propitious moment in 
my career to date. She has unfailingly read and commented on grant applications, letters 
of application, and a myriad chapter drafts. Even more importantly, Karin encouraged me 
many times when I was ready to give up. For her belief in me, I will always be grateful 
and amazed. 
 I would also like to thank Erika L. Milam, an invaluable support throughout this 
entire dissertation process. Erika sustained me with her enthusiasm and warmth 
throughout the conceptualization, research, and writing of this dissertation. Not only did 
she remind me of the vast literature on the history of science with which I had to contend, 
she consistently pushed me to look at my project in a wider scope. 
 My additional committee members only further represent my good fortune. 
Barbara Weinstein, my original advisor, was a source of calm practicality from the start, 
a rare find. Mary Kay Vaughan always reminded me to further refine my arguments and 
provided incredibly helpful feedback. Eyda Merediz gave her time and patience to help in 
 iii 
the process. I have been incredibly lucky to work with such wonderful scholars, both at 
Maryland and elsewhere. For all of the support from all five of these excellent women, I 
will always be grateful.  
 This project meant extensive stays for research in Chile. A number of people 
made these trips not only possible, but enjoyable. I would like to acknowledge Professor 
Sol Serrano at the Pontificia Universidad Cat?lica de Chile; Maria Soledad Z?rate 
Campos at the Universidad Alberto Hurtado; and Claudio Javier Barrientos Barria and 
Hillary Hiner at the Universidad Diego Portales. Finally, a special thanks for the tea and 
time goes to Mar?a Consuelo Figueroa Garavagno. These scholars made my arrival in 
Chile, and my use of the archives, much easier. 
 A number of organizations have financially supported my research to make this 
dissertation possible. I must first thank the Department of History at Maryland for critical 
support at various stages. From them, I received a travel grant that allowed for 
preliminary research in Santiago more years ago than I would like to admit. I also 
received a prospectus development award and a dissertation support award that have 
contributed tremendously to my completion of this project. Finally, I must acknowledge 
the crucial research support I received from the National Science Foundation. Housed in 
the Division of Social and Economic Sciences, the Science, Technology, and Society 
Program provided me with the necessary funding to do the bulk of my research in 
Santiago with the Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement Grant. Without that grant, 
this dissertation would not have been possible. 
 Finally, I need to give special thanks to my friends at the University of Maryland. 
I cannot begin to say how grateful I am for all the support and friendship that the 
 iv 
graduate students at Maryland have given me. Amy Rutenberg, Jeremy Best, and 
Christina Larocco all joined the program with me and have seen me through since the 
beginning. My fellow Latin American history students deserve special mention. Ted 
Cohen stands out among them. Ted and I joined the program together and he has 
consistently supported my work. Reid Gustafson and Shane Dillingham were kind 
enough to read very early versions of my second chapter. They were also nice enough to 
share an office with me for two years. Brandi Townsend not only read drafts, but she was 
also crazy and brave enough to come to Chile with me the second time. She even got me 
to Macchu Picchu! The rest of the Latin Americanists have made my years at Maryland a 
real pleasure. Jeffrey Brideau, not a Latin Americanist but a great friend nonethelss, also 
deserves a special thanks. Jeff took the time to read numerous grant applications, chapter 
drafts, and generally stayed a good sport through all the ups and downs of writing. 
Finally, Steph Hinnershitz-Hutchison deserves more than a few kudos for all her last 
minute help in making this dissertation presentable for public viewing. 
 I could hardly finish these acknowledgments without taking the time to mention 
my friends and family. All of you have contributed in ways that you cannot even truly 
appreciate. Katie Neuner has been my true friend for over a decade and her opinion has 
never failed me. Thank you for reading my introduction and conclusion and making sure 
I did not give up. My friends have also been instrumental in keeping me sane and out of 
my head: Emily Dorsey, Mike Piel, Craig Officer, Alana Blanks Flowers, Krysta 
Berquist, and Jessica Wagner. Finally, my family has put up with me for not only the 
entirety of my graduate school career, but my whole life. They might be listed last here, 
but that hardly represents how important their love and support have been to me. Nancy 
 v 
Jenal, my mother, and Amy Walsh, my sister, have supported me through it all. Without 
them, my accomplishments are irrelevant. 
 vi 
Table of Contents 
 
 
Acknowledgments ............................................................................................................ii 
 
Introduction ....................................................................................................................1 
?La raza chilena? and the Social Question: 
Catholicism, Gender, and Eugenics in Chile, 1900-1950 
 
Chapter One..................................................................................................................27 
?La pureza del alma con el aseo corporal?: 
Approaching the Social Question in Chile 
 
Chapter Two .................................................................................................................83 
?Las Dos Verdades?: 
Catholic Characterizations of the Relationship between Religion & Science 
 
Chapter Three .............................................................................................................115 
Man, the Monkey without a Tail? 
Eugenics, the Social Question and Catholicism in Chile 
 
Chapter Four ..............................................................................................................156 
Natural Partners: 
Eugenics and the Modernization of Chilean Patriarchy 
 
Conclusion ..................................................................................................................199 
Social Reform, Chilean Progressivism and the Legacy of Catholic Eugenics 
 
Bibliography ...............................................................................................................211 
 vii 
List of Figures 
 
Figure 1: Moustache, ?La Viruela en Valpara?so,? Zig-Zag, no. 24 (July 30, 1905) 
 
Figure 2: Moustache, ?Virus anti-amoroso,? Zig-Zag, no. 28 (August 27, 1905) 
 
Figure 3: ?Tabletas de Antikamnia,? Revista M?dica de Chile, no. 1 (January 1915) 
 
Figure 4: ?Raz?n de la fuerza,? Zig-Zag, no. 220 (May 8, 1909) 
 
Figure 5: F. de N. Krizwan, ?Este ser? nuestro primo?? Zig-Zag, no. 7 (April 2, 1905) 
 
Figure 6: C. Zozzi, ?Entre conyuges,? Zig-Zag, no. 544 (July 24, 1915) 
 
Figures 7 & 8: ?Ense?anzas de la vida,? Revista de la Cruz Roja Chilena, no. 4-5 (April-
 May 1931) 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 1 
Introduction 
 
?La raza chilena? and the Social Question 
Catholicism, Gender, and Eugenics in Chile, 1900-1950 
 
?Our race was born as all those called historic races should be: from the combination of 
the vanquishing male element with the vanquished female [one], complying with the 
biblical sentence that woman will avenge her race, perpetuating the blood of the 
conquered lineage. The birth of the Chilean race realized that virgin tribute to which 
poets who sing of the origins of peoples refer.?1 
-Nicol?s Palacios, La raza chilena, 1904 
 
?Science and Faith are sisters, because both are emanations and glimmers of the infinite 
light, which is God.?2 
-Bernardo Gentilini, Fe y ciencia, 1916 
 
?Human capital, that which is the fundamental base of economic prosperity of a country, 
has been underestimated and abandoned to its own fortune.?3  
-Salvador Allende, La realidad medico-social chilena, 1939 
 
This dissertation traces the development of eugenic science in Chile from 1900 to 
1950 to demonstrate the complex interconnections between Catholic and secular social 
reformers in the construction of a Chilean discourse regarding social welfare. It 
illuminates how these seemingly disparate historical actors came together by using 
eugenic science to maintain and expand male privilege by emphasizing work as a key to 
political agency while circumscribing female social roles to those of reproducers and 
                                                
1 Nicolas Palacios. Raza chilena: Libro escrito por un Chileno i para los Chilenos. Valparaiso, 
Chile: Imprenta i Litografia Alemana, 1904. 21. ?Naci? pues nuestra raza como deben haber nacido todos 
los grupos humanos llamados razas hist?ricas: de la conjuncion del elemento masculino del vencedor con el 
femenino del vencido, cumpli?ndose as? la sentencia b?blica de que la mujer vengara a su raza, 
perpetu?ndose por ella la sangre de la estirpe vencida.  En el nacimiento de la raza chilena se realiz? aquel 
tributo de v?rjenes que refieren los poetas que cantan el or?jen de los pueblos.? 
 
2 Bernardo Gentilini. La Fe y la Ciencia. Santiago de Chile: Librer?a y Casa Editorial de la 
Federaci?n de Obras Cat?licas, 1916. 22. 
 
3 Salvador Allende. La realidad medico-social chilena, Hern?n Soto, Mar?a Ang?lica Illanes and 
Mariano Requena (eds). Santiago, Chile: Editorial Cuarto Propio, 1999 (1939). 276-277. ?El capital 
humano, que es la base fundamental de la prosperidad econ?mica de un pa?s, ha sido subestimado y ha 
estado abandonado a su propia suerte.? 
 2 
nurturers, whether as wives and mothers or as social workers. Eugenics was used as a 
means to naturalize and modernize gender difference in order to create a modern 
patriarchal social order considered vital to Chile?s economic progress. Eugenics was so 
important to resolving the social question because virtually all doctors, lawyers, 
reformers and other experts believed that it was the premiere discipline that dealt with 
managing human interaction. While sociology, psychology and anthropology would 
become more popular as the twentieth century progressed, eugenics combined those 
social sciences with the physical science of biology to claim preeminence. Social 
reformers wanted to reacquaint Chileans with their natural imperatives and moral duties 
to better prepare them for economic competition in a globalized, capitalist marketplace. 
 Nicol?s Palacios?s description of the birth of the Chilean race combined a eugenic 
vision of the past infused with religious symbolism, demonstrating how the themes of 
Catholicism, eugenics, and gender were intertwined. He also represented a growing trend 
in Latin American understanding of race. A number of Latin American eugenicists, 
anthropologists, sociologists and ethnologists agreed that the region stretching from 
Mexico to Tierra del Fuego was marked by a specific ethnic identity based on the mixture 
of European, indigenous, and (sometimes) African racial characteristics.4 Uniquely, 
                                                
4 A fuller discussion of Jos? Vasconcelos?s La raza c?smica will come later in the chapter. For 
now, discussions of Latin American racial character can be found in: Nancy P. Applebaum, Anne S. 
Macpherson and Karin Alejandra Rosemblatt. Race and Nation in Modern Latin America. Chapel Hill: 
University of North Carolina Press, 2003. Peter M. Beattie. Tribute of Blood: Army, Honor, Race, and 
Nation in Brazil 1864 ? 1945. Durham: Duke University Press, 2001. Herman Bennett. Africans in 
Colonial Mexico: Absolutism, Christianity, and Afro-Creole Consciousness, 1570-1640. 
Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2003. Alejandra Bronfman. Measures of Equality: Social Science, 
Citizenship, and Race in Cuba, 1902-1940. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2003. R. 
Douglas Cope. The Limits of Racial Domination: Plebeian Society in Colonial Mexico City, 1660-1720. 
Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1994. Greg Grandin. The Blood of Guatemala: A History of Race 
and Nation. Durham: Duke University Press, 2000. Deborah Poole. Vision, Race and Modernity. Princeton: 
Princeton University Press, 1997. Diego A. Von Vacano. The Color of Citizenship: Race, Modernity, and 
Latin American/Hispanic Political Thought. New York: Oxford University Press, 2012. 
 
 3 
however, Palacios located Chilean European heritage not in Spain, but in the Germanic 
tribes of Northern Europe. He contended that the conquistadors who came to Chile, 
though Spanish subjects, were actually descended from Germanic stock, the Goths. For 
him, it was vital to state that very little Latin blood formed the basis of the Chilean racial 
identity.5 Palacios argued against Chileans cultivating a Latin identity and discouraged 
French, Italian, and Spanish immigration to Chile as a means of civilizing the nation. His 
book went on to prove and support this contention of racial purity of the Goths in Spain 
and the Araucanians in the new world. 
 This origin story also reflected the profoundly gendered nature of Chilean eugenic 
discourse. Palacios contended that the Chilean race was founded on male aggression and 
female submission. These roles were natural, mutually exclusive, and necessary for a 
strong people. As I will show in this dissertation, this idea set the tone for Chilean 
eugenicists and social reformers until the mid-twentieth century. They posited that men 
should lead the nation toward economic and social modernization. Women should follow 
their lead by raising healthy children in clean, orderly homes. Women of all social classes 
should get married and defer to their husbands. While they were important to the 
resolution of the social question, this was only as vessels of social reproduction and 
modernity. Reformers of all types were deeply committed to resolving the ?social 
question,? a term widely used to discuss the multifaceted ways capitalism affected social 
development. This debate encompassed issues such as illegitimacy, personal hygiene, and 
prostitution among others. 
                                                
5 Palacios 5-27. 
 4 
 This concern about the Chilean people found expression in a wide array of 
documents between 1900 and 1950. Salvador Allende?s notion of human capital that 
appeared in La realidad medico-social (1939) elaborated his belief that a state had a 
responsibility to its citizenry. He conceptualized this responsibility in eugenic terms. The 
2005 publication of Victor Far?as?s Salvador Allende: Antisemitismo y eutanasia 
explained Allende?s eugenic past in terms of a nascent predilection for fascism which 
ignited a lengthy controversy.6 However, this approach does not recognize that eugenics 
was popular among historical actors of all political stripes. Instead, I argue that 
recognizing Allende?s eugenically-inspired past does not cheapen his contribution to the 
development of the Chilean welfare state nor his commitment to Socialism. Rather, both 
he and Palacios demonstrate the pervasiveness and adaptability of eugenic thinking 
among Chilean intellectuals in the first half of the twentieth century. 
 On the other hand, Bernardo Gentilini?s description of the symbiotic relationship 
between science and religion illustrated a contemporary strand of Catholic thought during 
the first half of the twentieth century. This dissertation explores how Chilean Catholic 
social reformers incorporated science into their assessment and treatment of the social 
question. Historians have paid less attention to this discourse and Catholic science 
generally in Latin American. As such, some scholars might interpret Gentilini?s assertion 
that science and religion revealed the same truth as na?ve and disconnected from lived 
reality. However, this dissertation shows that secular social reformers popularized 
negative portrayals of Catholic reform. Instead, Chilean Catholics engaged with eugenic 
discourse as easily as their secular counterparts. 
                                                
6 Victor Far?as. Salvador Allende: Antisemitismo y euthanasia. Chile: Editorial Maye, 2005. 
 5 
Sources, Periodization, and Terminology 
 The first half of the twentieth century witnessed an important shift in the 
conceptualization of Latin American social welfare. While mostly Catholic charitable 
organizations, had been in charge of dealing with issues as they arose during the 
nineteenth century, the twentieth century saw the attempt to anticipate social problems in 
order to eliminate them completely. All historical actors also agreed that the state should 
be in charge of a large part of this programming. However, in Chile and throughout Latin 
America, the state apparatus was not capable of providing the personnel required to 
manage such a large system. In fact, even the Catholic Church had a relatively small 
network of agents outside the major urban centers. In this way, both groups had to come 
together to achieve their goals. 
 Between 1900 and 1950, Chile?s urban populations also grew tremendously. Men 
and women from throughout the country came to urban centers Santiago, Valpara?so, and 
Concepci?n, to find work. In 1895, the urban population living in cities of more than 
20,000 in Chile was 34%. By 1930, that number was closer to half of the entire country?s 
population.7 This new urban working class demanded new services and protections. Their 
numbers also made the social issues such as poverty, disease and infant mortality even 
harder to ignore. The fact that the average Chilean had a life expectancy of only thirty 
years by 1920 demonstrates how unhealthy the population actually was.8 Cities were 
teeming with men, women, and children who had no access to proper housing or clean 
                                                
7 Elizabeth Quay Hutchison. Labors Appropriate to Their Sex: Gender, Labor, and Politics in 
Urban Chile, 1900-1930. Durham: Duke University Press, 2001. 22. 
 
8 Simon Collier and William F. Sater. A History of Chile, 1808-2002. New York: Cambridge 
University Press, 2004. 177. 
 6 
water. The very real health threats to this population caused both Catholic and secular 
reformers to consider how to address them. 
 The period is also notable for a political landscape that became increasingly 
liberal and democratic. While the parliamentary period began in 1891 with President Jos? 
Manuel Balmaceda?s defeat by the Chilean military, the political structure this war left 
behind functioned with relative ease. However, growing political dissatisfaction with the 
parliamentary system ushered in a new presidential era in 1924 when General Carlos 
Iba?ez del Campo seized government control in order to turn it over to President Arturo 
Alessandri Palma in 1925. While the political situation between 1925 and 1932 was 
especially precarious, this strengthened executive style of government remained in place 
until the September 11, 1973 coup against President Salvador Allende.9 The emphasis on 
presidential power ushered in the era of coalitions between political parties, such as the 
Frente Popular and the Falange Nacional. Over the course of all of these political 
changes, social reform remained a key point of agreement between a variety of historical 
actors on both the right and left. 
 The Catholic and secular social reformers in this dissertation took this challenge 
seriously. I use the term ?social reformers? because all the documents they produced 
were inspired by efforts to resolve the social question, a phrase that was used by 
intellectuals the world over as shorthand to discuss the various dislocations, disruptions, 
and distractions the capitalist economic system had caused. Chilean social reformers were 
no different. Using the social question as a lens, the intellectuals I study authored papers, 
pamphlets, articles, and theses about how to resolve the myriad of problems they saw 
                                                
9 Ibid 147-148. 
 7 
facing a modernizing nation. Unlike their contemporaries in the North Atlantic, Chilean 
social reformers were dealing with social problems caused by modernity and the growing 
pains of a developing nation. This made their work all the more urgent. This urgency is 
palpable in the documents they have left behind. As such, the intellectuals I discuss here 
were social reformers, whether they actually took part in legislative efforts to create state-
 sponsored social welfare programs or not. 
 The sources analyzed are primarily monographs and periodicals. I specifically use 
popular scientific and medical literature produced by both secular and religious actors ? 
including journal articles, hygienic instruction manuals or pamphlets and medical theses 
or dissertations produced by both Catholic and secular actors ? giving special attention to 
scientific contributions of religious actors that historians have not yet analyzed. Focusing 
on Catholic social reformers allows for a new perspective on the creation of a discourse 
of social welfare. It also demonstrates the similarities between Catholic and secular 
reformers of the period. Finally, it shows that the Chilean Catholic Church was still an 
important factor in the day to day lives of many Chileans of both the upper and lower 
classes. 
Chapter Overview 
 To show the various layers that formed the discourse about Chilean welfare, I 
begin by discussing how social reformers understood and constructed the social question 
in Chile. In chapter one, I compare the writing of Catholic and secular social reformers to 
demonstrate that most of what they identified as social problems were similar. Not only 
that, but they recommended similar courses of action to resolve those problems. In 
particular, science was considered to be the most reliable means of effectively changing 
 8 
Chile?s fate while simultaneously encouraging social modernization. The second chapter 
continues on to explore the relationship between Catholicism and science generally. 
While most secular social reformers argued that Catholics had no business or place in 
Chile?s social renewal, Catholics vehemently objected to their exclusion. They did so by 
arguing that Catholicism and science were mutually beneficial. Chapter three focuses 
exclusively on the relationship between Catholicism and eugenics. I demonstrate how 
Chilean Catholics were able to contribute to the development of eugenics by accepting 
certain aspects of the science while also modifying the most problematic issues. Finally, 
in the fourth chapter, I demonstrate how modernization of Chilean social roles depended 
upon a naturalization of male and female gender difference. In this way, Catholic and 
secular social reformers were able to agree, even if their official positions were in 
opposition.  
Historiographical Review 
Catholic social reformers actively engaged in the creation of a Chilean welfare 
discourse in the first half of the twentieth century, though the current literature might 
suggest otherwise. The historiography regarding social reform and welfare program 
development in this period focused on the contributions of historical actors on the left. As 
a result, the contributions of social conservatives, Catholic or otherwise, were overlooked 
in the creation of a historical narrative that privileges Chile?s socialist and politically 
liberal past. This was, in no small part, the result of the importance of Salvador Allende?s 
election to the presidency and his subsequent ousting by Augusto Pinochet. La via 
chilena, the democratic transition to Socialist government that made Chile famous, and 
 9 
its precursors dominated Chilean historiography of the twentieth century.10 My work 
builds on the historical accounts of well-studied network of progressive individuals and 
groups working for social reform in Chile to demonstrate that historical actors in 
politically conservative groups were equally important to the creation of a eugenic social 
welfare discourse that shored up and modernized patriarchy. 
 Many scholars who study the first half of the twentieth century in Chile focus on 
the increasing secularization of the nation as a key to the development of social 
progressivism. Patrick Barr-Melej?s Reforming Chile: Cultural Politics, Nationalism, and 
the Rise of the Middle Class (2001) pointed out that the 1920 Law of Obligatory Primary 
Instruction was used by political liberals as a means to get Chilean children out of 
Catholic-operated schools into state-run institutions.11 This argument combined with his 
larger one about the relatively widespread acceptance of political radicalism on the part 
of Chileans. Throughout his monograph, Barr-Melej demonstrated how various political 
parties on the left compromised with each other to make larger and larger political gains. 
He argued that the Partido Radical became the ?dominant interest group in national 
affairs by the end of the 1930s.?12 My work does not ignore the importance and influence 
of leftist political parties and coalitions like the Partido Radical or the Frente Nacional, 
                                                
10 Brenda Elsey. Citizens and Sportsmen: F?tbol and Politics in Twentieth-Century Chile. Austin: 
University of Texas Press, 2011. Hutchison 2001. Thomas Miller Klubock. Contested Communities: Class, 
Gender, and Politics in Chile?s El Teniente Copper Mine, 1904-1951. Durham: Duke University Press, 
1998. Karin Alejandra Rosemblatt. Gendered Compromises: Political Cultures and the State in Chile, 
1920-1950. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2000. Heidi Tinsman. Partners in Conflict: 
the Politics of Gender, Sexuality, and Labor in the Chilean Agrarian Reform, 1950-1973. Durham: Duke 
University Press, 2002. Mary Kay Vaughan. Cultural Politics in Revolution: Teachers, Peasants, and 
Schools in Mexico, 1930-1940. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1997. Peter Winn. Weavers of 
Revolution: the Yarur Workers and Chile?s Road to Socialism, New York: Oxford University Press, 1986. 
 
11 Patrick Barr-Melej. Reforming Chile: Cultural Politics, Nationalism, and the Rise of the Middle 
Class. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2001. 142. 
 
12 Ibid 3. 
 10 
but shows that these groups were not the only important actors in social reform efforts 
during the first half of the twentieth century. 
 Some Chileanist scholars have pointed out that social conservatives were equally 
dynamic in the period between 1900 and 1950. For example, Simon Collier noted the 
development of two conservative political groups in the 1930s. He argues that the 
influence of German fascism fostered the growth of the National Socialist Party in Chile. 
Additionally, ?a group of dissident young Conservatives inspired by the ?social? 
encyclicals of the Papacy and by the thoughts of the French Catholic philosopher Jacques 
Maritain? formed the Falange Nacional in 1938.13 While these groups are not the focus 
on my dissertation, their influence and existence speak to a variegated political culture 
that included a variety of historical actors on both the right and left. Unfortunately, the 
extremism of conservative groups like the National Socialist Party has caused historians 
to shy away from important political actors such as the Falange. The Falange was a 
conservative coalition of various political parties designed to counter the Frente Nacional. 
Both the Falange and the Frente Nacional were integral to the political culture in Chile 
between 1938 and 1950. However, the Falange has received much less scholarly 
attention.14 
                                                
13 Collier 227. 
 
14 Some exceptions to this oversight are: Fernando Castillo Infante. La Flecha Roja: Relato 
hist?rico sobre la Falange Nacional. Chile: Editorial Francisco de Aguirre, 1997. Sandra McGee Deutsch. 
Las Derechas: The Extreme Right in Argentina, Brazil, and Chile, 1890-1939. Stanford: Stanford 
University Press, 1999. Carlos Gonzalez Cruchaga. Historia de una pol?mica: monse?or Manuel Larra?n y 
los or?genes de la Democracia Cristiana en Chile. Chile: Fundaci?n Eduardo Frei, 1997. Alejandro Silva 
Bascu??n. Una experiencia social cristiana: Formaci?n de la Falange. Santiago: Ediciones CESOC, 2008. 
Studying the Falange Nacional seems to be mostly a Chilean endeavor at this point. The titles here 
represent attempts by scholars on both the right and left to examine the legacy of the Falange. 
 
 11 
 Though more studies of political parties on the right are needed, this dissertation 
examines the institution of the Chilean Catholic Church alongside Chilean Catholic 
intellectuals and their contributions to the discourse of social welfare. This is motivated 
by a desire to explore the social relevance and political influence of Catholicism in the 
first half of the twentieth century, especially Catholicism inspired by social movements 
such as Catholic Action, in a country that many scholars have characterized as secular. 
Hannah Stewart-Gambino argued that, ?the post-1930s Chilean church did not wield the 
same degree of political power as did some other Latin American churches.  The pattern 
of economic and political modernization in Chile resulted in a process of secularization 
and rationalization more common to Europe than to other Latin American countries.?15 
Many historians agreed with Stewart-Gambino and treat the Chilean Catholic Church as 
an anachronistic institution with virtually no social influence in the twentieth century. 
However, the special relationship between the Chilean state government and the Catholic 
Church did not come to an official end until 1925. This belied the supposed political 
irrelevance of the Chilean Catholic Church prior to 1925. I also demonstrate that the 
Church did not lose its political capital immediately after disestablishment. The 
international Catholic response to social problems as evidenced by papal encyclicals such 
as the Rerum Novarum (1891) and Quadragesimo Anno (1931), Pope Pius XI?s 
establishment of the Pontifical Institute of Christian Archeology (1925) and the Pontifical 
                                                
15 Hannah Stewart-Gambino. ?Redefining the Changes and Politics in Chile,? in Conflict and 
Competition: The Latin American Church in a Changing Environment, Edward L. Cleary and Hannah 
Stewart-Gambino (eds). Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1992. 23. 
 
 12 
Academy of Sciences (1936) all show that Catholics were actively engaging in the 
important social and scientific developments of the period.16 
 Beyond arguing that the Chilean Catholic Church retained much of its social 
power and influence, this dissertation also explores the origins of Catholic progressivism 
in Latin America. In the 1970s, with the rise of liberation theology, scholars such as Ivan 
Vallier began to recognize that the Latin American Catholic Church played an important 
role in speaking out against authoritarian regimes. These scholars started to question the 
idea that Catholicism only bred political and social conservatism.17 In his monograph, 
Catholicism, Social Control, and Modernization in Latin America (1970), Vallier 
contended that, ?Far from being a static and settled system, the Church is actually one of 
the most innovative and experimental of large-scale organizations, being continuously 
engaged in the process of sociological construction.?18 Vallier was one of the first 
historians to recognize there existed potentially progressive elements functioning in the 
Latin American Catholic Church as an institution. 
 However, Vallier was skeptical of the motivations of Catholic actors. He pointed 
out that the political influence the Church did wield in Latin America was about making 
                                                
16 Phillip M. Thompson. Between Science and Religion: the Engagement of Catholic Intellectuals 
with Science and Technology in the Twentieth Century. New York: Lexington Books, 2009. 144. 
 
17 This is particularly informed by the literature on liberation theology: John Charles Chasteen. 
Born in Blood and Fire: a Concise History of Latin America. New York: Norton, 2001. Enrique D. Dussel. 
Politics of Liberation: a Critical World History. London: SCM Press, 2011. Hannah Stewart-Gambino. 
?Introduction: New Game, New Rules? in Conflict and Competition: The Latin American Church in a 
Changing Environment, Edward L. Cleary and Hannah Stewart-Gambino (eds). Boulder: Lynne Rienner 
Publishers, 1992. 3.  
 
18 Ivan Vallier. Catholicism, Social Control, and Modernization in Latin America. Englewood 
Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1970. 17-18. 
 
 13 
short-term gains and overlooking inconsistencies between behavior and dogma.19 Finally, 
Vallier argued that, ?the Church gains its greatest strength in situations where it is 
required to rely on mass fear to defend itself.  This defense, of course, reinforces 
traditional values, conservative extremism, and irrational leadership styles.?20 Much like 
other authors who have examined the role and development of social conservatism in 
Chile and Latin America, Vallier ultimately argued that the Catholic Church and its 
representatives were inherently traditional. While aspects of Catholic theology might be 
vehicles for social change, the Church still clung to an ideal past in which religion 
trumped all other forms of social control. 
 Unfortunately, this rather bleak estimation of conservative historical actors 
continued to pervade scholarly attempts. Sandra McGee Deutsch?s Las Derechas: The 
Extreme Right in Argentina, Brazil, and Chile, 1890-1939 (1999) defined the right as a 
reactionary response, ?to the egalitarian and liberating political tendencies of the 
moment?whatever these may be?and other factors it believes are undermining the 
socioeconomic order.?21 She contended that the bureaucratic authoritarianism that 
characterized Argentina, Brazil and Chile in the 1960s and 1970s had its roots in the 
extreme rightist movements of the 1930s.22 Though shining a light on political 
developments that had been previously overlooked by historians, McGee Deutsch?s 
monograph oversimplified Latin American conservatism, sharpening the difference 
                                                
19 Ibid 25-26. 
 
20 Ibid 40. 
 
21 McGee Deutsch 3. 
 
22 Ibid 331. 
 14 
between the right and left. This position made it difficult for her to adequately recognize 
some of the contributions of social conservatism in the development of Latin American 
political culture. 
 Underestimating the potential for social change in conservative institutions is not 
surprising, primarily because historical actors on the right often wrote about avoiding 
social disorder.23 However, avoiding disorder is not equivalent to avoiding social change. 
For example, Margaret Power?s Right-Wing Women in Chile: Feminine Power and the 
Struggle Against Allende, 1964-1973 (2002) explained why so many Chilean women 
supported the Pinochet regime. Power illustrated how women on the right were powerful 
political agents and played a critical role in the development of Chilean 
authoritarianism.24 Though the transition to authoritarianism could hardly be 
characterized as positive, it was still a meaningful social change that Chilean 
conservative women helped to usher into existence. However, she argued that historical 
actors on the right only took innovative action to maintain their version of the status 
quo.25 Yet, the Pinochet regime was markedly different from previous governments in 
Chile, both progressive and conservative, not least because it was an undemocratic one. 
Power also pointed out that women lost their political influence once the Pinochet regime 
came to power. She also notes that both progressives and conservatives had strong 
                                                
23 ?La derecha de la d?cada del treinta no ten?a un proyecto de ?desarrollo? sino un proyecto de 
?orden?, estaba obsesionada por evitar la vuelta a las situaciones de caos: la inestabilidad pol?tica de 1924-
 1932, el desorden provocado por la crisis econ?mica, los gobiernos d?biles o complacientes frente a los 
huelguistas o a los ?instigadores de la agitaci?n?, fue as? como vieron en Alessandri un restaurador de la 
?paz civil? y saneamiento econ?mico.? Tomas Moulian and Isabel Torres Dujisin. Discusiones entre 
honorables: las candidaturas presidenciales de la derecha, 1938-1946. Chile: FLACSO, 1988. 62. 
 
24 Margaret Power. Right-Wing Women in Chile: Feminine Power and the Struggle Against 
Allende, 1964-1973. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2002. 3, 11. 
 
25 Ibid 49. 
 15 
misgivings about the authoritarian turn of Chilean politics, as evidenced by the almost 
immediate objections made by political parties like the Christian Democrats. By 
examining how an earlier group of Catholics engaged with social reform, I connect anti-
 Pinochet efforts by the Christian Democrats and Catholic Church in the 1970s to an 
earlier tradition of social justice. 
 Another critical component of this project is a closer look at the relationship 
between Catholicism and science. One of the most influential Catholic intellectuals who 
wrote about the relationship between science and religion in the first half of the twentieth 
century was French philosopher and Jesuit priest, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881-
 1955). Teilhard wrote Christianity and Evolution in 1920 and contended that the divine 
operated through nature, so scientific findings had to be reconciled to religious truths.26 
This was the dominant position of most Catholic intellectuals and scientists for much of 
the twentieth century. As such, Catholics renewed their interest and efforts in scientific 
pursuits. In fact, this approach effectively ushered in a Catholic intellectual renaissance 
that, according to Phillip M. Thompson, ?provided a coherent alternative to the culture of 
modernity.?27 Catholics made their own version of modern life based on scientific 
principles that aligned with religious practice. While this dissertation examines this 
intellectual renaissance, I use Thompson?s argument to move away from discussing 
Catholic intellectual discourse as alternative. Instead, I argue that treating Catholic 
discourse as alternative overlooks the fact that it was similar to the discourse of the 
center-left in Chile. Building on both Teilhard and Thompson, this dissertation situates 
                                                
26 Thompson 57. 
 
27 Ibid 20. 
 16 
the renewed Catholic interest in the natural sciences during the early twentieth century in 
the context of addressing social problems considered to be the result of capitalist 
economic expansion. 
My work also problematizes how we understand secularism. I show that whether 
the Chilean state was completely secular or still secularizing did not preclude Catholic 
influence in social reform debates. As James Gilbert wrote for the American case, ?How 
does [religion] renew its force and energy inside a dynamic, pluralistic, and largely 
secular society? Part of the answer, I believe, is implicit in the dialectical interaction 
between science and religion throughout the twentieth century.?28 Studying how 
scientific and religious reformers interacted with each other in Chile, allows me to 
elucidate how Chilean Catholic social reformers remained relevant, even in a society that 
increasingly disparaged their efforts as self-interested and divorced from reality.  
 My work demonstrates that Catholic social reformers adopted and used the same 
scientific terminology as their secular counterparts. Many historians of science and 
religion have pointed out that by the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, religious figures 
made every effort to show that they were equally engaged in scientific developments. In 
fact, in Chile, ?The Church was concerned with, as much in its discourse as in its 
educational practice, demonstrating that its opposition to secularization did not mean its 
opposition to scientific knowledge nor to technological advances.?29 Fighting 
                                                
28 James Gilbert. Redeeming Culture: American Religion in an Age of Science. Chicago: 
University of Chicago Press, 1997. 3. 
 
29 Sol Serrano. Universidad y naci?n: Chile en el siglo XIX. Santiago, Chile: Editorial 
Universitaria, 1993. 90. ?La Iglesia se preocup?, tanto en su discurso como en su pr?ctica educacional, de 
demostrar que su oposici?n a la secularizaci?n no significaba su oposici?n al conocimiento cient?fico ni a 
los avances tecnol?gicos.? Many Catholic intellectuals spent a great deal of time and energy demonstrating 
that science and religion were their own separate realms that did not interfere with each other. As early as 
 17 
secularization did not necessarily imply an anti-modern point of view. In fact, I show that 
most Chilean Catholics believed that renewed religious faith was vital for healthy modern 
living.30 
 Catholic positions regarding social reform were not simple alternatives to secular 
programs. Both Catholic and secular Chilean social reformers advocated for similar types 
of programs to resolve the social question which shows that Catholic reforms were not 
alternative. All social reformers agreed that the family was the foundation to an orderly 
Chilean nation and, as such, the family had to be protected at all costs. They agreed that 
the way to do this was through the application of eugenic principles to gender behavior 
for both Chilean men and women. Not only did they agree that maintaining and 
reinforcing gender difference was critical to this project, but they also agreed that 
controlling female sexuality was by far the most effective way to address social 
problems. In this way, both groups illustrated the similarity that Gilbert found when 
studying the role of Protestantism in scientific development in the post-WWII United 
States. ?From the position of both big science and mainline of Fundamentalist religion, 
the participants in this discussion believed themselves to be strikingly different in origin, 
                                                                                                                                            
1893, Pope Leo XIII recognized that science and religion could coexist together for the mutual glory of 
God in the encyclical Providentissimus Deus as discussed in Peter M.J. Hess, ?Evolution, Suffering, and 
the God of Hope in Roman Catholic Thought after Darwin,? in The Evolution of Evil, Gaymon Bennett, et 
al (eds). Gottingen, Germany: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2008. 242. Thompson 181.  
 
30 This also fits with the call for studies of Catholicism and science outside Europe and the United 
States made by Lawrence M. Principe in Galileo Goes to Jail. He argues that anti-Catholic histories of 
science is partially the result of the field still being very much influenced by Anglocentric fields of study 
and source materials. Lawrence M. Principe, ?Myth 11-That Catholics Did Not Contribute to the Scientific 
Revolution,? in Galileo Goes to Jail and Other Myths about Science and Religion, Ronald L. Numbers 
(ed). Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2009. 101. 
 18 
social position, and belief. Yet from the standpoint of those excluded from the 
conversation, they could appear very similar.?31 
 One of the critical components to this similarity was the shared belief that Chilean 
men and women had to modify their behaviors to fit with natural dictates that 
strengthened gender difference. This was primarily because social reformers understood 
national order and social relations to be based on the nuclear family as the fundamental 
unit of a modern society.32 In other words, to be modern, Chilean people had to conform 
their activities to fit increasingly inflexible ideas about natural male and female behavior. 
Conservatives were not the only ones who used discursive tropes that privileged nature to 
legitimize their position. This dissertation will demonstrate how eugenicists in both 
camps understood male and female interactions and behavior as being dictated by 
biological imperatives. Not only that, but these social reformers all believed that Chileans 
had to align their behavior even more strictly to natural ideals implied in evolutionary 
theory and eugenic science. 
 The overwhelming popularity of eugenic science in the first half of the twentieth 
century, not only in Latin America but internationally, allowed many different kinds of 
social reformers to play an important role in the creation of the Chilean welfare state. 
Many historians have noted the hegemonic influence of eugenics in the first half of the 
twentieth century.33 Matthew Connelly stated that, ?the idea of improving the genetic 
                                                
31 Gilbert 6. 
 
32 Thomas C. Holt. ?Foreword,? in Race and Nation in Modern Latin America, Nancy P. 
Appelbaum, Anne S. Macpherson and Karin Alejandra Rosemblatt (eds). Chapel Hill: University of North 
Carolina Press, 2003. ?Gender provided the most powerful language to describe national and racial 
relations.  Whether invoked as metaphor, metonym, or allegory, the very idea of nation and national 
belonging is more often than not expressed in familial metaphors.? xii. 
 
 19 
makeup of humankind counted adherents all over the world, including everyone from 
W.E.B. Du Bois to John Maynard Keynes. Eugenics was invoked to justify everything 
from free day care to forced sterilization.?34 The malleability of eugenics allowed for 
historical actors from a wide swath of political, social and cultural positions to use it as a 
tool. 
 The Chilean Catholic response to eugenics was varied, but generally positive 
especially prior to 1930. In 1930, the papal encyclical Casti Connubii officially rejected 
the use or application of eugenics by Catholics.35 However, up until this point (and even 
afterward) Catholic social reformers accepted eugenics as the most useful means of 
resolving the social question, even when they disagreed with some of the more radical 
                                                                                                                                            
33 Gunnar Broberg and Nils Roll-Hansen (eds). Eugenics and the Welfare State: Sterlization 
Policy in Denmark, Sweden, Norway, and Finland. East Lansing: Michigan State University Press, 1996. 
Susan Currell and Christina Cogdell (eds). Popular Eugenics: National Efficiency and American Mass 
Culture in the 1930s. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2006. Daylanne K. English. Unnatural Selections: 
Eugenics in American Modernism and the Harlem Renaissance. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina 
Press, 2004. Paul A. Lombardo. Three Generations, No Imbeciles: Eugenics, the Supreme Court, and Buck 
v. Bell. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008. Christine Rosen. Preaching Eugenics: Religious 
Leaders and the American Eugenics Movement. New York: Oxford University Press, 2004. Marius Turda. 
Modernism and Eugenics. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010. 
 
34 Matthew Connelly. Fatal Misconception: The Struggle to Control World Population. 
Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2008. 8. See also: ?La eugenesia fue pensamiento 
hegem?nico durante la primera mitad del siglo XX. De hecho la filiaci?n ideol?gica de sus defensores 
abarca todo el espectro posible: nazis, fascistas, anarquistas, socialistas, progresistas y conservadores,? in 
H?ctor A. Palma, ?Consideraciones historiogr?ficas, epistemol?gicas y pr?cticas acerca de la eugenesia,? in 
Darwinismo social y eugenesia en el mundo latino, Marisa Miranda and Gustavo Vallejo (eds). Buenos 
Aires, Argentina: Siglo XXI de Argentina Editores, 2005. 127. ?Posteriormente, en los a?os veinte y 
treinta, veremos que personajes importantes, profesionales e intelectuales siguen luchando por lo mismo, 
aunque, adem?s, tienen que enfrentarse a una moral sexual tradicional tan estrecha y tan absurda, tan 
retr?gada, que incluso siendo cat?licos se hacen adeptos a la eugenesia, dentro de ciertos l?mites,? in 
Armando Garc?a Gonz?lez and Raquel ?lvarez Pel?ez, ?Eugenesia e imperialismo: Las relaciones Cuba-
 Estados Unidos, 1921-1940,? in Darwinismo social y eugenesia en el mundo latino, Marisa Miranda and 
Gustavo Vallejo (eds). Buenos Aires, Argentina: Siglo XXI de Argentina Editores, 2005. 103. 
 
35 Papal Encyclicals Online. ?Casti Connubii: Encyclical of Pope Pius XI on Christian 
Marriage,? by Pope Pius XI, December 31, 1930, 
http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Pius11/P11CASTI.HTM. 
 20 
elements of eugenic science.36 This rejection of negative eugenics did not prevent Latin 
American Catholics from engaging in the discipline as a whole. Nancy Leys Stepan?s 
?The Hour of Eugenics?: Race, Gender, and Nation in Latin America (1991) explored 
how eugenic science developed in a number of Latin American countries and contended 
that Latin Americans created their own, unique discipline. Part of the reason for the 
uniqueness of Latin American eugenics was the social and political influence of the 
Catholic Church in the region. In fact, Stepan contended that it was because of this 
influence that the most heinous aspects of negative eugenics (forced sterilization, 
abortion and euthanasia) were not a part of mainstream eugenic practice in any Latin 
American country. Building on Stepan?s work, this dissertation examines the relationship 
between Catholicism and eugenics more closely to better understand how Chilean 
eugenicists created a modern, patriarchal gender order to resolve issues that were 
identified as widespread social problems.37  
 Stepan identified the preference for Lamarckism as central to the development of 
a uniquely Latin American eugenic science.38 Lamarckism, especially before the mid-
 1930s, was still a widely accepted scientific theory outside Latin America as well. 
Recognizing the international appeal of Lamarckism combined with the scientific 
obstacles to a functional evolutionary theory until the 1930s helps to show that Latin 
American scientists and social reformers were not isolated from larger, transnational 
                                                
36 Nancy Leys Stepan. ?The Hour of Eugenics?: Race, Gender, and Nation in Latin America. 
Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1991. ?From the beginning, and alone of the major institutions of the 
West, the church opposed an extreme reproductive eugenics, for it took human reproduction as a sphere 
within its own rightful authority and did not cede that authority easily to secular science.? 111. 
 
37 Alexandra Stern. Eugenic Nation: Faults and Frontiers of Better Breeding in Modern America. 
Berkeley: University of California Press, 2005. 
 
38 Ibid 74. 
 21 
scientific trends. Darwinian evolutionary theory presented rather stubborn and alarming 
problems for biologists and eugenicists. Jean Gayon wrote, 
The long initial crisis of Darwinism was not only the result of external factors 
such as ?resistance? or the existence of rival evolutionary paradigms; it was also a 
consequence of a range of problems that were intrinsic to Darwin?s central 
hypothesis. These difficulties, most of which were linked to the concept of 
heredity, could not be resolved by the biology of the time.39 
 
Because Darwinism still could provide no proof of how favorable traits were passed from 
parent to offspring, Lamarckism remained appealing for many scientists. Gayon argued 
that Darwin?s own theory of evolution, until improved by the work of later biologists, 
was more accurately described as an extreme form of Lamarckism.40 Using Gayon and 
Stepan?s works as guides, the Catholic involvement in the development of eugenics as a 
social reform tool, especially before 1930, is no longer seen as an unusual occurrence. 
 Studying eugenic discourse brings up the question of race. In the North Atlantic, 
eugenic science was typically designed around an understanding of whiteness as racially 
and physically superior to all other racial categories.41 As a result, most of the work of 
Northern Atlantic eugenicists focused on bolstering white birth rates and limiting non-
 white fertility. In Latin America, the purpose of eugenics was quite different. While 
whiteness was still understood to be superior, most Latin American eugenicists believed 
that a process of cultural whitening would be enough to ensure the fitness of Latin 
American bodies. Some Latin American eugenicists, like Jos? Vasconcelos in Mexico, 
                                                
39 Jean Gayon. Darwinism?s Struggle for Survival: Heredity and the Hypothesis of Natural 
Selection, Matthew Cobb (trans). New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998. 3. 
 
40 Ibid 397. 
 
41 Laura L. Lovett. Conceiving the Future: Pronatalism, Reproduction, and the Family in the 
United States, 1890-1938. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2007. 
 
 22 
even posited that the mixture of European, African, and indigenous ancestry made Latin 
Americans the superior race by incorporating all the best aspects of the three founding 
races.42 While not everyone accepted Vasconcelos?s position, most Latin American 
eugenicists did believe that the region was characterized by a racial mixture that could be 
whitened with the application of social welfare tools. This was, in no small part, 
reflective of the influence of Lamarckian evolutionary concepts. In this way, 
environmental changes manifested physical ones. 
 Chilean eugenics did include this concept of cultural whitening combined with a 
more pernicious racism. The work of Palacios, and others like him, demonstrated that 
some Chileans believed that their mixture of European and indigenous qualities was 
superior to other Latin American nations. Palacios?s specific vision of Chilean racial 
origins was steeped in the scientific racism of the late nineteenth and early twentieth 
centuries. He took pains to show that Araucanian indigenous peoples were civilized to 
some extent prior to the European conquest and shared some cultural characteristics with 
the Germanic Spanish conquerors. Palacios was also quick to point out that very few 
slaves were ever brought to the region, making Chileans even more pure.43 By erasing 
racial difference between the European and indigenous peoples that comprised the 
majority of the Chilean population?s ancestry, he was able to discuss Chilean racial 
degeneration in relatively race-neutral terms. The roto chileno, or broken Chilean, who 
he pointed to as the cause of Chile?s current social and racial degeneration ? here ?race? 
                                                
42 Jos? Vasconcelos. La raza c?smica: Misi?n de la raza iberoamericana. Madrid: Agencia 
Mundial de Librer?a, 1925. 
 
43 Palacios 27-28. This opinion was not unique among Latin Americans. Brazilian historian and 
sociologist, Alfredo Ellis Jr., wrote similarly in his books Popula??es paulistas (1934) and Os primeiros 
troncos paulistas e o cruzamento euro-americano (1936). 
 23 
meant ?people? ? was neither mestizo nor black. Chileans were already white. Eugenics, 
as practiced and envisioned by Palacios, was not about whitening Chileans. It was about 
teaching them to behave in a manner that corresponded to their inherent, civilized nature. 
 The relative lack of interest in whitening and overtly racist terminology in Chilean 
eugenic science is notable. While poverty and disease were pathologized, Chilean 
eugenicists were not terribly interested in weeding out racial traits that in other Latin 
American countries were characterized as ?indigenous? or ?African.? This is an 
important distinction when examining the development of eugenic science as a discipline 
in Chile in comparison to Latin America generally. In Chile, the overwhelming belief that 
Chileans were already white (enough) on the part of most eugenicists, public 
intellectuals, and politicians meant that eugenics was about instructing people about 
hygiene and their natural place in the modern nation. A social reform program with these 
principles still falls under the category of whitening because it cannot be ignored that 
Chileans of more indigenous backgrounds were either excluded or pathologized 
according to this rubric. 
Because poverty, class, and disease were pathologized, but not racialized, I posit 
that this very much affected the overall aims of eugenics as a discipline in Chile. This, in 
turn, affected the kinds of social reform programs Catholic and secular intellectuals 
advocated for the nation. Chileans were not to use eugenics to lighten their complexions 
(though products for this did exist). Rather, I use the ideas of Karin Alejandra Rosemblatt 
who argues that, ?The populist elites of the [1920s and beyond] created gendered 
discourses of racial mixing and national unity that partially reversed previous forms of 
exclusion ? even as they persisted in positing the historical trajectory of the North 
 24 
Atlantic nations as a model.?44 This notion of eugenics was specific to Chile and deserves 
a more profound exploration, which I hope to provide. 
 The final component of this dissertation is an examination of the modernization of 
the patriarchal social structure in Chile. While a number of scholars have discussed this 
development in Latin America, my work demonstrates how eugenic science was critical 
to this process and how gendered concepts allowed for liberal and conservative social 
actors to come to a consensus about Chilean women?s sexual behavior in particular. 
Eugenic science was used to naturalize traditional gender roles, much as Judith Butler 
aptly pointed out that, ?gender fables establish and circulate the misnomer of natural 
facts.?45 Chilean social reformers, both Catholic and secular, saw eugenics as a means to 
rationalize the social order by contending that women were meant to stay in the home and 
men were meant to be breadwinners. This social model, according to these actors, would 
ensure healthy and happy workers that would contribute to the overall economic success 
of the nation. 
 Aligning gender behavior with natural paradigms meant an increased vigilance 
over Chilean women. Ericka Verba explains this by arguing that, 
                                                
44 Karin Alejandra Rosemblatt. ?Sexuality and Biopower in Chile and Latin America,? Political 
Power and Social Theory, Vol. 15 (2002): 229-262. 232. ?In repudiating promiscuity, these medical 
experts reinforced the assumption that men?whether national leaders or male family members?needed to 
protect women sexually while also avoiding diseases that threatened the nation?s moral integrity, racial 
vigor, and biological and demographic strength. The teaching of domestic economy and puericulture, both 
of which drew on Lamarckian eugenics, made women?s domestic and childrearing activities crucial to the 
future of the nation. Prescriptions for proper sexual and domestic conduct thus persistently associated virtue 
with whiteness.? See also: ?Introduction,? in Race and Nation in Modern Latin America, Nancy P. 
Appelbaum, Anne S. Macpherson and Karin Alejandra Rosemblatt (eds). Chapel Hill: University of North 
Carolina Press, 2003. 17. 
 
45 Judith Butler. Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. New York: Routledge, 
1990. xiii. ?In their attempts to illustrate how capitalism had denaturalized human social relations, Chilean 
anarchists punctuated their appeals for radical sexual equality with references to prior utopian moments of 
harmonious, ?natural? relations between men and women.? See also: Elizabeth Quay Hutchison. ?From ?La 
Mujer Esclava? to ?La Mujer Lim?n?: Anarchism and the Politics of Sexuality in Early-Twentieth-Century 
Chile,? Hispanic American Historical Review 81:3-4 (August-November 2001): 519-554. 521. 
 25 
Catholic social critics defined the crisis of the slackening of social customs to be 
primarily a female problem.  This was because of their gendered concept of the 
distribution of attributes; since this placed woman above man in her powers of 
persuasion in the moral realm, the critics consequently held woman accountable 
for the morality of the social customs reigning within any given society.46 
 
However, my research shows that Catholics were not the only ones to believe women 
held the key to social renewal. As mothers, workers, wives, and (occasional) workers, 
Chilean women had specific obligations to their nation. Even more so because the 
expansion of capitalism meant that more and more women were working outside the 
home, which disrupted the vision of a patriarchal Chilean working class.47 Women 
needed to be protected from and provided for by men in order to maintain natural gender 
boundaries, inside the home and factory. 
 A particular example of this was the renewed efforts to control female sexuality. 
While many social reformers lamented the sexual promiscuity of Chilean men, their 
behavior was seen as natural and difficult to control. As a result, much more ink was 
spilled on ideas about how to get women to be the gatekeepers to Chilean sexual 
responsibility.48 This resulted in the development of a number of social reform programs 
aimed at women in a variety of social positions. Young women, unwed mothers and 
married women all saw renewed and increasingly rigid attempts to restrict their sexuality. 
                                                
46 Ericka Verba. Catholic Feminism and the Social Question in Chile, 1910-1917: the Liga de 
Damas Chilenas. Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen Press, 2003. 34. 
 
47 Ibid 103. ?In particular, they argued that when matrilineality was overthrown by patrilineality 
and the monogamous marriage, women were finally and rightfully protected and supported by individual 
men. Women were thus able to give up unseemly productive labor and overt sexuality in the public domain 
and retreat to their ?natural,? socially valued domestic functions.? Linda Marie Fedigan. ?The Changing 
Role of Women in Models of Human Evolution,? Annual Review of Anthropology, Vol 15 (1986): 25-66. 
31. ??the state sought to legitimize marriage and the nuclear family as biologically natural and socially 
necessary institutions for all social classes and thereby to ensure the continued subordination of women?s 
individual interests in collective interests.? Susan K. Besse. Restructuring Patriarchy: the Modernization of 
Gender Inequality in Brazil, 1914-1940. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1996. 6. 
 
48 Rosemblatt, ?Sexuality and Biopower,? 248. 
 26 
And, while the sexual double standard was an issue that female social reformers decried 
over and over, it became an increasingly accepted reality.49 The result of this approach 
meant that legal and political inequalities between men and women expanded while also 
being naturalized, giving women very little ability to question the status quo either by 
conservative or progressive political means. 
 
Though Palacios had it wrong in terms of the origins of the Chilean people, he 
captured the fears and hopes of many Chileans in his writing, just as Allende and 
Gentilini did. Their fears were not without reason. At the turn of the twentieth century, 
the Chilean populace was unhealthy and ill-prepared for competing economically in a 
modern world in comparison to other countries in Latin America and elsewhere. Many 
Chileans believed they were the rotos chilenos that Palacios considered them to be. Yet, 
there was hope. Palacios pointed out the illustrious past of both the Gothic and 
Araucanian strands of the Chilean race, as a sign post for the future. Allende believed that 
hope lay in changing social relationships. Gentilini felt that a return to religious living 
was the means of modernizing. All of these men, and their counterparts, agreed that Chile 
was at a crossroads. They agreed that social reform was the only way to resolve the social 
question. Social reform was daunting but not impossible. But, the first step was 
identifying what the most pressing social problems facing the nation were. 
                                                
49 Elizabeth Dore. ?One Step Forward, Two Steps Back: Gender and the State in the Long 
Nineteenth Century,? in Hidden Histories of Gender and the State in Latin America, Elizabeth Dore & 
Maxine Molyneux (eds). Durham: Duke University Press, 2000. 23. 
 27 
Chapter One 
 
?La pureza del alma con el aseo corporal? 
Approaching the Social Question in Chile 
 
On May 15, 1891, Pope Leo XIII wrote in the papal encyclical, ?Rerum Novarum 
on Capital and Labor,? 
That the spirit of revolutionary change, which has long been disturbing the 
nations of the world, should have passed beyond the sphere of politics and made 
its influence felt in the cognate sphere of practical economics is not surprising. 
The elements of the conflict now raging are unmistakable, in the vast expansion 
of industrial pursuits and the marvelous discoveries of science; in the changed 
relations between masters and workmen; in the enormous fortunes of some few 
individuals, and the utter poverty of the masses; in the increased self-reliance and 
closer mutual combination of the working classes; as also, finally, in the 
prevailing moral degeneracy. The momentous gravity of the state of things now 
obtaining fills every mind with painful apprehension; wise men are discussing it; 
practical men are proposing schemes; popular meetings, legislatures, and rulers of 
nations are all busied with it -- actually there is no question which has taken a 
deeper hold on the public mind.50  
 
The pope was especially concerned about the social results among the working classes of 
capitalist industrialization. In this encyclical, he set the stage for Catholic intervention 
into social reform movements to address these concerns over the next fifty years.51 In the 
first half of the twentieth century, Catholics believed that social issues such as poverty 
                                                
50 Papal Encyclicals Online. ?Rerum Novarum: on Capital and Labor,? by Pope Leo XIII, May 
15, 1891, http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Leo13/l13rerum.htm. 
 
On the effects of the Rerum Novarum on social movements, eugenics and reform: Mar?a Luisa 
Aspe Armella. La formaci?n social y pol?tica de los cat?licos mexicanos: La Acci?n Cat?lica Mexicana la 
Uni?n Nacional de Estudiantes Cat?licos, 1929-1958. Mexico City: Universidad Iberoamericana, A.C., 
2008. Michael Fleet and Brian H. Smith. The Catholic Church and Democracy in Chile and Peru. Notre 
Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1997. Christine Rosen. Preaching Eugenics: Religious Leaders 
and the American Eugenics Movement. New York: Oxford University Press, 2004. Patience A. Schell. ?An 
Honorable Vocation for Ladies: The Work of the Mexico City Uni?n de Damas Cat?licas Mexicanas, 
1912-1926.? Journal of Women's History 10:4 (Winter 1999): 78-103. Hannah W. Stewart-Gambino. The 
Church and Politics in the Chilean Countryside. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1992.  
 
 
 
 
 28 
and worker exploitation contributed to catastrophic social and moral degeneration caused 
by capitalist economic expansion. This chapter explores how Chilean Catholics 
responded to these issues by using eugenics in order to rationalize a modern, patriarchal 
social structure while maintaining their political relevance in an increasingly secular 
political culture. 
At the opening of the twentieth century, capitalist economic development had 
produced a variety of seemingly new social issues in Chile such as widespread poverty, 
growing urban populations and increased opportunities for sexual contact between men 
and women. These developments were unsettling to historical actors as diverse as parish 
priests, social anarchists and women?s activists. Social reformers of all political stripes 
agreed that Chile?s social problems were the results of a capitalist economic system that 
put profit ahead of all other concerns, especially the well being of workers. This chapter 
explores how Chilean intellectuals and reformers discussed the social question in Chile 
between 1900 and 1950 to demonstrate that both Catholic and secular intellectuals 
identified the same social repercussions of capitalism as problems for Chile?s national 
progress. Additionally, these intellectuals all concurred that the best way to resolve these 
issues was the application of eugenic science. Studying the connection between eugenics 
and social reform in Chile elucidates how Catholic reformers were connected to the 
development of that discipline. 
 Managing the populace with eugenics was vital to Chile?s national modernization 
project in the early twentieth century. In the cartoon, ?La viruela en Valpara?so,? (see 
Figure 1) which appeared in the popular pictorial magazine Zig-Zag, the social nature of 
disease was portrayed as both dangerous to all levels of Chilean society and virtually 
 29 
uncontrollable by traditional means.52 The cartoon depicted concerns about the 
uncontrollable spread of disease that characterized the gendered debates about social 
disease and reform. Men carried disease home to their wives and families, which would 
spread through the unhygienic behaviors in which women with no eugenic education 
partook. Virtually all Chilean social reformers, regardless of religious affiliation, 
advocated the application of eugenic social welfare reforms to resolve the problems 
capitalism had caused. 
 
 
                                                
52 Moustache, ?La Viruela en Valpara?so,? Zig-Zag, no. 24 (July 30, 1905). 
 30 
 
Figure 1: Moustache, ?La Viruela en Valpara?so,? Zig-Zag, no. 24 (July 30, 1905). One artist?s rendering of 
how disease could easily spread from one individual to an entire family, exemplifying Chilean concerns 
about the spread of disease. From the Biblioteca Nacional.  
 
While the history of Chilean secular social reform has been well studied, the 
Catholic intellectuals who formed part of this dialogue have not been. As such, I discuss 
how Chilean Catholics believed their solutions to social crises differed from, and sought 
to improve upon, the work of their secular counterparts. While it is true that, at its most 
basic level, Catholics believed that their solutions were better because they were 
informed by religious beliefs, this conviction arose from a sense that their faith provided 
them with a unique ability to better appreciate the gravity of the social problems afflicting 
the country. To illustrate this Catholic intellectual position, I will first discuss the secular 
approaches to the social question that were most prevalent in Chile during the first half of 
the twentieth century. I divide the secular ideology into four distinct discourses: social 
problems, modernity, education and Catholic involvement. These four issues illuminate 
how secular reformers in Chile conceptualized social problems and their solutions. Next, 
I examine the Catholic approach to these four issues. This analysis illuminates how often 
and to what degree secular and Catholic social reformers agreed on the scope of the 
social question. 
 31 
 The secular intellectuals who argued that Catholics were socially backward based 
this argument on the fact that modern life was complicated and always changing, in 
contrast to the constant and unchanging character of a monolithic Church. However, most 
of these same secular intellectuals had trouble adjusting to modern living and mostly 
advocated for the modernization of patriarchal social structures that had been in place for 
decades to stabilize the social order and the persistence of gender difference. 
Nonetheless, they argued that Catholics were even less prepared, or able, to adapt to a 
modern, capitalist society. Catholic reformers strongly disagreed with this estimation. An 
anonymous author writing for La Revista Cat?lica (LRC), a widely circulated Catholic 
periodical published in Santiago and meant for Catholics of all social classes, wrote that 
secularists, ?tried to present the Church as an enemy of progress and the welfare of the 
people.?53 Progress, social welfare, and modernity were intimately linked for both secular 
and Catholic actors. This writer was correct in his assessment that secular efforts to 
portray the Catholic Church as anti-progressive also served to characterize it as against 
the working classes, a central tenet of secular reform discourse. The writer then pointed 
out that the Church and Catholics were not against modernity. Instead, the author argued 
that modernity was an illusion. The seemingly new liberal ideas been popularized by 
secularists such as free love and scientific knowledge had foundations in the Christian 
past going back to Adam and Eve.54 This approach showed that Catholics were not 
disconnected from modern social issues because modernity was not really a new 
phenomenon. 
                                                
53 ?Un nuevo peligro para los cat?licos,? La Revista Cat?lica, no. 124 (September 15, 1906): 256-
 265. 260. ?para poder as? presentar ? la Iglesia como enemiga del progreso y bienestar de los pueblos.? 
 
54 Ibid 261. 
 
 32 
 Nonetheless, one of the larger controversies within the Chilean Catholic 
community during the first half of the twentieth century was how to be a modern 
Catholic. In 1910, Father Samuel de Santa Teresa examined this issue in his article, ?El 
Cat?lico de Hoy.? He argued, ?Therefore, today?s Catholic has to develop his behavior 
today, in the day in which he lives, in the century in which he lives and in the country in 
which he lives, exactly the same as those Catholics of all days, centuries and countries.?55 
In other words, Santa Teresa believed that it was a Catholic?s duty to participate actively 
in the age in which he lived; pining for an idyllic, bygone era served no purpose. This 
chapter explores how Catholic reformers who took Santa Teresa?s message to heart 
discussed the Chilean social question. 
 Another commonality that both secular and Catholic Chilean intellectuals shared 
was their belief that women played a special role in the process of social renewal. 
Appearing in the 1913 article, ?Instruccion religiosa de la mujer? in El Eco de las Damas 
Chilenas (EDC), ?Une Vieille Fille? or ?An Old Maid? wrote, ?It is she who makes the 
home, exercising powerful influence in the ideas and habits of her husband, educating her 
children, influencing her employees or servants. In the society she frequents, she has a 
role no less important to play, that which the poor, invalid and needy have assigned 
her.?56 This demonstrates that Catholics were equally committed to the idea that women 
were integral to the resolution of the social question as wives and mothers, just as secular 
                                                
55 Samuel de Santa Teresa. ?El cat?lico de hoy,? La Revista Cat?lica, no. 214 (June 18, 1910): 
834-840. 836. ?Por tanto, el cat?lico de hoy tiene que desarrollar su acci?n hoy, en el d?a en que vive, en el 
siglo en que vive y en el pa?s en que vive, lo mismo exactamente que los cat?licos de todos los d?as, de 
todos los siglos y de todos los pa?ses?? 
 
56 Une Vieille Fille. ?Instrucci?n religiosa de la mujer,? El Eco de Las Damas Chilenas, no. 30 
(November 15, 1913). ?Es ella quien forma el hogar, ejerciendo poderosa influencia en las ideas y 
costumbres de su marido, educando los hijos, influyendo en sus empleados o servidores. En la sociedad que 
frecuenta, tiene un rol no menos importante que desempe?ar, que el que le est? asignado entre los pobres, 
desvalidos y menesterosos.? 
 33 
reformers did. By focusing on women?s role as homemakers, the difference between men 
and women was naturalized and reinforced modernizing the patriarchal social system and 
avoiding any discussion of female emancipation or equality as a part of social progress. 
Secular Conceptualizations of Social Reform 
Social Question 
 Dr. Lucas Sierra Mendoza?s Bases de la Higiene Moderna (1916) is an example 
of how secular intellectuals understood, and proposed to solve, the social question. As an 
accomplished surgeon, he contended that the main professional objective of the modern 
doctor was preventing disease by familiarizing patients with the latest information about 
hygienic behavior. For Sierra, ?Hygiene is the last base of all prosperity and should be 
the primordial objective of all government men, in that national health signifies 
prosperity and national wealth.?57 Sierra believed that doctors served as the hands of 
government public health efforts. He also explicitly linked economic prosperity to the 
health of the Chilean population, an opinion shared by most of his contemporaries both 
secular and Catholic. To be productive, workers had to be healthy. And, as Sierra points 
out, the government was responsible for creating salubrious conditions for its citizens. 
This model, popular with both secular and Catholic social reformers, popularized the 
concept of the citizen-worker.58 To play an active role in the political future of the 
                                                
57 Lucas Sierra. Bases de la Higiene Moderna: Papel que en la difusi?n de sus principios debe 
desempe?ar la mujer (Conferencia dictada en el Club de Se?oras el 11 de Noviembre de 1916). Santiago 
de Chile: Imprenta Universitaria, 1916. 6. ?La higiene es la base ?ltima de toda prosperidad y deber?a ser el 
objetivo primordial de todo hombre de gobierno, ya que salud nacional significa prosperidad y riqueza 
nacional.? 
 
58 Rolando Alvarez Vallejos and Antonio Aravena C. Los trabajadores y la nueva cuesti?n social: 
repensando la realidad laboral y sindical en Chile. Santiago: Grupo de Investigaciones del Trabajo, 
Instituto de Ciencias Alejandro Lipschutz, ICAL, 2004. Patrick Barr-Melej. Reforming Chile: Cultural 
Politics, Nationalism, and the Rise of the Middle Class, Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 
 34 
country, one had to play an economic role. Labor is what defined national belonging. 
This would have a special impact on Chilean women, as eugenic solutions to the social 
question insisted on their importance as mothers rather than workers. In fact, female work 
was pathologized. 
 Sierra?s biography plays an important role in explaining how he arrived at his 
conclusions. Born in the province of Concepci?n in 1866, he came to Santiago in 1883 to 
study at the Facultad de Medicina at the Universidad de Chile.59 When he completed his 
study under physician Manuel Barros Borgo?o in 1888, he began to work in venereal 
diseases. His professional life was characterized by the combination of research, 
teaching, and actual medical practice. In 1892, he went on a tour of Europe to further his 
skills and familiarize himself with new medical techniques. Upon the death of his mentor, 
Barros Borgo?o, Sierra was named the head of surgical staff at the hospital of San 
Borja.60 He continued to travel between Europe, the United States, and Latin America 
over the course of his professional life. He also briefly served as the Director General de 
Sanidad between 1925 and 1927.61 With this background, Sierra represented one of the 
most elite Chilean doctors of the period. Nonetheless, his extensive travels speak to the 
                                                                                                                                            
2001. Jorge I. Barr?a Ser?n. El movimiento obrero en Chile: S?ntesis hist?rico-social. Santiago: Ediciones 
de la Universidad T?cnica del Estado, 1971. I?igo L. Garc?a-Bryce and Elizabeth Quay Hutchison. Worlds 
of Labor in South America: Class, Gender, and Political Culture. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico 
Press, 2003. Fernando Ortiz Letelier. El movimiento obrero en Chile. Santiago: LOM Ediciones, 2005. 
Elizabeth Quay Hutchison. Labors Appropriate to their Sex: Gender, Labor, and Politics in Urban Chile, 
1900-1930. Durham: Duke University Press, 2001.  
 
59 ?Algunos datos biogr?ficos del Prof. Sierra,? Revista M?dica de Chile, no. 8 (October 1928): 
920-922. 920. 
 
60 Ibid 921. 
 
61 Museo Nacional de Medicina, ?Dr. Lucas Sierra (1866-1937),? 
http://www.museomedicina.cl/home/index.php/historia-de-la-medicina/125-dr-lucas-sierra-1866-
 1937.html. 
 
 35 
connections that Chilean intellectuals made to larger transnational scientific trends. 
Returning to his Bases de la Higiene Moderna, Sierra also linked economic 
progress to a gendered concept of public health. He argued that the latest efforts at 
preventing disease were primarily motivated by economic factors. ?Of the three great 
motives that have compelled hygienic advances in the world philanthropy and panic more 
directly impact women; the third factor?economic interests?is more the sphere of 
man.?62 This statement is intriguing in the assignment of roles that men and women 
played in the resolution of the social question. Women were the conservators of 
philanthropy and panic, while men were more concerned with the economic ramifications 
of social problems. Sierra aptly captured an attitude shared by his peers. Virtually all of 
the authors discussed below consistently argued that women could play a role in the 
modernization of the social order, but they were subject to emotional whims. As such, 
female participation in resolving the social question could only go so far. Those 
reformers who privileged economic causes of the social question, like Sierra himself, 
rarely considered women capable of the rationality required to play an active role in the 
reform efforts designed to address social progress. 
That being said, Sierra made a point to stress that women were especially fitted to 
some aspects of social reform. They were better able to popularize new hygienic 
methodology and understanding.63 He wrote, ?In good terms, ladies, in your home, where 
you are the true queens, force yourselves to maintain conformity to the principles of 
                                                
62 Sierra 6. ?De los tres grandes m?viles que han impulsado los adelantos de la higiene en el 
mundo el de la filantrop?a y del p?nico impresionan m?s directamente a la mujer; el tercer factor?los 
intereses econ?micos?es m?s netamente del resorte del hombre.? 
 
63 Ibid. 
 
 36 
modern hygiene.?64 As wives and mothers, women were in a position to control the 
cleanliness of their homes. They could also instruct their family members in proper 
personal hygiene practices. While for Sierra the ultimate goal of public health efforts was 
to make a stronger national economy by making healthier workers, a hygienic private 
space traditionally controlled by women was integral to this becoming a reality. 
 Most striking, Sierra points out that encouraging improved social hygiene was a 
Christian mission.65 He made it clear that the best way to ensure that hygienic practices 
take hold was by encouraging women to find spiritual advisors who were aware of the 
latest developments in the field. 
Be sure, ladies, that your spiritual guides, that the priest you seek out for Christian 
missions, be at the same time instructed and proficient in the fundamentals of 
hygiene, the art of staying healthy, useful and good. Associate, by all accounts, 
the purity of the soul with the cleanliness of the well understood body; your work 
is doubly useful, serving God and country.66 
 
This demonstrates the complicated relationship between Chilean Catholicism and social 
reform. Many reformers believed that women were critical to the improvement of the 
Chilean race while at the same time they worried that women remained in the thrall of the 
Catholic Church. Both of these assumptions were based on entrenched ideas about gender 
roles and behavior. Women were understood to be the caregivers for their families, so 
they were in a special position to impart eugenic knowledge to their children. However, 
                                                
64 Ibid 30. ?En buenos t?rminos, se?oras, en vuestro hogar, donde sois las verdaderas reinas, 
esforzaos por mantenerlo en conformidad a los principios de la higiene moderna?? 
 
65 Ibid 31. ?Proteged la salud de los que os rodean; es hasta econ?mico sin contar el lado mucho 
m?s noble, humanitario y cristiano.? 
 
66 Ibid. ?Haced, se?oras, que vuestros directores espirituales, que el sacerdote que busc?is para las 
misiones cristianas, sea a la vez un hombre instru?do y difunda las bases de la higiene, el arte de 
conservarse sano, ?til y bueno.  Asociad, en buenas cuentas, la pureza del alma con el aseo corporal bien 
entendido;--har?is obra doblemente provechosa, sirviendo a Dios y a la patria...? 
 
 37 
they were also thought to be more swayed by emotion than reason, making them more 
connected to religious practice which was a potential disruption to eugenic instruction. 
Sierra wanted to use and modernize this trait. Thus, Chilean women had to be instructed 
in public health practices by men who were sensitive to their religious predilections. 
 Women were often seen as non-secular agents in an increasingly secular Latin 
American political culture. Charles A. Hale argues that this was the result of 
Enlightenment principles that were popularized over the nineteenth century that 
privileged individual thought and freedom from religious influence.67 In the context of 
new republics, men were understood to be citizens and had a part to play in the public 
sphere. Women, according to K. Lynn Stoner, were identified with tradition and 
antiquated religious fervor.68 In this way male and female gender roles, even before the 
twentieth century, were bifurcated to associate men with secularism and women with 
Catholicism. This also conveniently meant that women could be written out of debates 
about the citizen-worker because they did not engage with the public sphere. Early 
twentieth century social reformers wanted to maintain this separation. 
 Women were especially important to the resolution of the social question in Chile 
because most intellectuals identified infant mortality rates as the number one issue 
affecting economic prosperity. Javier Rodr?guez Barros?s article ?Hacia la despoblacion,? 
                                                
67 Elizabeth Dore. ?One Step Forward, Two Steps Back: Gender and the State in the Long 
Nineteenth Century,? in Hidden Histories of Gender and the State in Latin America, Elizabeth Dore & 
Maxine Molyneux (eds). Durham: Duke University Press, 2000. 22-23. Charles A. Hale. ?Political Ideas 
and Ideologies in Latin America, 1870-1930,? in Ideas and Ideologies in Twentieth Century Latin America, 
Leslie Bethell (ed). New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996. 143.  
 
68 K. Lynn Stoner. From the House to the Streets: The Cuban Woman?s Movement for Legal 
Reform, 1898-1940. Durham: Duke University Press, 1991. 131. 
 
 38 
was an example of this position.69 He wrote, ?The high infant mortality rate presents us 
with a problem of national interest that needs a rapid solution, if we do not want to see in 
short time, the disappearance of our race, and depopulation, the true punishment that 
threatens the future of civilized nations.?70 Rodr?guez Barros was especially interested in 
improving the infant mortality rate by encouraging more healthy births. This was a 
strategy that was recommended by variety of reformers during the period. However, 
rather than focusing on improving prenatal care, Rodriguez Barros argued that the 
primary cause of infant death was illegitimacy.71 Families with absent fathers, or working 
mothers, created unhealthy living conditions for children. This was due to the fact that 
parents in those situations did not have the time, or inclination, to inform themselves 
regarding proper childcare and nutrition. As such, Rodr?guez Barros?s main advice was to 
encourage formalizing sexual unions with marriage because it would ensure a stable 
family unit able to care properly for children. Emphasizing marriage as a solution for 
social problems was a reform measure that was not far from that of Catholic intellectuals. 
 In addition to his surprising lack of interest or awareness regarding pre- and post-
 natal healthcare affecting infant mortality, Rodr?guez Barros also added that Chilean 
women had increasingly used birth control and abortion to the detriment of the nation?s 
progress. He wrote, ?The voluntary restriction of fertility, that results from the adoption 
of anti-conceptive practices, or from provoked abortion, constitutes in our country an 
                                                
69 Javier Rodr?guez Barros. ?Hacia la despoblacion,? La Revista M?dica de Chile, no. 11-12 
(November-December 1923): 788-805. 789. 
 
70 Ibid 792. ?La alta mortalidad de ni?os se nos presenta como un problema de inter?s nacional 
que necesita una soluci?n r?pida, si no queremos ver en poco tiempo m?s, la desaparici?n de nuestra raza, y 
la despoblaci?n, verdadero flagelo que amenaza el porvenir de las naciones civilizadas.? 
 
71 Ibid 795. 
 
 39 
exceptionally serious evil, it can bring us to depopulation.?72 For a man like Rodr?guez 
Barros, any form of birth control was tantamount to race suicide. In the Chilean context 
of high infant mortality, to avoid having children was unthinkable.73 Needless to say, he 
considered women to be exclusively responsible for the increased use of birth control and 
incidence of abortion. He could not conceive of the idea that Chilean men also benefited 
from these reproductive technologies as well. 
 As a result, he urged women to fulfill their natural duty of having children while 
ignoring the role men played in the formation of nuclear families. ?The highest calling 
for woman is to be a mother; her most sacred task is to have and raise children, form with 
them a home and continue the work of life and civilization that nature has assigned 
her.?74 Much as Sierra did seven years earlier, Rodrigez Barros placed women squarely in 
the position of being able to address the social question through their natural role as 
reproducers. Additionally, both men supported the contention that being a woman meant 
one was naturally compelled to have children, care for the family and make a home. 
What was new in both cases was the childcare and hygiene methods women were 
                                                
72 Ibid 802. ?La restricci?n voluntaria de la fecundaci?n, que se traduce por la adopci?n de 
pr?cticas anti-concepcionales, o por el aborto provocado, constituye en nuestro pa?s un mal 
excepcionalmente grave, puede traernos la despoblaci?n.? 
 
73 For discussions of race suicide and pronatalism see: Gisela Bock and Pat Thane. Maternity and 
Gender Policies: Women and the Rise of European Welfare States, 1880s-1950s. New York: Routledge, 
1991. Laura L. Lovett. Conceiving the Future: Pronatalism, Reproduction, and the Family in the United 
States, 1890-1938. Stepan 1991. Alexandra Stern. Eugenic Nation: Faults and Frontiers of Better Breeding 
in Modern America. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2005. 
 
74 Barros 804. ?La misi?n m?s alta de la mujer es ser madre; su tarea m?s sagrada es tener y criar 
hijos, formar con ellos un hogar y continuar la obra de vida y de civilizaci?n que la naturaleza le ha 
encomendado.? 
 
 40 
expected to familiarize themselves with to be responsible, modern mothers.75 These new 
expectations recognized a minimal female engagement with the public sphere, but this 
was mitigated by reform efforts that focused on programs based on in-home visits or one-
 off public lectures. 
 Most secular and Catholic Chilean intellectuals feared that women were not aware 
of the most modern personal hygiene methods. Some even doubted whether or not 
women were capable of living up to these standards. However, most agreed that the first 
step was to popularize new hygienic practices. In a series of twelve lectures entitled, 
?Medicina social y progreso nacional,? Ren? Sand extolled new hygienic practices. A 
Belgian doctor trained in social medicine, Sand traveled to Chile in 1924 and helped to 
develop the field of Chilean social work. Some of his lectures were then published in the 
Revista de la Beneficencia Publica shortly after. Sand argued in his first lecture that, 
?education and hygiene are the foundations on which the building of the future society 
must be constructed.?76 Sand, Sierra and others typically discussed Chilean society as a 
building that needed the proper foundation to stand.77 Some said this foundation was the 
                                                
75 This was an opinion that was mirrored in the mainstream press of the time. For example, in an 
article appearing in El Mercurio in 1925, Dr. Cora Mayers gave a lecture to popularize new hygiene 
techniques. Mayers held women exclusively responsible for the maintenance of the Chilean race. 
?Conferencia sanitaria popular,? El Mercurio, no. 8843 (July 13, 1925): 3. 3.  
 
76 Rene Sand. ?Medicina social y progreso nacional: 1a Conferencia,? Revista de la Beneficencia 
P?blica, no. 1 (March 1925): 1-122. 5. ?la educaci?n y la higiene son las bases sobre las cuales debe 
construirse el edificio de la sociedad futura.? 
 
77 This attitude is mirrored in another article published in Servicio Social in 1935. According to J. 
Delagrange, ?La familia, sociedad en miniatura, no puede, no debe desaparecer.? J. Delagrange. ?El 
servicio social y la familia como unidad econ?mica, espiritual y moral,? Servicio Social, no. 2 (April-June 
1935): 90-100. 90. The family was the cornerstone of society as a whole; virtually all of the intellectuals in 
this era felt the same way. Families had to be organized to ensure that modern, Chilean society would 
properly function. As Delagrange wrote, ?Una familia en estado de crisis es una carga y peligro para la 
sociedad: no s?lo su propia existencia no produce ninguna satisfacci?n a los suyos, sino que su actuaci?n 
social es deficiente, la crisis que sufre influencia el estado general de la colectividad de que forma parte.? 
Ibid 91. Here, the importance of the individual?s health and social formation to the whole was made 
 41 
family while others argued that it was the practice of public health itself. Conceptualizing 
Chilean society as an architectural project allowed for the management of people and 
bodies as though they were tools, which fostered the growing interest in eugenics. 
Eugenics approached human interaction in mechanistic terms, which allowed for people 
to become cogs in the larger societal machine. 
Sand also articulated the position that hygienic efforts needed to apply to 
everyone, but in different ways. For example, public hygiene efforts such as border 
patrols, clean water and food programs, and the control of infectious diseases were 
advantageous to all Chileans. However, another level of social hygiene reform and 
programming was necessary for those members of the population that could not care for 
themselves.78 While Sand did not clarify who this category of people might be, women, 
children and the poor were the most common groups identified by secular reformers as in 
need of government assistance and intervention. 
 Like his secular counterparts, Sand also linked hygienic efforts to national 
economic strength. ?It is proclaimed that the principal care for Public Powers must be to 
ensure instruction and health, supreme riches and unending sources of new wealth.?79 It 
seems that this was the ultimate, and most important, goal of public health for him. 
Creating a healthy population was the key to ensuring a bright economic future, the 
primary objective of national development and progress. Governments, he argued, were 
                                                                                                                                            
apparent. All members of a family had their appropriate roles to fulfill: father as breadwinner, mother as 
caregiver and homemaker, children as future workers. When these roles broke down, it threatened the 
stability of society as a whole. 
 
78 Sand 6. 
 
79 Ibid 8. ?Se proclama que el cuidado principal de los Poderes P?blicos debe ser el de asegurar a 
la poblaci?n la instrucci?n y la salud, riquezas supremas y fuentes inagotables de nuevas riquezas.? 
 42 
designed to provide for their citizens economically. In order to do that, governments also 
had to provide the proper working conditions to keep those citizens healthy (and 
working). 
 However, Sand discussed social medicine somewhat differently than Sierra or 
Rodr?guez Barros. According to him, ?Social Medicine is, not a humanitarian aspiration 
without an objective base, but rather a science based on impartial observation, on 
systematic experimentation, on the patient and contradictory analysis of the observed 
facts, that is, the only methods capable of arriving at the discovery of the truth.?80 Sand 
emphasized the importance of scientific practice of social medicine. While all of the 
intellectuals discussed in this chapter agreed that social medicine and public health were 
scientific pursuits, they did not necessarily all agree they were exclusively scientific or 
that they should be. Sand, however, believed that scientific methodology was critical to 
the effectiveness of public health both in Chile and back in his home country of Belgium. 
 In the second lecture, Sand connected the social question even more to economic 
changes in Chile. He made clear that social medicine should not be confused with class 
warfare. He wrote, ?We see, this way, the scientific demonstration of that which daily life 
teaches us: the inequality of social classes from the physical and mental perspective, and 
the profound influence of social factors on health.?81 His opinion was important in light 
of the fact that Sand believed the most important result of public health efforts was 
                                                
80 Ibid 19. ??la Medicina Social es, no una aspiraci?n humanitaria sin base objetiva, sino que una 
ciencia fundada en la observaci?n imparcial, en la experimentaci?n sistem?tica en el an?lisis paciente y 
contradictorio de los hechos observados, es decir, sobre los ?nicos m?todos capaces de conducir al 
descubrimiento de la verdad?? 
 
81 Rene Sand. ?Medicina social y progreso nacional: 2a Conferencia,? Revista de la Beneficencia 
P?blica, no. 1 (March 1925): 1-122. 33. ?Vemos, as?, la demostraci?n cient?fica de lo que nos ense?a la 
vida diaria, a saber: la desigualdad de las clases sociales desde el punto de vista f?sico y mental, y la 
influencia profunda de los factores sociales sobre la salud.? 
 43 
economic strength. This strength depended on having a healthy working class, not upon 
eliminating class distinctions. While some secular reformers believed that class 
difference was the cause of the social problems afflicting Chile, Sand attributed class 
difference to the natural variation found in all species. This variation was not cause for 
concern and need not be corrected. In fact, if there were no class difference, there would 
be no workers to engender Chile?s national progress. As will be demonstrated below, 
Chilean Catholic intellectuals shared this opinion regarding social medicine as well. 
 Sand also argued that the Chilean mortality rate should be addressed by 
encouraging women to have more children, while overlooking the role of men in this 
issue. In his sixth lecture he wrote, ?On the other hand, the number of abortions, the 
percentage of miscarriages and infant mortality are more elevated; the size and weight of 
newborns is less when a mother works outside the home.?82 This statement was a mixture 
of pejorative concepts about both class and gender, demonstrating that Sand attributed a 
low birth rate to those women who chose to work outside the home. Unlike other 
intellectuals who lamented the fact that the lower classes were reproducing at a much 
higher rate than their social betters, he believed that working outside the home prevented 
women from pursuing their natural calling to be wives and mothers and affected their 
ability to get pregnant. 
 Leo Cordemans, European founder and director of the Escuela de Servicio Social, 
agreed that women had a special place in the resolution of the social question. However, 
she emphasized that women could address these issues as visitadoras or social workers, 
                                                
82 Rene Sand, ?Medicina social y progreso nacional: 6a Conferencia,? Revista de la Beneficencia 
P?blica, no. 1 (March 1925): 1-122. 96. ?Por otra parte, el n?mero de abortos, el porcentaje de la 
mortinatalidad y de la mortalidad infantil son m?s elevados la talla y el peso de los reci?n nacidos son 
inferiores cuando la madre trabaja fuera de la casa?? 
 
 44 
not only as cultural reproducers. In fact, she argued that visitadoras served just as 
important a purpose as the doctors with whom they typically worked. She wrote, 
?Analyzing the documents obtained by her own detective perspicacity, the Social Worker 
can establish and determine after her diagnostic the most adequate treatment. Her method 
is that of the doctor and there exist social diagnostic rubrics just as precise as those of 
medical diagnostics.?83 Most female intellectuals who wrote about the social question 
shared Cordemans?s opinion. Unlike their male counterparts, these women argued that 
they could contribute to Chilean social progress and reformation not only as wives and 
mothers but also as active members of political and social movements in their own 
right.84 Cordemans added to this by emphasizing that visitadoras used scientific 
techniques that were equivalent to those practiced by doctors. 
 Cordemans highlighted the scientific nature of social medicine and social work 
much like Sand. She argued that, ?Social Service is today a science that each person 
serves with the faculties of the brain, but in spite of everything it has maintained its 
character of service work that requires the giving of the heart.?85 Social work was a 
scientific pursuit but it needed to be administered with emotion and care, making it the 
ideal discipline for women who wanted to help Chile?s national progress. Though 
Cordemans did not elaborate on this point in her article, visitadoras were usually young, 
                                                
83 Leo Cordemans. ?Algunas caracter?sticas del servicio social,? Servicio Social, no. 1 (March 
1928): 1-9. 4. ?Analizando los documentos obtenidos merced a su perspicacia de detectivo, la Visitadora 
Social puede establecer despu?s su diagn?stico y buscar el tratamiento m?s adecuado. Su m?todo es el del 
m?dico y existen reglas de diagn?stico social tan precisas como las del diagn?stico m?dico.? 
 
84 Mar?a Ang?lica Illanes. Cuerpo y sangre de la pol?tica: La construcci?n hist?rica de las 
Visitadoras Sociales (1887-1940). Santiago, Chile: LOM Ediciones, 2006. 
 
85 Ibid 9. ?El Servicio Social es hoy d?a una ciencia que cada uno sirve con las facultades de su 
cerebro, pero ha conservado a pesar de todo su car?cter de obra al servicio de la cual cada uno se entrega 
con todo su coraz?n.? 
 45 
single women or women with grown children. As such, their social mothering would not 
conflict with their actual duties as mothers. Even according to a more expansive view of 
women?s ability to contribute to social progress, being a wife and mother took 
precedence for women in the modernization and reorganization of the Chilean social 
structure. 
 Author J. Delagrange, however, noted that the responsibility for a well-managed 
family did not lie solely with the wife and mother. Unlike many of his/her counterparts, 
he/she argued that women could not be expected to resolve the social question by 
mothering alone. ?The woman cannot sustain the moral weight of the social edifice 
herself; she, just like the man, agrees to elevate the standard of living of the collective; 
the situation is always abnormal when one must make up for, with only their energies, the 
insufficiencies of the other.?86 Women were not capable of replacing a father figure in the 
education and instruction of their children. This position diverged from the dominant 
opinion that women should take charge of the home environment while men were only 
responsible for providing financially for their families. This statement also implied that 
women should not be left to their own devices when making decisions regarding their 
children, allowing room for intervention either on the part of a husband or father as well 
as the state itself if a woman was raising her children alone. It was vital that the family 
                                                
86 J. Delagrange. ?El servicio social y la familia como unidad econ?mica, espiritual y moral,? 
Servicio Social, no. 2 (April-June 1935): 90-110. 105. ?La mujer no puede soportar ella sola el peso moral 
del edificio [social]; ella concurre, tanto como el hombre, a elevar el nivel de la vida de la colectividad; la 
situaci?n es siempre anormal cuando el uno o la otra debe suplir, con sus solas energ?as, las insuficiencias 
de uno de ellos.? 
 
 46 
function as a viable and stable unit because, ?the family is the most effective means for 
the regeneration of the human being.?87 
 Women were not the only group that was vital for the Chilean modernization 
project. Many Chilean doctors were equally concerned about their own role in this social 
drama. Luis G. Middleton C. argued that the state was responsible for dealing with 
economic issues, not medical professionals. He went on to say that a strong central 
authority was necessary for addressing social problems, though it was unclear whom or 
what would comprise that authority.88 Middleton C. was of the opinion that doctors 
should not meddle in social issues because it might foster a lack of neutrality in the 
medical profession, ?We understand that it is strange to many people that a doctor might 
intervene in problems that are the domain of politics and the economy.?89 This statement 
demonstrates that by the mid- to late-1930s, the public discourse about the social question 
had become mired in political debates in Chile. For Middleton C., focusing exclusively 
on medical problems and treatments, rather than on social problems, was the way to 
avoid incendiary political issues. This protected medicine and science as objective forces 
capable of providing the necessary proofs required for social reform efforts. 
 Middleton C.?s writing illustrates that there were a variety of opinions amongst 
secular intellectuals in Chile regarding the relationship of Socialism to the social 
question. Middleton C. represented a relatively conservative opinion. In contrast, 
                                                
87 Ibid 109. ??la familia es el medio m?s favorable para la regeneraci?n de ser humano?? 
 
88 Luis G. Middleton C. ?El medico ante las realidades del problema social y sus soluciones,? 
Revista M?dica de Chile, no. 1 (January 1938): 50-58. 52. 
 
89 Ibid 53. ?Comprendemos que ha de extra?ar a muchas personas el que un m?dico intervenga en 
problemas que son del resorte de la pol?tica y de la econom?a.? 
 
 47 
Salvador Allende and Jorge Palma Cereceda?s article, ?Panorama bio-demogr?fico, 
econ?mico y cultural de Chile? in a 1944 edition of the Bolet?n M?dico Social (BMS) 
argued that socio-economic conditions affected medical conditions. 
The enormous number of deaths and the increased morbidity quota that register 
on our demographic indices, aside from determining the stagnation of the 
population, influence the volume of production and greatly affect the general 
economic possibilities [of Chile], because of the lost work hours and the 
diminished consumption they represent, they indicate a considerable reduction in 
national wealth.90 
 
At this time, Allende was already a well-established member of the Chilean Socialist 
party and had served as Minister of Health since 1938. Therefore, it is not surprising that 
he linked material conditions to physical ailments. What is more interesting is the fact 
that, even as late as 1944, the importance of the social question was being discussed in 
mostly economic terms by an advocate of greater social equality demonstrating that 
national progress was still understood as economic strength. More, this emphasis on 
economic strength privileged male work over female reproduction. 
 Additionally, Allende and Palma Cereceda?s article supported the idea that a 
return to family order was necessary for Chile?s economic renewal. They argued, ?A 
growing disintegration of proletariat families and the middle classes has [been] a result of 
the uncontrolled participation of women and children in economic toils.?91 Women and 
children had to return to their proper places in the home in order to assure Chilean 
                                                
90 Salvador Allende G. and Jorge Palma Cereceda. ?Panorama bio-demogr?fico, econ?mico y 
cultural de Chile,? Bolet?n M?dico Social, no. 117-119 (July-September 1944): 181-202. 181. ?El enorme 
n?mero de muertos y la subida cuota de morbilidad que registran nuestros ?ndices demogr?ficos, aparte de 
determinar el estancamiento de la poblaci?n, influyen en el volumen de la producci?n y afectan, 
grandemente, las posibilidades econ?micas generales [de Chile], porque las horas del trabajo que se pierden 
y la disminuci?n de consumo que representan, significan una merma considerable en la riqueza nacional.? 
 
91 Ibid 197. ?Una creciente desintegraci?n de las familias proletarias y de las clases medias como 
resultado de la incontrolada participaci?n de ni?os y mujeres en las faenas econ?micas.? 
 
 48 
economic strength. This depended on men making a family wage that would allow for 
women and children to return to their natural places: home and school. This shows that 
even more politically liberal reformers believed in a patriarchal social structure.92 My 
examination of these intellectuals has demonstrated that, on the one hand, there was a 
relative uniformity of opinion regarding the social question among secular intellectuals. 
Most of these men (and women) identified the same issues as being important and 
suggested the same means of correcting them. However, within that consensus, there was 
disagreement in terms of who was to administer these programs and what their ultimate 
goals were. This was mostly debated in terms of who owned science and scientific 
expertise in the field of eugenics. 
Modernity 
 The intellectuals and reformers who wanted to address the social question also 
invariably reflected on how modern life had changed the Chilean social structure. This 
went beyond simply attributing the changes to capitalist expansion, though this was 
considered a deciding factor. These individuals most often referred to issues regarding 
health and growing class disparity when discussing the social question. These were 
certainly the results of modern economic developments such as factories and assembly 
lines, but modern living brought with it a new set of problems that did not necessarily 
appear economic. After all, none of them suggested that a return to pre-industrial living 
                                                
92 ?On the other hand, the obsession with women?s roles, behavior, and consciousness reflected 
deep and widespread anxieties among the rising urban elites over the rapidity and disorderliness of 
socioeconomic change.? Besse 2. Sueann Caulfield. In Defense of Honor: Sexuality Morality, Modernity, 
and the Nation in Early-Twentieth Century Brazil. Durham: Duke University Press, 2000. Rosemblatt 
2000. Mary Kay Vaughan. ?Modernizing Patriarchy: State Policies, Rural Households and Women in 
Mexico, 1930-1940,? in Hidden Histories of Gender and the State in Latin America, Elizabeth Dore & 
Maxine Molyneux (eds). Durham: Duke University Press, 2000. 
 
 49 
was the way to resolve the social question. Instead, they wanted to modernize social 
relationships in Chile while preserving patriarchal social structures that ensured stability. 
As a result, their reflections upon modernity demonstrated an anxiety regarding gender 
confusion among a variety of social groups such as women, youths and criminals. These 
were fears that were shared by Catholic reformers as well. 
 In a brief article appearing in a 1918 edition of El Mercurio, the author lamented 
the fact that the Chilean upper classes were not marrying enough.93 The author, identified 
only as ?Merlin,? placed the blame for this situation squarely on gender confusion, ?The 
man cowers; the girl calls and is not pursued.?94 In this case, men were the ones who 
were not behaving properly. They were expected to pursue women in order to produce a 
family. However, upper class men had become too retiring and timid according to Merlin. 
 This was further supported by the example Merlin used of a thirty-year-old single 
man who was going bald from both hereditary causes and Chile?s poor environmental 
conditions.95 This description demonstrated that the man in question was already losing 
his virility at thirty, the age when most experts agreed that men were at their prime for 
having and raising children. The article went on to say that this man was not interested in 
getting married because, ?the girls are pretty and mature; but very badly raised, they 
spend a lot on clothes, they want cars, they are all the same, and they do not know one 
useful thing.?96 Merlin did not disagree that modern women were frivolous and too 
                                                
93 Merlin. ?Un problema social,? El Mercurio, no. 6401 (January 12, 1918): 3. 3. 
 
94 Ibid. ?El hombre retrocede; la ni?a llama y no es seguida.? 
 
95 Ibid. 
 
96 Ibid. ??las chicas est?n bonitas y maduras; pero muy mal criadas, gastan mucho con vestirse, 
quieren autom?vil, son todas iguales, y no saben ninguna cosa ?til.? 
 50 
concerned with clothes and luxury, but he also blamed this man for committing crimes 
against the nation. The single man had not accepted his duty to find a woman, train her 
out of her frivolity, and become a husband; he was too lazy. Rather, the man had chosen 
to live as a bachelor and avoid his societal obligation of producing the Chilean race. 
Merlin believed that young Chileans had very little interest in family life, which 
threatened the stable social order required for increased economic prosperity. 
 Male inability or disinterest in pursuing women and making families was 
bemoaned throughout the Chilean popular press as early as 1905. Another example of 
this attitude was illustrated in the cartoon, ?Virus anti-amoroso,? in Zig-Zag (see Figure 
2).97 The most important image from this cartoon was that of a woman standing on her 
balcony, waiting for suitors who would never come. 
 
                                                
97 Moustache. ?Virus anti-amoroso,? Zig-Zag, no. 28 (August 27, 1905). 
 51 
 
 
Figure 2: Moustache, ?Virus anti-amoroso,? Zig-Zag, no. 28 (August 27, 1905). Another cartoon by the 
artist Moustache, this time demonstrating how men and women needed each other to fully realize their 
potential. From the Biblioteca Nacional. 
 
In 1925, another article appearing in El Mercurio stated, ?Excessive work in a 
mother brings with it as a consequence floods of pain and physical misery and the 
degeneration of the future citizens of the Republic.?98 Taking a different approach than 
Merlin, Agustin Ortuzan E. argued that women of all classes were the ones who were 
increasingly losing interest in forming families. He contended that political radicals gave 
                                                
98 Agustin Ortuzan E. ?Protecci?n a la madre y al ni?o,? El Mercurio, no. 8841, (July 11, 1925): 
3. 3. ?El trabajo excesivo en la madre trae como consecuencia raudales de dolor y de miseria f?sica y la 
degeneraci?n de los futuros ciudadanos de la Rep?blica.? 
 
 52 
out birth control information to women, damaging Chile?s potential economic 
development by diminishing the size of the workforce. Providing birth control 
information implied that Chilean men and women would limit the size of their families. 
What Ortuzan E. most feared was that upper class families would choose to have fewer 
children in order to preserve the lifestyle to which they were accustomed when they 
should be trying to out-reproduce the lower classes.99 
 Growing disinterest in family life continued to be perceived as a problem by most 
secular reformers. Mar?a Besa de D?az, whose article appeared in El Mercurio in 1933, 
wrote, ?Anti-family ideas float in the air like miasmas over swamps.?100 She contended 
that social and political radicals were trying to make Chileans believe that modern life 
required the rejection of family and obligation in favor of a life of individualism and 
indulgence. In this article, she argued that proposed divorce legislation in Chile was an 
example of this trend and actually represented a step backward in terms of social 
progress.101 Like Ortuzan E., Besa de Diaz also stipulated that it was up to women to 
correct this error. 
Finally, the woman that knows society?s conscience, feels the weight of that high 
calling of saving it upon her, lending it her quiet experience of centuries, her 
honor and sincerity to help man untangle the complicated skein of life, of the call 
of modern civilization, and putting her generous breast before the assaults of that 
insolent barbarity that tries to destroy her familial reign, complies with the 
providential mission that this hour of the world has signaled to her.102 
                                                
99 Ibid. 
 
100 Mar?a Besa de D?az. ?Ideas que vivifican, ideas que matan,? El Mercurio, no. 17,747 (June 22, 
1933): 7. 7. ?Las ideas antifamiliares flotan en el aire como las miasmas sobre los pantanos.? 
 
101 Ibid. 
 
102 Ibid. ?Finalmente, la mujer que se sabe conciencia de la sociedad, siente que pesa sobre ella el 
alt?simo deber de salvarla prestando en la hora cr?tica su callada experiencia de siglos, su honradez y 
sinceridad para ayudar al hombre a desenredar la embrollada madeja de la vida, de la llamada civilizaci?n 
 53 
 
Education 
 In order to navigate the difficulties presented by the social question and modern 
life, most Chilean intellectuals saw primary education as the means of rectifying social 
problems. They advocated for a new type of education, infused with scientific principles, 
which would prepare young children for their future responsibilities as citizens, workers 
and reproducers. Secular intellectuals often placed the responsibility for this education 
squarely in the hands of the state. However, there was still quite a lot of debate about 
what this education should include and how to best impart it to young Chileans. In 
addition, most of these intellectuals insisted on an educational program that cultivated in 
children a moral code of behavior that was informed by Judeo-Christian principles, even 
if it was ostensibly secular. What is most striking is that the ultimate goal of this 
education was to teach children to recognize their obligation, as individuals, to the 
collective good. As such, it did not greatly differ from Catholic educational goals. 
 Dr. Cora Mayers, founder of the Escuela de Enfermer?a at the Universidad de 
Chile, argued that the best place to instruct children in hygiene was in school.103 She 
wrote, ?But of all these centers that contribute to hygienicizing the masses, none realizes 
a work more solidly educational and of the most sure fruits than does the school.?104 
Mayers believed a state institution was the best place for children to be instructed in their 
                                                                                                                                            
moderna, y que poniendo su pecho generoso ante las embestidas de esa insolente barbarie que pretende 
arrasar con su reinado familiar, cumple con la misi?n providencial que esta hora del mundo le tiene 
se?alada.? 
 
103 Museo Nacional de Medicina. ?Dra. Mayers, Cora (1895-1931),? 
http://www.museomedicina.cl/home/index.php/historia-de-la-medicina/180-dra-cora-mayers-1895-
 1931.html. 
 
104 Cora Mayers. ?La educaci?n higi?nica de la nacion,? Revista de la Beneficencia P?blica, no. 3 
(September 1924): 199-202. 199. ?Pero de todos estos centros que contribuyen a higienizar las masas, 
ninguno realiza una obra m?s s?lidamente educativa y de m?s seguros frutos que la que realiza la escuela.? 
 54 
obligations as citizens. This was primarily because she believed imposing proper habits 
and behavior could counteract any deficiencies caused by a child?s heredity. In fact, the 
main objective of any scholastic hygiene program was to create children that were, 
?strong individuals and aware of their responsibilities to society.?105 Mayers?s own 
history bears mentioning. As a pioneer in social medicine and pediatrics, she traveled 
extensively between France, Great Britain, Germany and Chile. Even more sobering and 
telling, she died in 1931 the victim of a ?crime of passion? perpetrated by her colleague 
Dr. Alfredo de Mar?a.106 This macabre anecdote shows how women, even the most 
professional and lauded, remained subject to the whims of men. 
 Using education as a means of teaching responsibility to the collective good was a 
common trope among secular intellectuals. Madame M. Mulle, the director of Central 
School of Social Service of Brussels where Ren? Sand had also taught, explained this as 
the result of the natural self-preservation instincts of the species. ?Primitive human 
societies, surely also had rules of conduct for their members, instinctively, unconsciously 
admitted by themselves and which are the foundation for the moral development of 
humanity.?107 Mulle portrayed educating children for the national collective good as a 
natural imperative without which human civilization, and the species itself, would 
devolve. By linking this argument to the larger discourse of evolution, Mulle was able to 
                                                
 
105 Ibid 200. ??individuos fuertes y penetrados de sus responsabilidades para con la sociedad.? 
 
106 ?Dra. Mayers,? http://www.museomedicina.cl/home/index.php/historia-de-la-medicina/180-
 dra-cora-mayers-1895-1931.html. 
 
107 M. Mulle. ?La educaci?n moral y social de ni?o,? Servicio Social, no. 1 (March 1930): 25-33. 
25. ?Las sociedades humanas primitivas, seguramente ten?an tambi?n reglas de conducta para sus 
miembros, instintivamente, inconscientemente admitidas por ellos mismos y que son la base del desarrollo 
moral de la humanidad.? 
 
 55 
portray education reform as both inevitable and necessary. However, though she was 
concerned with the moral instruction of young Chileans, she still held the state 
responsible for education. For her, education was a secular project and was not under the 
purview of religious instructors. 
 What was most interesting about Mulle?s approach to education was that its 
primary function was to teach ?morality,? or the awareness and acceptance of one?s 
obligation to the collective good. ?All that wakes the cultivation of free will, all that 
forms and tempers character, it is the base of moral culture. If the educator has his 
attention focused on the possible social value from these elements, his action will be 
doubly happy and fertile.?108 Mulle referred to a moral culture that tempered the 
individual?s characteristics in favor of the group stability. Thus, for secular intellectuals, 
morality was not necessarily based on religious dogma but on understanding one?s 
obligations as a citizen and worker. In particular, this might include forfeiting your own 
desires for the good of the group. While this was not a strictly Catholic ideology, the idea 
of self-sacrifice in the name of others was certainly informed by the Judeo-Christian 
tradition. 
Catholic Involvement 
 In terms of defining the social question, problems caused by modernity, and 
educational goals, secular Chilean intellectuals did not differ greatly from their Catholic 
contemporaries. The major difference between these groups was how, or if, Catholic 
people would be involved in the resolution of the social question. For most secular 
intellectuals, the answer was a resounding, ?no.? To them, Catholicism represented not 
                                                
108 Ibid 29. ?Todo aquello que despierte el cultivo de la voluntad, todo lo que forma y templa el 
car?cter, es la base misma de la cultura moral. Si el educador, tiene su atenci?n puesta en el valor social 
posible de estos elementos, su acci?n ser? doblemente feliz y fecunda.? 
 56 
only staunch political anti-progressivism but also a slavish adoration of the past that 
would only hamper national economic progress. Catholicism represented the antithesis of 
free thinking. Most secular reformers also presumed that Catholicism prevented 
innovative and scientific thought. Because the resolution of the social question depended 
on the application of eugenic science, Catholics were considered unable to engage in this 
project. 
 An example of this anti-Catholic sentiment appeared in a 1916 article in El 
Mercurio entitled, ?Democracia y cristianismo.? Senator Luis Malaqu?as Concha Ortiz 
was quoted saying, ?Christian charity funds patrons in order to enslave men and the 
Democratic Party [in order] to free them.?109 Concha Ortiz believed that Christian 
charitable organizations were designed to bind individuals to the antiquated institution of 
the Catholic Church that preferred to live in the past. His words left very little room for 
interpretation. Even though the author who quoted him wrote this article to demonstrate 
that there was no contradiction between Christianity and democracy by illustrating how 
men like Concha Ortiz were incorrect, the latter?s statement illustrated the type of 
hostility Catholics faced when engaging in debates about the social question. 
 Concha Ortiz?s opinion of the Church was especially negative, but he was not 
alone. Many Chilean secular intellectuals believed that Catholic charity had served its 
purpose and was no longer relevant to addressing modern social ills. In another article by 
Cordemans, ?De la caridad al servicio social,? she wrote, ?Assistance has evolved from 
Charity, which is an immediate donation, without worrying about tomorrow, calming the 
call of hunger, cold, pain, Philanthropy which has an organization and a defined 
                                                
109 ?Democracia y cristianismo,? El Mercurio, no. 6509 (December 24, 1916): 3. 3. ??la 
beneficencia cristiana funda patronatos para esclavizar a los hombres y el Partido Dem?crata para 
libertarlos.? 
 57 
purpose?and, finally, Social Assistance whose purpose is the most perfect adaptation 
possible of the individual to his environment.?110 This was a fairly common position 
among social service professionals. They recognized that their work shared many similar 
characteristics with charity, but stipulated that it was informed by scientific methods.111 
As Cordemans argued, social work did not simply relieve an existing problem but 
anticipated and attempted to solve that problem. She believed that social work when 
properly applied would eradicate social problems, something charity could never do. 
 Cordemans repeatedly pointed out that social work was a scientific practice, 
further distinguishing it from Catholic charity. ?The system that demands this assistance 
is Social Service, a true science that encapsulates the rubrics of social diagnosis, those of 
treatment based on preventative and curative measures, with the exception of procedures 
that are simply palliative.?112 This was important because it garnered much more respect 
for the burgeoning field of social work while, at the same time, depicting Catholic efforts 
to resolve the social question as simple charity. Cordemans clearly believed that charity 
did have its place, but that modern social problems called for modern tools. Like other 
secular intellectuals of the era, she did not believe that anything Catholic could provide 
modern solutions to modern social issues. 
                                                
110 Leo Cordemans. ?De la caridad al servicio social,? Servicio Social, no. 1-2 (March-June 
1927): 3-7. 7. ?La asistencia ha evolucionado de la Caridad, que es la d?diva inmediata, sin preocuparse 
del ma?ana, calmando el grito del hambre, del fr?o, del dolor, a la Filantrop?a que supone una organizaci?n 
y un fin definido?y, en fin, a la Asistencia Social cuyo fin es la adaptaci?n la m?s perfecta posible del 
individuo a su medio.? 
 
111 Illanes 2006. Mar?a Emma Mannarelli. Limpias y modernas: G?nero, higiene y cultura en la 
Lima del novecientos. Lima: Ediciones Flora Trist?n, 1999. 
 
112 Ibid. ?El sistema que reclama esta asistencia es el Servicio Social, verdadera ciencia que 
encierra las reglas del diagn?stico social, las del tratamiento basadas sobre las medidas preventivas o 
curativas, con exclusi?n de los procedimientos simplemente paliativos citados m?s arriba.? 
 
 58 
 Concha Ortiz and Cordemans both advocated a strict separation of religious and 
secular efforts to resolve the social question, but this was not the only position among 
secular reformers. Judge Samuel Gajardo supported a mixture of private and state welfare 
programs. He argued that these programs could actually complement each other.113 As a 
judge in the juvenile court system, Gajardo saw that both emotional and scientific 
methods had to be brought to bear in order to help young delinquents. It is true that 
protecting an abandoned child is a problem of love, that requires brotherly sentiments, 
but it is also essentially a political problem.?114 Gajardo went on to suggest that a variety 
of institutions be used to try and curb juvenile delinquency. He represented a middle 
ground position for secular intellectuals. He recognized a space for private charity in the 
resolution of the social question, even as he recommended that the state be primarily 
responsible for the administration of social reform programs. 
Catholic Conceptualizations of Social Reform 
Catholic Action 
 While most secular reformers repeatedly argued against any sort of Catholic 
involvement in resolving the social question, Catholics responded to this with equal 
fervor. An example of this was the development of Acci?n Cat?lica throughout Latin 
America in response to the Rerum Novarum. This social movement within the Catholic 
Church proved to be a variegated response to the social question, but still provided a 
framework within which Catholic reformers could work. As a result, many different 
social programs fell under the umbrella of Catholic Action. Another way Catholics and 
                                                
113 Samuel Gajardo. ?Caridad y asistencia social,? El Mercurio, no. 17,782 (July 27, 1933): 3. 3. 
 
114 Ibid. ?Cierto es que la protecci?n al ni?o abandonado es un problema de amor, que requiere 
sentimientos fraternales, pero es tambi?n un problema esencialmente pol?tico...? 
 59 
social conservatives responded to the social question was the creation of the Falange 
Nacional. Founded in 1935 as a political coalition of various conservative parties, this 
group wanted to respond to the increasingly Socialist developments in Chile?s political 
culture. One of the most important parties in this group was the Christian Democrats.115 It 
was their political platform that most closely aligned with Catholic social reformers 
positions regarding the social question. The following documents explore the various 
opinions about how Chilean Catholics should engage in social reform. 
 A short booklet summarizing the final decisions made regarding social work at 
the Congreso Social Cat?lico which took place in September 1910 stated, ?The Catholic 
Social Congress convinced of the absolute necessity of a solid instruction in Christian 
social science, as an indispensable condition of being able to exercise Christian social 
action with good results demands of all Catholics that wish to take a part in this action 
(especially the leading element) to procure with all possible means this knowledge.?116 
This group of Catholics thought that creating their own field of social work was critical to 
actively engaging with social reform. Not only that, but they advocated for the most 
powerful Chilean Catholics to be mindful of these efforts which shows that the entire 
Catholic community in Chile was needed to effectively combat social problems. 
 This booklet then explained that all social work programming organized by the 
Church needed to be well planned. ?The works must be based on a firm foundation, legal 
                                                
115 Jos? D?az Nieva. Chile: de la Falange Nacional a la Democracia Cristiana. Madrid: 
Universidad Nacional de Educaci?n a Distancia, 2000. Rosemblatt 2000. Winn 1986. 
116 Conclusiones aprobadas por la Secci?n ?Obras Sociales? del Congreso Social Cat?lico. 
Santiago: Imprenta ?La Ilustraci?n,? 1912. 12. ?El Congreso Social Cat?lico convencido de la absoluta 
necesidad de una s?lida instrucci?n en la ciencia social cristiana, como condici?n indispensable de poder 
ejercer con provecho la acci?n social cristiana exhorta a todos los cat?licos que deseen tomar parte en esta 
acci?n (especialmente al elemento dirigente) a procurarse con todos los medios posibles este 
conocimiento.? 
 60 
and economic?So that first and foremost the people see that the best friends of even 
their material well being, are Catholics.?117 Showing the people that Catholics were the 
best at anticipating, and resolving, their social needs made sense in the context of the 
attacks Catholic reformers suffered at the hands of secular detractors. Catholic reformers 
believed that the working classes were slowly turning against them because they thought 
Catholicism supported the upper classes and because it was oriented toward spiritual, 
rather than material, gains. To combat this, the booklet called for the creation of youth 
centers to teach civic and moral obligations along with promoting literary explorations. It 
also called for scientific centers to be opened to promote science among Catholics.118 
 Another tactic Catholics used to demonstrate that they were integral to the 
resolution of the social question was by exploring the relationship between charity and 
social work. In Luisa Jorrisen?s 1931 article, ?El concepto de caridad en la Asistencia 
Social,? she argued that, ?Before all, that which we have to make clear is that there is no 
charity that exists that does not have a religious background.?119 Jorrisen was the director 
of the Escuela de Servicio Social ?Elvira Matta de Cruchaga?, the school of social work 
housed at the Universidad Cat?lica. As such, it was not surprising that she supported 
Catholic charity as a part of social work. By positing that there was no social work that 
did not have, at its core, a religious motivation struck squarely at naysayers who argued 
that Catholics had no business in matters of social reform. To further prove this 
                                                
 
117 Ibid 18. ?Las obras deben ser fundadas sobre base firme, legal y econ?mica?.Que 
principalmente el pueblo vea que los mejores amigos de su bienestar a?n material, son los cat?licos.? 
 
118 Ibid 22. 
 
119 Luisa Jorrisen. ?El concepto de caridad en la Asistencia Social,? La Revista Cat?lica, no. 699 
(April 11, 1931): 321-327. 322. ?Ante todo, lo que hemos de dejar en claro es que no existe caridad que no 
tenga un fondo religioso.? 
 61 
connection, Jorrisen pointed out that in Chilean hospitals, orphanages and other welfare 
institutions there was almost always a mix of government and religious personnel. She 
even argued that, ?Even though [religious] personnel are allowed to realize their 
charitable ideals, generally these institutions, as they are, are not linked to that ideal.?120 
This is an intriguing point to make. While highlighting the complementary nature of 
secular and religious social programming, she noted that religious personnel in secular 
institutions did not press their religious opinions on those seeking the service. This 
suggests that there were at least some Catholic reformers who were not interested in 
proselytizing while dealing with social problems. 
 Chilean Catholics continued to believe that a religious renewal would spark a 
social renewal through the 1940s. As late as 1949, Eduardo Leon Bourgeois wrote that 
without morality all efforts at social action would fail.121 What had changed since the turn 
of the century, however, was a more marked anti-Socialist and anti-Communist position 
on the part of Catholics. Bourgeois argued that encouraging the working classes to focus 
on religious life would show them their individual worth and produce real social change, 
unlike socialism.122 He wrote that a return to Christian principles would, ?reintegrate the 
                                                
 
120 Ibid 326. ?A pesar de que a este personal [religioso] se le permite realizar su ideal de caridad, 
generalmente esas instituciones, como tales, no est?n vinculadas a dicho ideal.? 
121 Eduardo Leon Bourgeois. ?La acci?n social cristiana a la luz de la teolog?a,? Estudios, no. 191 
(January 1949): 38-56. 38-39. 
 
122 Ibid 47-48. For relationship between Catholicism and Socialism see: Tom Buchanan and 
Martin Conway (eds). Political Catholicism in Europe, 1918-1965. New York: Oxford University Press, 
1996. Hugh McLeod. Piety and Poverty: Working-class Religion in Berlin, London, and New York, 1870-
 1914. New York: Holmes & Meier, 1996. Adam Michnik. The Church and the Left, David Ost (trans and 
ed). Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993. George Weigel. The Final Revolution: The Resistance 
Church and The Collapse of Communism. New York: Oxford University Press, 1992. The emphasis on 
Europe in these books is not coincidental. There are very few attempts to understand the relationship 
between Catholicism and Socialism in Latin America. Nonetheless, a noble attempt is: Jos? Aldunate Lyon, 
et al. Cr?nicas de una Iglesia Liberadora. Santiago: LOM Ediciones, 2000. 
 62 
masses with Christ, which is a much more profound thing than the solution to the social 
question, because it supposes a growth in faith, and a moral purification and an end of the 
total prostration of the people.?123 
Education and Secularism 
 Just as secular intellectuals argued that education was a vital component to 
resolving the social question, so too did their Catholic contemporaries. Both groups 
agreed that education was the most important component of forming fit and healthy 
citizens. However, the Catholic approach to education also included another element. 
Most of the literature about educational improvements in the name of national progress 
addressed the increasing governmental attempts to secularize education. Chilean 
Catholics strongly disagreed that the state needed to control education in order to ensure 
its quality. They argued that parents had the right to educate their children as they saw fit, 
either in a public or private educational institution. The state could not compel parents to 
send their children to secular schools. This was not only out of a desire to protect the 
Catholic legacy of education in Chile but also because Chilean Catholic intellectuals 
believed that Catholic education provided a better set of tools to deal with social 
problems. 
 In 1901, Martin S. Rucker wrote an article entitled, ?Estudios Sociales: La 
Juventud Cat?lica,? for La Revista Cat?lica. In this article, Rucker argued that secular 
institutions favored a specific type of education. ?If the work of intellectual and moral 
formation were to be reduced to creating only good family men, without taking into 
                                                
 
123 Bourgeois 54. ??del reintegro de las masas a Cristo, que es cosa mucho m?s profunda que la 
soluci?n de la cuesti?n social, porque supone robustecimiento en la fe, y depuraci?n moral y salir al pueblo 
de la postraci?n total.? 
 63 
consideration Christian public life, without working to prepare useful citizens, that later 
in social and political circles they would exert strong and healthy influence, the Church 
would have little to complain against impiety.?124 In other words, Rucker felt that secular 
institutions did not really foster proper behavior among young Chileans. If secular 
instruction could make responsible individuals who recognized their social obligations, 
the Church would have no complaints. But Rucker?s statement also illuminates that 
forming public individuals was a part of the larger Catholic mandate. As a result of the 
popularity of Catholic Action and the Rerum Novarum, a practicing Catholic was no 
longer someone who only attended mass. Rather, one must become part of the larger 
network of Catholics engaging in the public sphere. 
 At the turn of the twentieth century, Chilean secular efforts to establish a Ley de 
Instrucci?n Primaria Obligatoria had begun to coalesce, effectively ousting Catholic 
education in favor of state education. Though the actual legislation was not successful 
until 1920, Catholic educators and reformers in Chile saw these efforts as direct attacks 
on one of their primary social functions. In a 1902 article, Catholic writer L.R.L. argued 
that the state wanted to prohibit religious education, but did not have the necessary 
resources to replace the schools that would be lost.125 This was clearly a misguided 
choice, according to L.R.L. If education was so important, what would be accomplished 
by closing schools? 
                                                
124 Martin S. Rucker. ?Estudios Sociales: La Juventud Cat?lica,? La Revista Cat?lica, no. 3, 
(September 1, 1901): 127-131. 127. ?Si el trabajo de la formaci?n intelectual y moral se redujera a formar 
hombres buenos s?lo para el hogar de la familia, sin que se tomara en cuenta para nada la vida p?blica 
cristiana, sin que se trabajara por preparar ciudadanos ?tiles, que despu?s en los c?rculos sociales y pol?ticos 
ejercieron ben?fica y saludable influencia, poco tendr?a la Iglesia que pelear con la impiedad.? 
 
125 L.R.L. ?Cuestiones de actualidad: ? prop?sito de la ley sobre instrucci?n: primaria 
obligatoria,? La Revista Cat?lica, no. 25, (August 2, 1902): 9-17. 10. 
 64 
 L.R.L. also pointed out that this legislation was anti-religious and circumscribed 
the rights of parents. ?Finally, if the law of obligatory instruction is anti-religious in its 
tendencies and inopportune for current circumstances in the country, it is also contrary to 
the sacred right that fathers have to give their children the education that most conforms 
to their beliefs.?126 Parents had the right to control the type of education that their 
children received. The state could mandate that all children attend school, but L.R.L. 
argued that it could not legislate what type of education all children received. Instead, 
he/she argued that the state should address the economic conditions that caused children 
to work rather than attend school.127 
 ?Education and the instruction of the people are the most important factors in 
progress and civilization.?128 Written in 1903, this statement exemplified what both 
Catholic and secular reformers believed education could accomplish. This statement 
represented a somewhat unusual combination of both secular and religious feeling. The 
article, ?Los Maestros,? appeared in El Diario Popular (EDP), a newspaper aimed at the 
working class which also professed to serve the spiritual needs of that community. As 
such, EDP was a hybrid of the discursive tropes being used by both camps. It therefore 
supported the idea that education was the key to national progress. However, it also 
argued that, ?And this religious education is today even more necessary when we think of 
                                                
 
126 Ibid 11. ?Finalmente, si la ley de instrucci?n obligatoria es antirreligiosa en sus tendencias ? 
inoportuna por las circunstancias actuales del pa?s, es tambi?n atentatoria del sagrado derecho que tienen 
los padres de familias de dar ? sus hijos la educaci?n que sea m?s conforme ? sus creencias.? 
 
127 Ibid 14. 
 
128 Ego Sum. ?Los maestros,? El Diario Popular, no. 114 (January 19, 1903): 1. 1. ?La educaci?n 
y la instrucci?n de un pueblo son los factores m?s importantes de su progreso y de su civilizaci?n.? 
 65 
the largest social revolution we have seen in centuries.?129 Clearly, religious instruction 
was important to the author, Ego Sum or ?I Am.? However, he/she argued that this 
religious instruction was important in light of the social revolution resulting from modern 
life and capitalist economic expansion. Unlike other Catholic thinkers, Ego Sum did not 
necessarily seem to think this revolution was all bad. Not to say that he/she supported 
communism or socialism, but rather, saw that the change in society was much more than 
class warfare. In fact, these same social changes required a return to Christian teachings. 
 Ego Sum did agree that the main purpose of education was to instruct young 
Chileans in how to live up to their social responsibilities. ?I have here, then, the great 
mission of those who teach children. They must be inculcated to see that their future 
depends on them, and they can achieve, without great difficulties, comfort and wealth by 
means of saving and good habits.?130 Smart and healthy living was the key to a 
productive life. Teachers should spend their time giving their students the necessary tools 
to accomplish this goal. Notably, this conceptualization of education spoke to the 
growing emphasis on economic disparity between the classes. For Ego Sum, religious 
education was valuable because moral health encouraged not only physical health but 
also fiscal responsibility. He saw this type of moral education as capable of truly 
transforming social and economic relationships in Chile, an opinion his secular 
counterparts shared. 
 
                                                
 
129 Ibid. ?Y esta educaci?n religiosa es hoy d?a tanto m?s necesaria cuanto que presenciamos la 
revoluci?n social m?s grande que han visto los siglos.? 
 
130 Ibid. ?He ah?, pues, la gran misi?n de los que ense?an ? los ni?os. Deben inculcarles que su 
porvenir depende de ellos mismos, y que pueden conquistar, sin grandes dificultades, por medio del ahorro 
y de las buenas costumbres la comodidad y la riqueza misma.? 
 66 
Social Question 
 Chilean Catholic intellectuals disagreed that they were incapable of understanding 
and addressing the social question, but they were very aware that many Chileans agreed 
with Concha Ortiz and Cordemans. As a result, most of the Catholic literature regarding 
the social question first explained why a Catholic solution to the social question was 
needed at all. In most cases, Catholic intellectuals argued that they were better able to 
resolve the social question because their methods were more complete. Catholic solutions 
did not focus solely on economic issues, but rather sought to understand the profundity of 
the various social ills affecting Chile. They also argued that the Catholic Church 
represented the longest-standing charitable institution in the country. It had experience 
dealing with social problems that newer social welfare organizations did not have. 
Finally, Catholics identified themselves as the most prepared to resolve the social 
question because their religious beliefs best fit with the self-sacrifice advocated by social 
reformers of the period. They pointed out that they were the traditional guardians of the 
exact moral attitudes championed by secular reformers. 
 A very early example of this position appeared in a 1901 edition of La Revista 
Cat?lica. The author, ?N.N.,? argued that the social question was more than an economic 
issue.131 N.N. argued that attempting to push Catholics out of debates regarding the social 
question was detrimental to Chile?s progress. Instead, he/she actively encouraged Chilean 
Catholics to take part in the social question by stating, ?There is no one who does not see 
how far from this pernicious falsehood Catholics are and must consider and make this 
                                                
131 N.N. ?Estudios Sociales: Indicaciones pr?cticas para la acci?n social de la juventud Cat?lica,? 
La Revista Cat?lica, no. 7 (November 1, 1901): 316-317. 316. 
 
 67 
issue be considered primarily as a moral one.?132 Much like Mulle or Mayers, N.N. 
commuted the social question into a question of morals. By framing the social question as 
a moral issue, as had many secular reformers, Catholics were able to integrate themselves 
in dialogues about how to improve the country. 
 Chilean Catholic efforts to take part in the social modernization project were not 
the result of self-interest and self-preservation alone. While it is tempting to explain 
Catholic involvement in these issues as a last-ditch effort to maintain whatever remaining 
social cache they had, Catholic intellectuals of the period discredited this belief. Ricardo 
Cox M?ndez, writing in El Mercurio in 1909, argued that changes in Catholicism at the 
turn of the century were not the result of self-preservation but rather Chilean Catholic 
interest in the social question grew out of the fact that the Church was a dynamic and 
vibrant social institution.133 ?But the Church lives in the world and lives in history, that 
is, lives between the waves of human generation and the vicissitudes of events: and in the 
midst of this perpetually agitated sea, as all boats on the move, it inclines to one side, and 
then the other; more, with the prow always pointed to the far horizon, where the sun of 
eternal justice shines.?134 Cox M?ndez felt that Catholic involvement in the social 
question was actually the result of a social demand for that involvement. The Church was 
born of the people that it served and they implored that the social question be resolved. 
                                                
132 Ibid. ?No hay quien no vea cu?n lejos deben estar los cat?licos de esta perniciosa falsedad y 
han de considerar y hacer que esta cuesti?n sea considerada principalmente como una cuesti?n moral.? 
 
133 Ricardo Cox M?ndez. ?Orientaciones contempor?neas del catolicismo,? El Mercurio, no. 4323 
(September 17, 1909): 5. 5. 
 
134 Ibid. ?Pero la Iglesia vive en el mundo y vive en la historia, es decir, vive entre el oleaje de la 
jeneracion humana y de las vicisitudes de los acontecimientos: y en medio de este mar perpetuamente 
ajitado, como toda nave en marcha, ya se inclina de un lado, ya del otro; mas, con la proa enderezada 
siempre hacia el horizonte lejano, donde brilla el sol de la eterna justicia.? 
 68 
Therefore, Catholic interest in the social question was not the result of self-serving 
preservation but grew from an authentic desire to serve and help the people the Church 
was obligated to protect. 
 Catholic intellectuals did not believe that the social question was the result of 
economics alone. For most Chilean Catholic intellectuals, the causes of social 
degeneration were individual laziness, inclination toward luxury, and general lack of 
faith. These behaviors had to be stamped out of children from a young age by their 
parents. ?There is no doubt that for parents it is much easier and more comfortable to let 
children do what they please, and this motive is why in our times, in which reigns well 
being, and with it egotism, there is so much indulgence and so much laziness in the 
vigilance and subjection of the family.?135 For this writer, modern parents had become 
lazy and disinterested in properly disciplining their children. Catholic reformers held both 
men and women responsible. Children needed to be taught obedience and to control their 
passions. After all, it was control that was needed to improve society; control when 
choosing a fit marriage partner, finding an appropriate job, and managing the cleanliness 
of his or her person and home. Only Catholic instruction could teach the self-sacrifice 
that such control necessitated for the social question to be resolved. 
 This parallels secular thought of the period. For both groups, the family was the 
epicenter of social turmoil. If the family could be regulated and monitored, then Chilean 
society as a whole would improve. As Carlos Solis de Ovando B. wrote in his book, La 
iglesia y el obrero, ?The corruption of the family would bring as a consequence the 
                                                
135 ?La liga y la educaci?n de los ni?os,? El Eco de la Liga de Damas Chilenas, no. 5 (November 
1, 1912). ?No hay duda que para los padres es mucho m?s f?cil y m?s c?modo el dejar que los ni?os hagan 
lo que quieran, y es ese uno de los motivos porque en nuestros tiempos, en que reina el bienestar, y con ?l 
el ego?smo, hay tanta indulgencia y tanta flojedad en la vigilancia y la sujeci?n de la familia.? 
 69 
corruption of society and that which derives from the first could not survive.?136 The 
family was the foundation of Chilean society. All the interested parties in the debate 
regarding the social question agreed. What they disagreed about was to what degree any 
institution, state or private, should intervene into family life. 
 The possibility of intervention was complicated by the fact that many Catholics 
believed that the first step toward resolving the social question was a return to traditional 
religious practices, something secular intellectuals roundly disavowed. In the 1915 
monograph, ?Cu?l es nuestra situaci?n?, the writer pointed out that men and young 
people had started coming to mass less and less regularly.137 While women were also 
mentioned in this statement, the loss of men was more troubling. Without adult men 
demonstrating the proper amount of religious dedication, young men and women had no 
example to follow. The Church and its religious practices would then become socially 
irrelevant because the most powerful members of society were no longer actively 
participating. 
 This writer then suggested that the way to garner more social prominence was to 
turn to the women who still attended regular services. Women could serve as a valuable 
resource to the Church in its time of need. ?Thanks be to God, the great majority [of 
women] still remain true to the Church and their faith. And the woman is the mother, the 
wife, the daughter, the home, she is selflessness and virtue, she is the heart that knows 
                                                
 
136 Carlos Solis de Ovando B. La iglesia y el obrero: Conferencia a los socios de San Jos? de 
Buin en 25 de Agosto de 1912. Santiago de Chile: Imprenta y Encuadernaci?n Lourdes, 1912. 22. ?La 
corrupci?n de la familia traer?a por consecuencia la de la sociedad y ?sta que se deriva de aqu?lla tampoco 
podr?a subsistir.? 
 
137 ?Cu?l es nuestra situaci?n??Qu? hemos de hacer? A la obra! Santiago de Chile: Imprenta 
Chile, 1915. 6-7. 
 70 
how to love.?138 Like other writers, this anonymous author placed women at the center of 
the home and family. They shaped the foundational unit of Chilean society, the family. 
Therefore, women had a vital role to play in Chilean social renewal. In fact, this writer 
believed that the Church had not fully utilized women?s power to its advantage. He/she 
wrote, ?It is a force that has remained practically inactive or very little taken advantage 
of, for God?s cause. And the rimes demand the cooperation of all.?139 Of course this 
position assumed and accepted the notion that women had a special relationship with the 
Church, a notion that secular intellectuals were quick to use against Catholic and female 
reformers. 
 While many Catholic intellectuals pointed to moral causes of the social question, 
many also agreed with secular reformers that the solution needed to be scientific. M. 
Rucker S., the same Martin Rucker S from previous discussion and also the Rector of the 
Universidad Cat?lica, approached the social question in much the same way as his 
secular counterparts did, even though his article appeared in La Revista Cat?lica and was 
designed for a Catholic audience. He argued that, ?The Encyclical ?Rerum Novarum? 
provoked an enormous scientific movement. The largest social issues were studied with 
determination; the principles were set in a precise way and the notable document 
commentators immediately enlightened the mind in order to penetrate the teachings 
                                                
 
138 Ibid 15. ?Gracias a Dios, su gran mayor?a se conserva todav?a fiel a la Iglesia y a su fe. Y la 
mujer es la madre, es la esposa, es la hija, es el hogar, es la abnegaci?n y la virtud, es el coraz?n que sabe 
amar?? 
 
139 Ibid. ?Es una fuerza que ha permanecido casi inactiva o muy poco aprovechada, para la causa 
de Dios. Y los tiempos exigen el concurso de todos.? 
 71 
emanating from the Papal See.?140 Rucker S. combined common secular discursive tropes 
with that of Catholic ones. He believed that scientific solutions to the social question 
were the most effective. Therefore, he argued that the Rerum Novarum?s call for social 
justice inspired the scientific study of poverty and social degeneration. This was not 
simply applying hindsight to historical events. For many Catholics, the Rerum Novarum 
did create a new, socially conscious era of Catholicism. 
 Rucker S.?s suggested solutions to various social problems were no different from 
secular reformers at the time. He advocated for a minimum wage, arguing, ?Touching on 
the theory of minimum wage that consists of what a sober worker and his wife, with three 
or four children and with the possibility to be able to have a small savings for the future 
of the family, one could bring before our consideration the testimony of eminent 
sociologists, profound theologians and illustrious Princes of the Church.?141 Here, he 
used the expertise of sociologists, theologians and clergy members to support his point. 
While the latter two categories might not be terribly convincing to secular Chileans, 
sociologists often claimed purely scientific methodology and training. Rucker S. 
recognized that this was equally as important as religious training when dealing with 
social problems. 
 A longer treatise on the subject of the social question was Bernardo Gentilini?s 
1919 monograph, Nuevas orientaciones sociales. Gentilini was a prolific writer and 
                                                
140 M. Rucker S. ?Orientaciones de acci?n social con motivo del XXV aniversario de la enc?clica 
Rerum Novarum,? La Revista Cat?lica, no. 371 (January 20, 1917): 93-108. 95. ?La Enc?clica ?Rerum 
Novarum? provoc? un enorme movimiento cient?fico. Las grandes cuestiones sociales se estudiaron con 
empe?o; se fijaron los principios de un modo preciso y los comentadores del notable documento dieron luz 
inmensa a la mente para penetrar en las ense?anzas emanadas de la c?tedra pontificia.? 
 
141 Ibid 97. ?Tocante a la teor?a del salario m?nimo que consiste en lo que necesita un obrero 
sobrio con su esposa, con tres o cuatro hijos y con la posibilidad de poder hacer alg?n peque?o ahorro para 
el porvenir de la familia, podr?a traer ante nuestra consideraci?n el testimonio de eminentes soci?logos, de 
profundos te?logos y de ilustres Pr?ncipes de la Iglesia?? 
 72 
Catholic public intellectual, actively working between 1910 and 1940. The amount of his 
publications and their inclusion in a wide variety of mediums, speaks to his importance as 
a central voice among Chilean Catholic social reformers. Gentilini agreed with the 
previous writers that the social question was the result of non-Christian living.142 
However, unlike some of the more conservative elements in the Catholic camp, he argued 
that the social problems affecting Chile were the result of a complex interaction between 
a variety of forces. ?The social question is the acute crisis, of a religious-moral character, 
political and especially economic, because the whole world experiences it, and in 
particular the proletariat.?143 Much like his contemporaries, both Catholic and secular, he 
recognized that the biggest contributor to social problems was the explosion of an 
exploited working class. He also linked this to a global phenomenon of capitalist 
development. This belied the argument secular intellectuals made that Catholics buried 
their heads in the sand and did not see social problems as they were. Gentilini was clearly 
aware of global trends and local issues affecting Chilean society that were unrelated to 
religion per se. 
 That being said, Gentilini still argued that Catholicism was the only road to social 
renewal for Chile. ?Only religious morality possesses the principles of individual and 
social reform that we have been discussing?In other words, there must be imperatives, 
                                                
 
142 Bernardo Gentilini. Nuevas orientaciones sociales. Santiago de Chile: Apostolado de la 
Prensa, 1919. 12. 
 
143 Ibid 13. ?La cuesti?n social es la crisis aguda, de car?cter religioso-moral, pol?tico y 
especialmente econ?mico, por que atraviesa el mundo, y en particular el proletariado.? 
 
 73 
taxes for the conscience that recognizes the sanction of a superior justice.?144 Because the 
primary problem was worker exploitation, Gentilini argued that a higher power was 
necessary to combat human greed. While he did not disagree with human measures to 
address this problem, such as government legislation, he believed that the most effective 
tool for combating social ills was a return to religious living through personal reflection. 
The reason was simple, ?The simple imperatives of reason, of human solidarity, of 
science and all those imperatives that form the base of lay morality, are not able to have 
dominion over an atheist or materialist conscience that does not recognize either divine 
law nor sanction.?145 Encouraging people to follow divine law would ultimately solve 
and prevent all social problems. If this seems hopelessly na?ve, secular reformers 
believed that education had the same transformative power. 
 Another example of religious writer sharing the same opinions as secular 
reformers appeared in La Revista Cat?lica in 1920. In his article, ?Deberes de los 
Cat?licos en los momentos actuales,? Gilberto Fuenzalida G. argued that to correctly 
address the social question, it was first necessary to know the causes of social 
problems.146 Much like other reformers of the period, he believed that knowing the cause 
of the social disease was integral to ultimately finding its cure. However, Fuenzalida G. 
also argued, like Gentilini did, that the root cause of social degeneration was an 
                                                
144 Ibid 68. ?S?lo la moral religiosa posee los principios de la reforma individual y social de que 
venimos hablando?En otras palabras, han de ser imperativos, impuestos por una conciencia que reconoce 
la sanci?n de una justicia superior.? 
 
145 Ibid 69. ?Los simples imperativos de la raz?n, de la solidaridad humana, de la ciencia, y todos 
esos imperativos que forman la base de la moral laica, no pueden tener imperio sobre una conciencia atea o 
materialista que no reconoce ni la ley ni la sanci?n divina.? 
 
146 Gilberto Fuenzalida G. ?CR?NICA NACIONAL-Deberes de los Cat?licos en los momentos 
actuales,? La Revista Cat?lica, no. 462 (November 6, 1920): 688-709. 691. 
 
 74 
increasing distance from God and religious practice on the part of Chileans.147 This 
provided the Church with the key to true resolution of all the social problems afflicting 
Chilean society. Returning to Catholicism was a more assured way of dealing with social 
ills than science or social work could ever be. ?We have an immensely more secure 
teaching than that of sociologists and philosophers, [we have] that of our sacred Mother 
Catholic Church, which, illuminated with the light of heaven, guides us through the social 
question, just as it does for all the other moral questions, to the only possible solution.?148 
 Fuenzalida G. then outlined how Chilean society had moved away from Catholic 
teachings. He first pointed out that civil marriage had caused, ?the relaxation of familial 
ties, the corruption of the home, the illegitimacy of children, the abandonment of wives, 
the moral and physical ruin of the family.?149 This was one place where Catholics felt 
privileged to intervene because marriage was a religious sacrament. Some Catholic 
intellectuals disagreed with civil marriage, believing that it permitted informality in terms 
of male-female sexual relationships which fostered male irresponsibility to the children 
of those unions. Some argued that civil marriage required too much paperwork and, as a 
result, couples chose not to formalize their unions. Others argued that couples needed to 
be encouraged to have both religious and civil ceremonies because, with the current 
system, men often ended up with two wives; one from a civil ceremony, one from a 
religious one. Finally, there were those who agreed with Fuenzalida G. and felt that only 
                                                
147 Ibid. 
 
148 Ibid. ?Tenemos un magisterio inmensamente m?s seguro que el de esos soci?logos y fil?sofos, 
el de nuestra santa Madre la Iglesia Cat?lica, que, iluminada con la luz del cielo, nos se?ala para la cuesti?n 
social, as? como para todas las dem?s cuestiones morales, la ?nica soluci?n posible.? 
 
149 Ibid 692. ??la relajaci?n de los lazos familiares, la corrupci?n del hogar, la ilegitimidad de 
los hijos, el abandono de las esposas, la ruina moral y f?sica de la familia.? 
 75 
a religious ceremony was necessary. Regardless of these opinions, however, Catholic 
intellectuals felt that marriage was within their purview and a specific site they could 
manage to resolve the social question. 
 Though Fuenzalida G. was unhappy about state intervention into marriage, this 
did not extend to other facets of the social question. He argued that capitalist economic 
models had not helped the working classes and state regulation and intervention was 
necessary to correct this imbalance.150 Fuenzalida G. attributed these economic problems 
to a loss of religious feeling. ?To resolve the social question, that is, to remedy this 
profound discontent that today society suffers and which carries it quickly to its ruin, 
requires that men forget their hatreds and begin again to love each other as brothers.?151 
As men and women moved away from Catholic teachings, they forgot their obligations to 
each other. For him, this explained why capitalist businessmen exploited their workers. 
While the only true solution to this situation was a renewal of Catholic piety, state 
intervention could be used in the interim. Fuenzalida G. recognized that the current 
reality meant that government involvement would probably be more effective than 
advocating a strictly religious solution. This demonstrated a pragmatism that secular 
opponents chose not to recognize about their Catholic contemporaries. 
 Finally, this article also explained who was important to the resolution of the 
social question. Fuenzalida G. wrote, ?In this War all are soldiers?Men and women, 
young and old, rich and poor, priests and parishioners, currently all have a sacred duty to 
                                                
 
150 Ibid 698. 
 
151 Ibid 698-699. ?Para resolver la cuesti?n social, es decir, para remediar este hondo malestar que 
hoy padece la sociedad y que la lleva precipitadamente a su ruina, se requiere que los hombres olviden sus 
odios y comiencen de nuevo amarse como hermanos?? 
 
 76 
perform.?152 Because his ultimate solution to the social question was a return to Catholic 
traditions, it stood to reason that Fuenzalida G. held all members of Chilean society 
equally accountable. However, he conceptualized this accountability within a patriarchal 
framework. Men and women were not expected to contribute to the social renewal in the 
same way. Nor were rich and poor. Instead, each group had their own social place and 
role to fulfill. 
 Though most Catholic intellectuals were quick to point out that the social question 
arose from more than economic conditions, and required more than economic solutions, 
they still agreed with secular intellectuals that capitalist economic development needed to 
be controlled. Carlos Labb? M. wrote, ?if we do not frankly approach the problem of the 
differences between capital and labor, the workers will refuse to hear us, the workers will 
repudiate us, telling us to our faces that we do not care for their well being.?153 This was a 
very important issue for Catholic reformers and intellectuals. With the growing 
popularity of socialism, communism, and anarchism among the working classes in Chile, 
religious practice had begun to severely dwindle. The loss of the confidence of the 
working classes was a common trope in Catholic literature of the time. Many Catholic 
intellectuals argued that workers had originally trusted in the Church to care for them, but 
had since lost confidence in the institution.154 Workers now turned to unions and politics 
                                                
152 Ibid 700. ?En esta Guerra todos son soldados?Hombres y mujeres, ancianos y ni?os, ricos y 
pobres, sacerdotes y fieles, todos tienen actualmente un sagrado deber de cumplir.? 
153 Carlos Labb? M. ?VARIEDADES-CUESTI?N SOCIAL,? La Revista Cat?lica, no. 502 (July 
1, 1922): 67-70. 68. ??si no abordamos francamente el problema de las diferencias entre el capital y el 
trabajo, los obreros se negar?n a o?rnos, los obreros nos repudiar?n, ech?ndonos en cara que no nos 
interesamos por su bienestar.? 
 
154 Ibid 69. ?No es posible pensar que se ha de resolver la cuesti?n social s?lo con ense?ar el 
catecismo y predicar en las iglesias, puesto que el primer trabajo de los enemigos de la fe y del orden ha 
sido alejar de las iglesias al obrero e inspirarle repulsi?n y odio a la sotana y al ministerio.? 
 77 
as a means of alleviating their suffering. As such, Labb? M. strongly recommended that 
Catholic reformers take an interest in the plight of the working classes, implicitly 
critiquing political liberalism much like many progressive Chilean intellectuals. 
 Labb? M. then recommended that priests take an active role in helping the 
working classes, with certain limitations. ?You must leave the sacristy; but not abandon 
it.?155 He believed that priests had to work to improve social conditions in Chile. 
However, they had to maintain their role as priests. They were not working men 
themselves. This was a noteworthy bifurcation of the social roles of the parish priest. On 
the one hand, Labb? M. expected him to make efforts to address social problems resulting 
from capitalist expansion. On the other, he was not to confuse this struggle with his larger 
mission of religious instruction. This position demonstrated the variety of conservative 
thought among Chilean Catholic intellectuals.156 
 While some intellectuals puzzled out the role of the priest in resolving the social 
question, Chilean doctors were also trying to determine their role in the new social order. 
Alfredo Bowen H.?s 1936 article in Estudios, ?La Acci?n M?dica en el Problema Social,? 
sought to understand the relationship between doctors and the social question. Bowen H. 
argued that the social question was only tangentially related to the practice of medicine. 
?It is logical that up until a point the Social Question looks at the bodily health of 
individuals, collectively considered, but it does not demand medical techniques for the 
                                                
 
155 Ibid. ?Hay que salir de la sacrist?a; pero no hay que abandonarla.? 
 
156 Labb? M.?s opinion can be found in a variety of other texts from the period. One especially 
good example is Bernardo Gentilini?s 1925 monograph, La restauraci?n religiosa y social. He argues that 
true civilization is inherently Christian and it is the loss of this Christian civility that has caused trouble in 
Chile. Bernardo Gentilini. La restauraci?n religiosa y social. Santiago de Chile: Apostolado de la Prensa, 
1925. 
 
 78 
integral solution of the Social Question, considered it in all its aspects and causes.?157 
Bowen H. stated that issues such as marriage, abortion, venereal disease and prostitution, 
though they all related to the practice of medicine, could not be resolved by medical 
treatments alone.158 In fact, he argued that it was inappropriate for medical practitioners 
to get overly involved in social issues. 
 Bowen H. argued that those doctors who made overly zealous efforts in the name 
of public health or social hygiene were, at best, misguided. At worst, they were class 
warriors, ?This materialist [Marxist] concept has infiltrated into the younger generations 
of professional Chileans due to errors in our elementary, secondary and higher education. 
Thus the vast majority of new doctors consider the problems of ?man? as problems of the 
?body.??159 He suggested that some Chilean doctors were overstepping their professional 
boundaries. Rather than focusing their attention on what they had been trained to do, treat 
the body for its ills, they were being drawn into debates about how human beings should 
interact with each other and their environment. These were clearly not questions that 
ought to interest doctors, but rather philosophers and theologians. Since this article 
appeared in Estudios, a Catholic publication, it seems likely that Bowen H. separated 
medicine from the social question to allow Catholics a place in the latter debate. 
                                                
157 Alfredo Bowen H. ?La Acci?n M?dica en el Problema Social,? Estudios, no. 39 (February 
1936): 17-21. 17. ?Ello es l?gico hasta aquel punto en que la Cuesti?n Social mira a la salud corporal de los 
individuos, colectivamente considerados, pero no lo es al exigir tecnicismo medico para la soluci?n integral 
de la Cuesti?n Social, consider?ndola en todos sus aspectos y causas.? 
 
158 Ibid 19. 
 
159 Ibid 20. ?Este concepto materialista [Marxista] se ha infiltrado en las generaciones j?venes de 
profesionales chilenos por errores de nuestra educaci?n fiscal, secundaria y superior. De ah? que la inmensa 
mayor?a de los nuevos m?dicos considere los problemas del ?hombre? como los problemas del ?cuerpo.?? 
 
 79 
 By as late as 1938, Chilean Catholic understanding of the causes and solutions of 
the social question remained the same. In an article written for Estudios entitled, 
?Posici?n del m?dico cat?lico ante el problema social,? Roberto Barahona Silva wrote, 
?The social problem is the modern form of the results of sin and particularly Christian 
sin.?160 Similar to the opinions of Labb? M. and Fuenzalida G., Barahona Silva believed 
that the social problems facing Chile were the result of increasing laxity in terms of 
religious observance. Unlike Labb? M., however, Barahona Silva encouraged Catholic 
doctors to move beyond their strictly professional training to resolve the social question. 
?Technically, a Catholic doctor is just a doctor. His Catholic specification modifies his 
extraprofessional network and, in this sense, he is purely and simply a Catholic.?161 They 
had a special duty, as both Catholics and doctors to resolve these social issues. 
 Another important development in this debate was that Catholics began to employ 
the term ?social justice? to discuss the social question, a trend that began in the late 
1930s. Alejandro Hunneeus C. argued that authentic social order could only come from 
social justice.162 ?Many aspects of the current economic and social organization do not 
respond to the true concept of Christian social order: the current distribution of riches 
allows grave injustices to fester; present civilization can only defend itself with that 
                                                
160 Roberto Barahona Silva. ?Posici?n del m?dico cat?lico ante el problema social,? Estudios, no. 
68 (July 1938): 10-17. 10. ?El problema social es la forma moderna de los resultados del pecado y 
particularmente del pecado de los propios cristianos.? 
 
161 Ibid 15. ?T?cnicamente, un m?dico cat?lico es s?lo un m?dico. Su especificaci?n de cat?lico 
modifica el radio extraprofesional de su persona y, en este sentido, es pura y simplemente un cat?lico.? 
 
162 Alejandro Hunneeus C. ?CR?NICA NACIONAL-Alocucion sobre ?La iglesia y la cuesti?n 
social,?? La Revista Cat?lica, no. 858 (June 1939): 385-390. 385. 
 
 80 
which is just and true in it. The rest demands reorganization.?163 Like his predecessors, 
Hunneeus C. believed that loss of faith was the primary cause of social degeneration. 
However, he discussed this loss of faith in a new way. This was not about encouraging 
both workers and employers to attend mass more regularly. Rather, Hunneeus C. felt that 
Chilean society had to fundamentally change to become more just. Using the language of 
social justice even allowed for non-Catholics living in Chile to actively agitate for their 
freedom from exploitation in the workplace. 
 Hunneeus C. was also adamant in his defense of the Church against those who 
argued that it was one of the contributors to this exploitation. ?Those who see in the 
Church a protector of the abuses of the present age, which it has been the first to 
condemn, gravely err. And those that try to consider it only a force for conservation, 
under whose shadow injustices can prosper, also equally err. To both the Church repeats 
that it only accepts and seeks out sincere, complete and full social justice.?164 Clearly, 
Catholic reformers were still confronting secular contemporaries that saw their efforts to 
resolve the question as little more than thinly veiled attempts to hold onto whatever 
remaining social capital they had. Hunneeus C. wanted to show that this was not the case. 
For him, the Catholic Church was a source of social change, not stagnation. In this 
moment, it is possible to see the stirrings of a more liberal Catholic consciousness in 
Chile that would come to fruition decades later. 
                                                
163 Ibid 387. ?Muchos aspectos de la actual organizaci?n econ?mica y social no responden al 
verdadero concepto del orden social cristiano: la actual distribuci?n de las riquezas adolece de graves 
injusticias; s?lo puede defenderse, de la civilizaci?n presente, lo que en ella existe de justo y verdadero. Lo 
dem?s exige reorganizaci?n.? 
164 Ibid. ?Yerran, pues, gravemente los que quieren ver en la Iglesia un amparo a los abusos de la 
?poca presente, que ella ha sido la primera en condenar. Y yerran, igualmente, los que pretenden 
considerarla solo una fuerza de conservaci?n, a cuya sombra puedan prosperar las injusticias. A ambos la 
Iglesia repite que s?lo acepta y busca una sincera, integra y plena justicia social.? 
 
 81 
 What did Hunneeus C. mean exactly when he talked about social justice? He 
argued that, ?its doctrine [Christian justice] takes as its base the eminent dignity of the 
human person, that materialist economy tries to forget.?165 This definition of social 
justice, or Christian justice, was particularly telling when considered in conjunction with 
the increasing influence of eugenics in public health and hygiene programs. By 
articulating that social justice protected the dignity of the human person, this implicitly 
protected the integrity of the human body, soul and psyche as well. Therefore any sort of 
government intervention into the individual?s private life or body, spaces traditionally 
controlled by the Church, was not permissible. This argument specifically objected to the 
increasingly use of sterilization and negative eugenics as a means of addressing social 
problems. 
 The previous article demonstrated a new phase in the development of Chilean 
Catholic thought regarding social welfare and the problems facing Chile. While the 
earlier articles illustrated that Catholics believed that a lack of faith was the cause for 
social ills, later intellectuals began to take a more nuanced approach. These later authors 
discussed social injustice, rather than sin per se, as the cause of social problems. What 
this shows is that Chilean Catholic intellectuals were engaged in the larger social debates 
of their age and incorporated the methodology, terms and concerns of the secular social 
welfare system into their own work. This approach to the social question anticipated the 
direction of Catholic thought for the remainder of the first half of the twentieth century 
and beyond. As late as 1948, Eduardo Leon B. wrote in Estudios, ?It is a well known 
thing that social discontent, fruit of injustice, comes from sin, and at its root, from 
                                                
165 Ibid 388. ??su doctrina [justicia cristiana] toma como base la eminente dignidad de la persona 
humana, que la economia materialista pretende olvidar.? 
 82 
original sin.?166 While their secular contemporaries preferred to mock or overlook their 
genuine attempts to address social problems, the fact remains that Catholics would 
continue to be actively engaged in these debates. 
 
 The Chilean social question comprised a variety of issues and social problems, 
but both Catholic and secular intellectuals approached them in similar ways. Therefore, 
Catholic reform efforts should not be overlooked when examining the history of Chile?s 
social welfare programming. These documents also illustrate that both groups shared 
similar views about how society should be ordered in modern times. This vision was 
based on a notion of progress being economic production capacity that called for 
productive (male) workers who remained in good health for their entire working lives. To 
achieve this, both groups argued that women had to play the roles of wife and mother in a 
new, more hygienic way. While this gave women in Chile more agency and political 
power than they had had previously, it still privileged their socially reproductive roles 
over any other. Finally, these reformers believed in the transformative power of science 
and education as the means to resolving the social question. For Catholics, this belief 
required a formal discourse that addressed the relationship between Catholicism and 
science. 
                                                
166 Eduardo Leon B. ?Catolicismo y evolucion social,? Estudios, no. 189 (October-November 
1948): 41-57. 41. ?Es cosa muy sabida que el malestar social, fruto de injusticia, viene del pecado, y en su 
ra?z, del pecado original?? 
 83 
Chapter Two 
 
?Las Dos Verdades? 
Catholic Characterizations of the 
Relationship between Religion & Science 
 
 
Figure 3: ?Tabletas de Antikamnia,? Revista M?dica de Chile, no. 1 (January 1915). This advertisement 
explains what symptoms Antikamnia tablets could relieve and how to ensure that you had purchased 
legitimate pills. From the Biblioteca Nacional. 
 
The advertisement above (see Figure 3), which appeared regularly in the Revista 
M?dica de Chile during 1915, exemplifies the complex relationship between religion and 
science in Chile between 1900 and 1950. The distributors of Tabletas de Antikamnia 
 84 
were trading on the cultural esteem of nuns to present their product as reliable and 
effective. The nun, an attractive woman looking off into the distance, symbolized the 
consumer verifying that she had bought the authentic product. ?All genuine tables have 
the monogram AK,? the ad states.167 The nun?s piety implies that the pills? efficacy is 
reliable. Using an image of a nun to sell American-made analgesics in Chile elucidates 
how a variety of historical actors conflated Catholicism and science. Chilean Catholic 
social reformers used this ambiguity to their advantage to engage with debates regarding 
the social question. 
The social question galvanized social reformers internationally and, in many 
historical contexts, paved the way for the modern welfare state.168 In Chile, Catholics 
were engaged in local debates about eugenic science precisely because they perceived it 
was linked to the potential resolution of the social question. They felt obliged to combat 
these social ills, because their religiosity rendered them uniquely prepared for this 
challenge. The Chilean Catholic intellectuals discussed in this chapter did not believe that 
their religious identity precluded them from original scientific exploration and 
understanding. Nonetheless, there were a variety of opinions regarding how Catholicism 
was designed to work with science. Some of these intellectuals believed that science and 
religion rarely interacted. Many others believed that science and Catholicism worked 
                                                
167 ?Tabletas de Antikamnia,? Revista M?dica de Chile, no. 1 (January 1915). 
 
168 Katherine Bliss. Compromised Positions: Prostitution, Public Health, and Gender Politics in 
Revolutionary Mexico City. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2001. Sueann Caulfield. 
In Defense of Honor: Sexual Morality, Modernity, and Nation in Early-Twentieth-Century Brazil. 
Durham: Duke University Press, 2000. Donna Guy. Sex and Danger in Buenos Aires: Prostitution, 
Family, and Nation in Argentina. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1991. Karin Alejandra 
Rosemblatt. Gendered Compromises: Political Cultures & the State in Chile, 1920-1950. Chapel Hill: 
University of North Carolina Press, 2000. Mary Kay Vaughan. ?Modernizing Patriarchy: State Policies, 
Rural Households and Women in Mexico, 1930-1940,? in Hidden Histories of Gender and the State in 
Latin America, Elizabeth Dore & Maxine Molyneux (eds). Durham: Duke University Press, 2000. 
 
 85 
together to allow human beings to make the best practical use of the natural world and 
resources that surrounded them. 
As demonstrated in the previous chapter, the social question became important in 
the historical context of rapidly expanding capitalist industrialization and was specifically 
used by political progressives to diminish the social influence of the Catholic Church. 
This chapter explains how this situation gave rise to the development of a Chilean 
Catholic scientific discourse that posited a symbiotic relationship between religion and 
science by focusing on gender and eugenics as a means of improving social conditions. 
The Catholic acceptance of eugenics also illuminates how scientific expertise was often 
deployed to modernize patriarchal gender systems in Latin American in the twentieth 
century. 
Latin America and Scientific Inquiry: Historiographical 
Considerations 
 
Histories of science in North Atlantic nations have focused on the increasing 
popularity of eugenics among secular scientists and intellectuals during the 1920s and 
1930s, while social histories of Latin American gender have charted the 
contemporaneous development of a modernized, patriarchal social system based on 
eugenic principles.169 Building on these two frameworks, I posit that both Chilean 
                                                
169 On eugenics: Peter J. Bowler. ?Scientific Attitudes to Darwinism in Britain and America,? in 
The Darwinian Heritage, David Kohn (ed). Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985. 650. Pietro Corsi 
and Paul J. Weindling. ?Darwinism in Germany, France, and Italy,? in The Darwinian Heritage David 
Kohn (ed). Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985. 701. William B. Provine. ?Adaptation and 
Mechanisms of Evolution after Darwin: a Study in Persistent Controversies,? in The Darwinian Heritage, 
David Kohn (ed). Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985. On gender: Thomas Miller Klubock. 
?Morality and Good Habits: The Construction of Gender and Class in the Chilean Copper Mines, 1904-
 1951,? in The Gendered Worlds of Latin American Women Workers: From Household and Factory to the 
Union Hall and Ballot Box, John D. French & Daniel James (eds). Durham: Duke University Press, 1997. 
238. Karin Alejandra Rosemblatt. ?Domesticating Men: State Building and Class Compromise in 
Popular-Front Chile,? in Hidden Histories of Gender and the State in Latin America. Elizabeth Dore & 
Maxine Molyneux (eds). Durham: Duke University Press, 2000. 
 86 
Catholic and secular doctors, scientists and public intellectuals used eugenic science to 
rationalize a new patriarchal social order for the specific purpose of addressing what they 
considered to be an increasing social disorder that resulted from the social dislocations 
caused by the rise of capitalism. Shoring up gender difference and encouraging select 
heteronormative social behavior was central to this effort. What is intriguing is that 
Catholics turned to eugenics, a science that supported selective human breeding and in 
some of its North Atlantic variations championed euthanasia, abortion and forced 
sterilization all of which were anathema to Catholic ideology, as the most effective means 
of modernizing these social roles. This was possible due to the articulation of a 
specifically Catholic eugenic science in Chile that supported different types of social and 
sexual control. 
Max Weber?s The Protestant Work Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism argued, 
?Only in the West does science exist at a stage of development which we recognize to-
 day as valid.170? He went on to recognize the scientific contributions of Indian, Chinese 
and Egyptian cultures, but did not feel that they shared the rigor of Western science. 
Weber linked scientific advancement and enquiry with the rise of capitalism and the 
modern nation-state. For him, the symbiosis of religion, capitalism and science in the 
West was obvious. The existence of one, proved the other. Ascetic Protestantism fostered 
capitalism in the West that, in turn, was fostered by a burgeoning community of scientists 
and technocrats. Though Weber first penned these words in 1904, many scholars tacitly 
accepted this premise without much difficulty. Science could only be authentically 
produced in the rational, Protestant cosmovision. While newer histories of science have 
                                                
170 Max Weber. The Protestant Work Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. Mineola, NY: Dover 
Publications, Inc., 2003 (1905). 13. 
 87 
problematized this assumption, the belief that authentic science was not made in Latin 
American persists. However, this chapter illustrates that Chilean Catholics were equally 
committed to using science as a tool to resolve the social question. This was precisely 
because they also linked capitalism, religion, and science as Weber did. 
 The history of science in Latin America is a relatively new field among North 
Atlantic scholars. Many of these scholars have overlooked scientific developments in 
Latin America because of its Catholic religious heritage, which presumably discouraged 
rational, scientific thought. In the Chilean case, this historiographical predisposition was 
influenced by a specific historical context that privileged anti-clericalism as the means by 
which to modernize Chilean society. Chilean historian Sol Serrano demonstrated that the 
founding of the Universidad de Chile was based on growing anti-clericalism and secular 
efforts to oust the local Church from a position of political power.171 The university was 
founded in 1842, during the heyday of political liberalism in Latin America, with two 
central tenets: social mobility based on democracy and the use of science and technology 
to advance social progress. As such, Chilean education and nationalism were predicated 
on anti-clericalism as essential to political freedom and progress. 
The emphasis on secularism and anti-clericalism has served to obscure the social 
and political contributions, both conservative and progressive, of the Chilean Catholic 
Church during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries while also unintentionally 
supporting the idea that Latin America was too bogged down in religious conflicts to 
produce original scientific knowledge. Instead, I argue that Catholicism played a 
fundamental role in the development of the field of eugenics in Chile. While the impact 
                                                
171 Sol Serrano. Universidad y naci?n: Chile en el siglo XIX. Santiago, Chile: Editorial 
Universitaria, 1993. 
 
 88 
that secular, progressive movements had on Chilean social and political history cannot be 
denied, it has overshadowed the equally vibrant developments amongst contemporary 
Catholic, conservative actors.172 Examining the contributions of liberal political actors is 
clearly important to understanding Chilean history, but does not capture the variegated 
influence of the Catholic Church during the same period. 
 The most recent scholarship regarding Latin America and science has primarily 
focused on how the imperial relationship between Spain (and Portugal) and its colonies 
affected the growth and development of particular scientific disciplines. Jorge Ca?izares-
 Esguerra?s collection of essays, Nature, Empire, and Nation: Explorations of the History 
of Science in the Iberian New World (2006), investigates Spain?s role in the development 
of botany as a discipline in the Early Modern period. Specifically, he argues that the 
contribution on the part of Spanish botanists represented new and original scientific work 
illustrating how the Iberian world did indeed contribute to the development of science 
during the colonial period.173  However, neither Ca?izares-Esguerra nor most of the other 
monographs of this type discuss how Latin America continued to contribute to original 
                                                
172 During the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Chileans sought to modernize their 
political systems by cutting official ties with the Catholic Church culminating in the disestablishment of 
the Church in 1925. Patrick Barr-Melej argues in his monograph, Reforming Chile: Cultural Politics, 
Nationalism, and the Rise of the Middle Class (2001), that anti-clericalism, especially in the early twentieth 
century, was an increasingly common feature among progressive social movements. Charles A. Hale. 
?Political Ideas and Ideologies in Latin America, 1870-1930,? in Ideas and Ideologies in Twentieth Century 
Latin America, Leslie Bethell (ed). New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996. Lawrence M. Principe. 
?Myth 11-That Catholics Did Not Contribute to the Scientific Revolution,? in Galileo Goes to Jail and 
Other Myths about Science and Religion, Ronald L. Numbers (ed). Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 
2009. Karin Alejandra Rosemblatt. Gendered Compromises: Political Cultures & the State in Chile, 1920-
 1950. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2000. 
 
173 Jorge Ca?izares-Esguerra. Nature, Empire, and Nation: Explorations of the History of Science 
in the Iberian New World. Palo Alto: Stanford University Press, 2006. 
 
 89 
scientific developments past 1850.174 The unintended result of this approach is that 
scholars of Latin America themselves support the argument that twentieth century 
science was the purview of scientists working in North America, Europe and Asia. It 
seems that as Spain?s imperial power diminished over the course of the nineteenth 
century, so too did its claim for a place as a scientific innovator. This begs the question of 
the relationship between science and empire, which a number of scholars have 
examined.175 But most of these authors have looked at how imperial forces have brought 
or created new science to subdue the people they encounter, very few discuss how those 
sciences are used or applied by the local communities. 
 While the history of science in Latin America might be in its formative stages in 
the North Atlantic academy, the historiography exploring the relationship between gender 
and social welfare and reform programs points to a much more complex picture.176 This 
literature often examines how the relationship between women of different classes affects 
gendered behavior. In the context of the social question, this is especially useful to my 
work. Elizabeth Quay Hutchison wrote that, ?Aristocratic ladies and the Catholic Church 
                                                
174 Daniela Bleichmar, et al (eds). Science in the Spanish and Portuguese Empires, 1500-1800. 
Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2009. Thomas F. Glick, et al (eds). The Reception of Darwinism in the 
Iberian World: Spain, Spanish American, and Brazil. Boston: Kluwer Academic, 2001. Juan Jos? Salda?a 
(ed). Science in Latin America: a History, Bernab? Madrigal (ed). Austin: University of Texas Press, 2006. 
 
175 Looking outside the Spanish Empire, the relationship between science and empire has been 
studied in a variety of different ways, see: Brett M. Bennett and Joseph Morgan Hodge. Science and 
Empire: Knowledge and Networks of Science across the British Empire, 1800-1970. New York: Palgrave 
Macmillan, 2011. James Delbourgo and Nicholas Dew. Science and Empire in the Atlantic World. New 
York: Routledge, 2008. Sujit Sivasundaram. Nature and Godly Empire: Science and Evangelical Mission 
in the Pacific, 1795-1850. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005. 
 
176 Susan K. Besse. Restructuring Patriarchy: The Modernization of Gender Inequality in Brazil, 
1914-1940. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1996. Ann Farnsworth-Alvear. 
Dulcinea in the Factory: Myths, Morals, Men and Women in Colombia?s Industrial Experiment, 1905-
 1960. Durham: Duke University Press, 2000. 
 
 90 
were long at the forefront of efforts to address social problems by setting up private 
initiatives to combat what they understood as an increasingly explosive social 
condition.?177 The alliance between the Catholic Church and upper class women to 
control lower class women might seem unsurprising. However, if we look more closely at 
this relationship, we begin to understand how the nexus between gender and eugenics 
created a specific historical circumstance in which Chilean Catholics, particularly 
Catholic women, could enter into scientific debates with authority equal to that of their 
secular counterparts. This helps to both contextualize the continuing political relevance of 
the Chilean Catholic Church in the twentieth century and the Latin American engagement 
with science generally. Additionally, we see that women?s involvement in the resolution 
of the social question was not incidental. Rather, the relationship between wealthy charity 
women, middle class social workers and poor mothers was central to the process of 
Chilean social renewal. 
Chilean Catholic Characterizations of the Relationship between 
Religion and Science 
 
Chilean Catholic intellectuals felt that the connection between Catholicism and 
science was both historically based and vital for responsible, social progress. Most of 
these individuals wrote in response to a vast amount of international literature that was 
both critical and suspicious of Catholic (or religious) involvement in not only the debates 
regarding the social question, but also the application and administration of social welfare 
projects. While the Chilean Catholic intellectual characterization of the relationship 
between science and religion was perhaps naive, it was a logical response to the 
                                                
177 Elizabeth Quay Hutchison. Labors Appropriate to Their Sex: Gender, Labor, and Politics in 
Urban Chile, 1900-1930. Durham: Duke University Press, 2001. 173. 
 91 
staunchly anti-clerical positions they encountered. The Catholic intellectuals here 
typically took the position that Catholicism was critical to the appropriate application of 
science to resolve social problems by characterizing the relationship between religion and 
science as complementary. Both science and religion illuminated how to best live 
according to the laws of nature that God had created. 
Most historians of science point to John William Draper?s History of the Conflict 
between Religion and Science (1874) and Andrew Dickson White?s A History of the 
Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom (1896) as foundational texts that 
characterized the relationship between religion and science as one of conflict. Both 
writers were exceptionally critical of conceiving of this relationship as being positive in 
any way. Draper wrote, ??The history of Science is not a mere record of isolated 
discoveries; it is a narrative of the conflict of two contending powers, the expansive force 
of the human intellect on one side, and the compression arising from traditionary faith 
and human interest on the other.?? 178 Contemporary historians of science recognize that 
these texts were especially vitriolic in their estimation of religion and religious thinking, 
however, they also note that these opinions filtered into both common and academic 
thinking with pervasive strength.179 Though Draper and Dickson White?s works were first 
                                                
178 Ronald L. Numbers (ed). Galileo Goes to Jail and Other Myths about Science and Religion. 
Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2009. 1. 
 
179 Ibid. Peter J. Bowler and Iwan Rhys Morus. Making Modern Science: A Historical Survey. 
Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005. 18. James Gilbert. Redeeming Culture: American Religion in 
an Age of Science. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997. 46. David C. Lindberg and Ron L. 
Numbers. ?Introduction,? in God and Nature: Historical Essays on the Encounter between Christianity and 
Science. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986. 3. Richard Olson. ?Series Forward,? in Religion 
and the Physical Sciences, Kate Grayson Boisvert (ed). Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2008. xiv. Anti-
 Catholic portrayals are partially the result of the fact that Anglo-centric experience and sources are 
emphasized in the field. Lawrence M. Principe. ?That Catholics Did Not Contribute to the Scientific 
Revolution,? in Galileo Goes to Jail: and Other Myths about Science and Religion, Ronald L. Numbers 
(ed). Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2009. 101.  
 92 
published in the United States (and in English), seemingly quite far from the Chilean 
context of this study, their opinions formed part of a transnational anti-clerical movement 
that permeated Catholic thought in many nations. In fact, by the turn of the twentieth 
century, both of these works were housed in the Biblioteca Nacional de Chile. 
The works of Draper and Dickson White also formed part of a growing, local 
canon of anti-clerical opinions regarding the relationship between Catholicism and 
science. An example of this can be found in the minutes from the Congreso Cient?fico 
Internacional Americano held in Buenos Aires in 1910. At that conference, the Chilean 
delegate, Paulino Alfonso, noted that, ?Science is the necessary condition for the 
complete emancipation of the body and spirit which promote the progress and abundance 
of the faculties.?180 While certainly more mild in approach than Draper or Dickson 
White, Alfonso still made clear in this statement that religious thought had no place in 
science. In fact, it was antithetical to the scientific process. Alfonso stated that religious 
intervention into matters that he saw as strictly scientific would be detrimental to the 
progress that was so badly needed not only in Chile but throughout Latin America. 
Female writer, Clara de la Luz, shared this opinion. In her La mujer y la especie 
(1913), de la Luz writes, ?With a woman who only knows La Historia Sagrada [a 
selection of Bible stories], the Lives of the Saints and only goes to mass, leaving 
abandoned her duties as housewife, one cannot make a nation, nor form a family.?181 This 
                                                
180 Santiago E. Barabino and Nicol?s Besio Moreno (eds). Congreso Cient?fico Internacional 
Americano, Vol. 1. Buenos Aires: Imprenta de Coni Hermanos, 1910. 194. ?De todas las emancipaciones 
del cuerpo y del esp?ritu conducentes al desarrollo y plenitud de las facultades, es condici?n necesaria la 
ciencia.? 
 
181 Clara De la Luz. La mujer y la especie (trabajo leido en el Centro Dem?crata de Santiago el 3 
de Mayo de 1913). Santiago de Chile: Imprenta Lee y CA., 1913. 20. ?con una mujer que s?lo sepa la 
 93 
particular statement speaks to the very real difficulties Chilean Catholics faced when 
trying to engage in debates regarding the social question. Secular or progressive political 
actors consistently argued that religious education, preparation, and instruction was not 
related to the vicissitudes of daily life and, thus, not a solution to material problems. 
While not all of these actors agreed with de la Luz that women who read scripture would 
leave their wifely duties undone, most did feel that religious inclination, at best, 
distracted people from the very real, pressing needs of social improvement that were vital 
to Chilean progress. 
To combat these anti-clerical opinions, Chilean Catholic intellectuals mainly 
described the relationship between religion and science in two ways. Some argued that 
science and religion revealed two separate truths that were equally important though 
unrelated to each other. This position addressed the critiques from the harshest anti-
 clericalists who believed that religion was a distraction from real life while still arguing 
for the social importance of religious ideals. The other, more common trope posited that 
religion and science worked together to illuminate the same truth, one that could be 
applied to resolve social problems. This latter position was by far the most popular, and 
longest lasting, among Chilean Catholic intellectuals. It discredited anti-clericalism by 
arguing that religion was the most fundamental component to solving the social question. 
Catholic intellectuals argued that Chilean society had suffered at the hands of 
uncontrolled capitalist expansion and that the best way to address concomitant social 
problems was through the application of new social science methods, such as social work 
and eugenics, combined with moral instruction. Without the moral compass that 
                                                                                                                                            
Historia Sagrada, la <Vida de los Santos> e ir a misa dejando abandonado sus deberes de due?a 
de casa, no se puede hacer patria, ni formar una familia.? 
 94 
Catholicism provided, the social restoration of Chilean society would be incomplete and 
doomed to failure. 
This position first appears early in the twentieth century in Rodolfo Vergara 
Ant?nez?s 1910 article, ?Materialism and the Origin of Things.? He argued that social 
degeneration was the result of secularist efforts to separate Catholicism from social issues 
based on the flawed notion that religion and science were opposing forces. This article 
appeared in La Revista Cat?lica, a religious periodical published by the Archdiocese of 
Santiago. With a run lasting from 1901 to 1951, this periodical was popular and designed 
to appeal to both laypeople and clergy members who were already engaged in debates 
about the social question. Strict materialist philosophy posited that the interaction of 
matter was the only fundamental building block for all natural life and phenomena on 
Earth. In the materialist cosmogony, life resulted quite by accident from a series of 
random matter interactions. Thus, for materialists, the divine played no role in the 
creation of life or the evolution of human life. Nor did they believe that religion should 
intervene in the contemporary debates regarding improving human living conditions. In 
contrast, Catholics believed that human life was created for a divine purpose and the 
creation of life was part of a God-given plan. Objecting to this thinking, materialists 
argued against religious involvement in social reform programs.  
Catholics rejected the notion that their religious belief prevented them from 
accurate interpretation of scientific facts. For them, emphasizing the materiality of nature 
only further demonstrated the existence of the divine. Vergara Ant?nez, Presiding 
Bishop?s Officer and Rector of the Universidad Cat?lica at the time of this lecture, 
 95 
agreed.182 ?Materialism has accorded to matter divine attributes, and has made matter 
divine. But nature, indignantly refusing the undeserved honor that [the materialists] try to 
bestow upon her, proclaims the name and grandeur of her Author.?183 Vergara Ant?nez 
showed that scientific study ultimately revealed the existence of religious truth, making 
science and religion intimately connected and discrediting materialist thinkers who 
portrayed Catholics as reactionary traditionalists.  
When Vergara Ant?nez turned his attention to discussing the origin of life, he 
again stipulated how religious thinking and scientific theory worked together. He wrote, 
?but, if everything begins with the atom, that was supposedly the beginning; and, if it had 
a beginning, it is not eternal; and, if it is not eternal, someone had to create it.?184 This 
was a common anti-materialist trope amongst Chilean Catholics. They argued that human 
reason did not support the belief that life could arise from nothing. As such, the existence 
of an intelligent creator was implicit. The proof of a Divine Creator, for Vergara Ant?nez 
was the natural world itself. Natural laws, the existence of human life, and the seeming 
order of nature spoke to this reality. Human reason, or common sense, could not support 
the supposed randomness inherent in the materialist understanding of nature. The 
question for Vergara Ant?nez was: Why believe that the world was randomly organized 
                                                
182 As university rector, Vergara Ant?nez was head of the Universidad Cat?lica from 1898-1914. 
As leader of the university, he made decisions regarding faculty and curriculum. Notably, he put the pieces 
in place for the agriculture program during his tenure. In this position, he represented not only an upper 
level of the Chilean clergy, but also of the educational community. Office of the President, ?Monsignor 
Rodolfo Vergara Ant?nez,? 
http://rectoria.uc.cl/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=85%3Amonsenor-rodolfo-vergara-
 antunez&catid=9&Itemid=59. 
 
183 Rodolfo Vergara Ant?nez. ?El materialismo y la origen de las cosas,? La Revista Cat?lica 
May 21, 1910 632-642. 639. ?El materialismo ha puesto en la material los atributos divinos, y con esto ha 
hecho de ella una divinidad. Pero la naturaleza, rehusando indignada el honor inmerecido con que 
pretenden ensalzarla, proclama ? voces el nombre y la grandeza de su Autor.? 
 
184 Ibid 635. ??pero, si todo empieza por el ?tomo, ?ste ha debido tener principio; y si ha tenido 
principio, no es eterno; y si no es eterno, alguien ha debido criarlo.? 
 96 
when there was so clearly an organizing force or principle at work? While this line of 
reasoning was more rhetorical than other arguments regarding the relationship between 
Catholicism and science, it spoke to the Catholic belief that nature had a divine order and 
that lesser beings played a role in that order. Lesser beings might include animals but it 
could also be understood to mean unfit individuals. They too were part of God?s plan and 
were able to exercise free will. As such, stabilizing the social order should be achieved 
through the application of reform efforts and not left to the ?survival of the fittest.? 
Materialist approaches implied that certain individuals were not fitted to survive in a 
modern society and no amount of intervention could change that fact. Chilean Catholics 
did not accept this absolution of responsibility for the lower classes or ?less fit.? 
 Vergara Ant?nez illustrated this point by arguing that religiously-informed 
scientific exploration was vital to solving growing social problems. According to him, 
Chile was experiencing a social degeneration and denouement on par with the fall of the 
Roman Empire. In particular, he pointed to the increasing indulgence and greed of the 
upper classes (read wealthy industrialists) as retarding the improvement of society. 185 
Vergara Ant?nez believed that Chilean Catholics might play a critical role in the 
advancement of Chilean society; not just because religion and science were meant to 
function in tandem but also because only morality could fight indulgence. Application of 
scientific principles alone was not enough. Indulgence and greed were, after all, character 
flaws. By so doing, Vergara Ant?nez was able to carve out a space into which Chilean 
Catholic scientists could pour their energy. This was also a clever way to use the same 
discursive tools of Communism and Socialism to his ends. By highlighting the 
                                                
185 Ibid 632. 
 
 97 
exploitative relationship between worker and employer, Vergara Ant?nez made his 
version of social reformation fit into an already popular discourse among the working 
classes while still differentiating Catholic social programs from potentially dangerous 
Socialist movements.  
For Vergara Ant?nez, and others like him, only hard work, prayer and a renewal 
of faith could adequately resolve the social question. Materialism, so popular among 
secular reformers, was not equipped to resolve these issues. ?[M]aterialism, arrogant and 
boastful, claims to represent the sciences, and presumes to dazzle the unlearned 
multitudes with the vain apparatus of scientific formulas.?186 Materialism promised easy 
results with the simple application of science. This implied that materialism was actually 
more dogmatic than Catholic thought because it proposed a rigid set of natural laws that 
were immutable. To Vergara Ant?nez, relying on science alone to solve social problems 
was using a simple rubric that did not recognize the complexity of real life nor the 
importance of moral instruction. Chilean Catholics, while they accepted that science was 
a valuable tool in addressing what they perceived to be social problems did not believe 
that it was the only, or best, tool. ?To hear [the materialists] talk, they would say only 
they possess science?s secrets, or that it is a patrimony that is exclusively their own.?187 
Statements like this highlight Chilean Catholic efforts to maintain their own scientific 
identity in the increasingly secular political climate of turn-of-the-century Chile. In his 
denunciation of materialism, Vergara Ant?nez implied that Catholics were equally 
                                                
186 Ibid. ??[E]l materialismo, que, altanero y jactancioso, se arroga la representaci?n de las 
ciencias, y pretende deslumbrar ? las indoctas muchedumbres con el vano aparato de formulas cient?ficas.? 
 
187 Ibid 633. ?Al o?rlos [los materialistas], se dir?a que solo ellos poseen los secretos de la ciencia, 
? que ?sta es un patrimonio exclusivamente suyo.? 
 
 98 
capable of using and creating scientific knowledge. While it seems clear that he expected 
that Catholic science would differ from materialist science, he certainly did not feel it 
would be lesser. 
This was based on Vergara Ant?nez?s contention that materialists were actually 
practicing a different faith. This was one of the more common counter-arguments of the 
period among Chilean Catholic intellectuals. He stated that materialists believed the 
universe created itself but could not provide proof of their claim. Rather than leaving his 
assessment of their position at that, he continued to say that Christians could not prove 
the existence of God, just as materialists were not able to substantiate their belief about 
the beginning of life.188 This opened the door for a common argument of the period: that 
those who placed all their hope in science were actually practicing a new faith. 
Materialists, according to Vergara Ant?nez, accepted a theory about the origin of life 
based on belief alone. Neither side had categorical proof of its position. This shows that 
Chilean Catholic intellectuals saw themselves as equal, if opposing, forces in the creation 
of a modern scientific community. Their faith was simply different than that of other 
actors in that community. Vergara Ant?nez called for materialists to recognize the fact 
that they were equally motivated by faith, rather than logic. The faith was simply in 
science, as opposed to religion. 
Materialist thought was often linked, in the minds of Catholic social reformers, 
with liberal philosophy stemming from the Enlightenment. This emphasis on the 
Enlightenment also served to highlight the gendered roles that men and women were 
meant to play in Chilean society. Combined together, this illuminated how Catholics had 
                                                
188 Ibid 634. 
 
 99 
been written out of scientific pursuits. In his article, ?La mujer de la ma?ana,? Catholic 
writer Esteban Lamy blamed the expansion of Enlightenment thinking for the loss of both 
female and Catholic political power. He argued that Enlightenment philosophy privileged 
secularism, a male ideal, pushing women and Catholics even further away from social 
influence. In addition, it also weakened the role of religious orders and their charitable 
work, places where women were equals to men in some cases. Enlightenment 
philosophers, and political progressives in general, believed that trained experts should 
replace religious charitable organizations. It comes as no surprise that those trained 
experts were typically men, while many of the religious orders involved in charity work 
were run by women.189 Lamy?s argument was not wholly incorrect. Enlightenment 
thinking did stress rationalism and anti-clericalism, ideologies that many felt did not 
mesh with feminine characteristics.190 It is unclear whether Lamy lamented this 
development because he was actually upset by women?s diminishing social power or 
because this signified a loss of power on the part of the Catholic Church. Just like the 
secular reformers he accused, he presumed a close relationship between women and 
                                                
189 Esteban Lamy. ?La mujer de ma?ana,? Article 3, La Revista Cat?lica, no. 263 (July 20, 1912): 
153-166. 161. 
 
190 While some scholars argued that women were not included in Enlightenment sentiments, others 
have shown that it was far more complex. The notion of the feminine had a role in natural philosophy that 
informed Enlightenment thinkers, even while actual women were overlooked, see: Bruce Burgett. 
Sentimental Bodies: Sex, Gender, and Citizenship in the Early Republic. Princeton: Princeton University 
Press, 1998. Sarah C. Chambers. From Subjects to Citizens: Honor, Gender and Politics in Arequipa, Peru, 
1780-1854. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1999. Arlene Diaz. Female Citizens, 
Patriarchs, and the Law in Venezuela, 1786-1904. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2004. Sarah 
Knott and Barbara Taylor. Women, Gender, and Enlightenment. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005. 
Londa Schiebinger. Nature?s Body: Gender in the Making of Modern Science. New Brunswick: Rutgers 
University Press, 1993. Theresa Ann Smith. The Emerging Female Citizen: Gender and Enlightenment in 
Spain. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006. 
 
 100 
Catholicism that meant a diminishing of women?s power affected the social influence of 
the Catholic Church. 
He believed in this close relationship because he contended that women were 
naturally moral beings. In the final article of his series, he wrote, ?But it is necessary to 
do justice to those philosophers that tried to suppress religious faith conserving at the 
same time the old morality: when they had succeeded the result was irreligion, they had 
the decency to feel afraid.?191 He believed that secular intellectuals had so long advocated 
for scientific social reform to create a modern social order that they did not recognize the 
risks this posed until it was too late. The result, according to Lamy, was a society without 
any sort of moral compass that was collapsing in sin, poverty and disease, a situation he 
believed Chile was experiencing in the 1910s. He called for a return of women?s social 
influence to restore Chilean society to its former glory. ?Now then, the woman is the 
natural enemy of disbelief and the new morality. The cult of materialism, the weakening 
of the family, the reign of force, they err in death the intellectuals, the heart and the 
interests of the woman.?192 By reintegrating women, and the Catholic Church, into 
modern Chilean political culture, the various social problems that resulted from 
immorality and capitalist economics would resolve themselves. 
 A brief article that appeared in La Revista Cat?lica four years later supported this 
contention. In the section detailing various foreign events, the anonymous author 
                                                
191 Esteban Lamy. ?La mujer de ma?ana,? Article 4, La Revista Cat?lica, no. 265 (August 17, 
1912): 310-326. 317. ?Pero es preciso hacer justicia a los filos?ficos que hab?an pretendido suprimir la fe 
religiosa conservando a la vez la moral antigua: cuando lograron por todo resultado la irreligi?n, tuvieron el 
valor de sentirse atemorizados.? 
 
192 Ibid 319. ?Ahora bien, la mujer es natural enemiga de la incredulidad y de la nueva moral. El 
culto a la material, el debilitamiento de la familia, el reinado de la fuerza, hieren de muerte la inteligencia, 
el coraz?n y los intereses de la mujer.? 
 101 
discussed the attempts by an English physiologist, Henry Charlton Bastian, to prove the 
spontaneous generation of life. Bastian had submitted a paper to the Royal Society, but 
that institution had rejected the paper?s findings.193 Nonetheless, the findings ?had been 
accepted, without the benefit of consideration, by our colleague ?El Mercurio?, which has 
made its own the frightful news to impress upon its readership as the last word in 
science.?194 The author?s implication was clear. Bastian labored to disprove a point that 
had been well settled among the scientific community since at least the 1860s in order to 
support his own materialist position. In addition, the secular leaning newspaper El 
Mercurio accepted Bastian?s results even when his own scientific colleagues would not. 
Together, this shows that Chilean materialists were equally committed to their ideological 
positions as their Catholic counterparts. Indeed, they even had their own scientific proof 
to support their opinions. 
 Alejandro Vicu?a?s The Harmony of Science and Religion: Scientific-Religious 
Conferences (1915) held much the same opinion regarding the symbiotic relationship 
between science and Catholicism. As a Presiding Bishop?s Officer, he had a similar 
pedigree to Vergara Ant?nez and was interested in similar issues. Originally delivered as 
a lecture and then turned into a monograph, this text was clearly popular amongst the 
Catholic intelligentsia in Chile and represents the upper echelons of clerical thought on 
the relationship between religion and science. Vicu?a stated that, ?For all time and 
amongst all peoples they have always distinguished two orders of knowledge: the one 
                                                
193 ?De nuevo la generaci?n espont?nea,? La Revista Cat?lica, no. 305 (April 18, 1914): 634-635. 
635. 
 
194 Ibid 634-635. ?ha sido aceptada, sin beneficio de inventario, por nuestro colega de ?El 
Mercurio?, el cual ha hecho suya la espantable noticia para propinarla a sus lectores como la ?ltima palabra 
de la ciencia.? 
 
 102 
attributed to heavenly revelations or coming from old traditions of religious character; the 
other, product or conquest of the individual force of human reason.?195 Though dividing 
knowledge into sacred and profane categories, Vicu?a did not argue that those categories 
were mutually exclusive or damaging to each other. This was because he believed all 
scientific activities fell under the latter category of human reason. While some 
materialists might argue that science was more than human reason alone, Vicu?a believed 
that human initiative and activity working in tandem with reason served as one type of 
knowledge. The other, more mystical knowledge was the result of pure philosophical 
debate and development. 
 Vicu?a argued that while scientists insisted on the infallibility and 
uncompromising nature of scientific discovery, Catholics were better equipped to 
interpret facts arising from both fields. As a result, unlike what secular social reformers 
often proposed, Catholics had a more accurate and realistic picture of the social problems 
affecting capitalist society because of their religious identity.196 For Vicu?a, then, Chilean 
Catholics were the obvious group to address social problems, as they were uniquely 
capable of understanding both the moral and physical implications of any social issue. 
This was complicated by the fact that he did not provide any concrete discussion of what 
sorts of interventions Catholics should make into the social question. Rather, he 
supported Catholic involvement in these issues on a broad scale. 
                                                
195 Alejandro Vicu?a. Armon?a de la ciencia y la fe: Conferencias Cientifico-religiosas. Santiago 
de Chile: Imprenta de San Jos?, 1915. 9. ?En todo tiempo y entre todos los pueblos se han distinguido 
siempre dos ?rdenes de conocimientos: el uno atribu?do a revelaciones del cielo o proveniente de antiguas 
tradiciones de car?cter religioso; el otro, producto o conquista del esfuerzo individual de la raz?n humana.? 
 
196 Ibid 59. 
 
 103 
The similarity of religion and science was also manifested in their communal 
natures. Vicu?a noted that religious and scientific ?truths? were only settled upon after 
thorough examination and consensus on the part of a community of experts. ?[T]he 
conduct of science and religion appear identical to me. Before admitting any truth, both 
are subject to rigorous examination which, when passed, begins to shape the patrimony of 
philosophical or religious reason.?197 Both religion and science were portrayed as being 
the result of communal examination and acceptance on the part of the intellectual 
communities that created them, showing that Catholic doctrine and scientific theory in 
Chile were both the result of knowledge production that privileged consensus. Many 
intellectuals understood this to be true for scientific communities, but Vicu?a extended 
this to apply to Catholic ones as well illustrating that Catholics were not dogmatists who 
blindly followed Church hierarchy. Rather, Catholic philosophy grew out of a meeting of 
the minds, just as scientific practices did. 
 Not only that, but for Vicu?a both religion and science served the same purpose. 
They were designed to better acquaint humanity with Truth. ?[I]t is clear, then, that 
religious truth has the same characteristics as scientific truth; it is universal, immutable, 
firm, impersonal?The cult of truth, in a word, is served by two worshippers: Religion 
and Science.?198 Rather than positing that either science or Catholicism was the more 
reliable means of understanding reality, Vicu?a stated that both were equally important to 
                                                
197 Ibid. ?[M]e parece id?ntica la conducta de la ciencia y de la religi?n. Antes de admitir 
cualquier verdad, ambas someten a la demandante a un severo examen, librado el cual, entra a figurar en el 
patrimonio de la raz?n filos?fica o de la raz?n religiosa.? 
 
198 Ibid 63. ?Es claro, entonces, que la verdad religiosa tiene los mismos caracteres de la verdad 
cient?ficas; es universal, inmutable, firme, impersonal?.El culto de la verdad, en una palabra, es servido 
por dos adoradores: la Religi?n y la Ciencia.? 
 
 104 
the difficult task.199 To truly understand human experience and the natural world, Vicu?a 
believed individuals needed both scientific and philosophical understanding. Failing that, 
one?s perception of reality would be skewed. 
 This position was popular throughout the first half of the twentieth century, but 
became increasingly more scientific and anti-capitalist over time as both the discursive 
power of scientific tropes increased and as Socialist movements garnered more political 
power in Chile. Victor Depassier?s The Death of Materialism: A Conference Dedicated to 
the Upper-Classes and the Students of Both Universities (1919) actively linked the 
popularity of materialist social movements like Socialism to the harsh economic realities 
of capitalist industrialization. ?Thus, it is explained why our workers and day laborers 
believe that religion symbolizes ignorance, deceit, misery, and how science implies the 
progressive concept of impiety, meaning the right to all sorts of grievances.?200 Depassier 
believed that the working classes were being fed the argument that religious leaders, and 
the Catholic Church generally, supported a status quo that exploited their labor. As such, 
they had become increasingly intransigent and disinterested in Catholic efforts to address 
these social issues. This quote illustrated Depassier?s concern that the working classes 
were looking for new, politically progressive leaders while the leaders of those groups 
                                                
199 This is an opinion shared by Giovanni No? as well. ?Fu? un error de los pensadores liberales 
del siglo pasado creer que la escuela podr?a subsistuir a la relijion en la tarea moralizadora de las masas.? 
?It was an error of the liberal thinkers of the last century to relieve that school could substitute for religion 
in the moralizing task of the masses.? Giovanni No?. La ciencia i los sentimientos humanitarios: 
conferencia leida en el Club de Se?oras el S?bado 25 de Noviembre de 1916. Santiago: Imprenta 
Universitaria, 1916. 25. 
 
200 Victor Depassier. La muerte del materialismo: Conferencia dedicada a las clases dirigentes y 
a los estudiantes de ambas Universidades. Santiago de Chile: Imprenta de San Jos?, 1919. VI. ?As? se 
explica que nuestros obreros y jornaleros creen que la religi?n significa ignorancia, enga?o, miseria, y que 
la ciencia implica el concepto progresista de la irreligiosidad, o sea el derecho a toda clase de 
reivindicaciones.? 
 
 105 
(read materialists and/or secularists) painted religion as the cause of increasing social 
disruption and discontent.201  
According to Depassier, however, religion was not the issue. Social difference 
was a biological fact, as evidenced in the works of Darwin and others, but capitalist 
industrialism had perverted the natural social order. Materialists who proposed that social 
difference was the result of capitalism alone were misinterpreting scientific facts. 
?[W]hen teaching the Darwinist doctrine, professors are obligated to implicitly recognize 
that the differences of all types that they observe in both organic and inorganic materials, 
are things that are necessary and natural to the social organism, just as bread and water 
are to the individual organism.?202 Depassier argued, however, that the acceptance of 
biological differences in human beings did not justify the exploitation of the lower 
classes. Growing social differentiation was caused by capitalist economic development 
that encouraged the gross exploitation of the lower classes in the interest of profit alone. 
While he did not propose that class difference itself was unnatural, the lower classes did 
have a natural role to play in Chilean society, Depassier felt that unfettered capitalist 
expansion had exaggerated this difference. Only a Catholic social reform program 
focused on a return to social responsibility and public morality on the part of the upper 
classes could improve this situation.  
As a philosophical text, Depassier did not offer much in the way of concrete 
recommendations for how Catholics could address this problem. Yet he did note that, 
                                                
201 Ibid. 
 
202 Ibid 4. ?Sin embargo, al ense?ar la doctrina darwinista, los profesores se ven obligados a 
reconocer impl?citamente que las diferencias de todo g?nero que se observan as? en lo org?nico como en lo 
inorg?nico, son cosas tan necesarias y naturales al organismo social, como lo son el agua y el pan al 
organismo individual.? 
 106 
?The principal object of this lecture is precisely to make young people understand that 
science is practiced to serve religion and between the two reigns a perfect harmony.?203 
Thus, involving young people in Catholic efforts to resolve social ills appeared to be an 
important factor. This was most likely born of a desire to maintain the Catholic Church?s 
political relevance. Depassier?s concerns about losing young people to the allure of 
politically progressive leaders touting scientific social reform as a panacea for all social 
problems prompted him to mitigate the differences between religion and science. 
Depassier, like Vergara Ant?nez before him, also asserted that materialism was a 
new faith. ?In Europe the philosophers, the thinkers and the politicians have received the 
discovery [of materialism] like a new Messiah, that comes to direct them down the 
[correct] path that humanity should follow in terms of political, economic and social 
issues.?204 This imagery spoke volumes about how Catholics in Chile viewed 
materialism. They applied their own religious experience to explain the popularity of 
materialism. By doing so, Catholics could actually engage with materialists on the same 
terms, as faithful believers. To do otherwise would have presented real difficulties in 
determining a Catholic course of action to respond to this new threat. 
As a counterpoint to these arguments in favor of religious and scientific 
symbiosis, Carlos Charlin?s 1934 article, ?The Two Truths,? represented the relatively 
unusual opinion that science and religion shared no common features. He wrote: 
                                                
203 Ibid IX. ?Precisamente el objeto principal de este trabajo es hacer comprender a la juventud 
que la ciencia se ha puesto al servicio de la religi?n y que entre ambas reina una perfecta armon?a.? 
 
204 Ibid III. ?En Europa los fil?sofos, los pensadores y los pol?ticos han recibido el descubrimiento 
[del materialismo] como a un nuevo Mes?as, que viene a se?alar el camino verdadero que debe seguir la 
humanidad en materia de orientaciones pol?ticas, econ?micas y sociales.? 
 
 107 
The scientific man looks at the world with open eyes, with eyes that are amplified 
and multiplied through the use of the microscope; he is an observer. The 
philosopher looks at the world with spirit, he sees the Earth through closed eyes; 
he does not study it, he considers it; he does not observe, he meditates; his mind 
does not take note or speculate. The one is a realist, only the fact and its 
immediate cause and its relationship to other facts interest him; the other is 
contemplative and lives in abstraction.205 
 
For Charlin, philosophers and scientists were not meant to share similar interests; their 
social functions were inherently different, if not in opposition. Philosophers pondered life 
without being able to provide definitive answers. Scientists could provide definitive 
answers about how natural laws worked, but they could not explain why those laws 
existed. Recognizing and respecting these spheres of influence was paramount. This 
opinion might be at least partially the result of the article being published in Estudios, a 
periodical strictly for Catholic study and contemplation produced by the Centro de 
Estudios Religiosos in Santiago. Though it represented some of the most conservative 
elements in the Chilean Catholic Church network, it was published from 1932 to 1957 
speaking to its longevity and popularity. 
Charlin?s staunch belief in the separate influence and value of religion and science 
created a situation in which Chilean Catholic involvement in the social question was 
problematic. However, he explained how Catholics could engage in science using French 
entomologist Jean-Henri Fabre (1823-1915) as an example. Fabre was an intellectual 
contemporary of Darwin, mostly active between 1862 and 1913, well known for studying 
insects and observing their behavior. However, he never proposed why insects behaved 
                                                
205 Carlos Charlin. ?Las Dos Verdades,? Estudios, no. 15 (February 1934): 3-14. 4. ?El hombre de 
ciencia mira el mundo con sus ojos muy abiertos, con sus ojos amplificados, multiplicados por el 
microscopio; es un observador. El fil?sofo mira el mundo con el esp?ritu, mira la tierra con los ojos 
cerrados; no la estudia, la considera; no observa, medita; su mente no anota, especula. El uno es realista, le 
interesan s?lo el hecho y su causa inmediata, su relaci?n con otro hecho; el otro es especulativo, vive en la 
abstracci?n.? 
 
 108 
as they did.206 To do so would mean that Fabre had stepped out of his role as a scientist 
and had become a philosopher. Philosophers, according to Charlin, were not equipped to 
practice science. This was a unique opinion. Most Catholic intellectuals connected the 
work of early natural philosophers, mostly men of faith, to current scientific work in an 
effort to demonstrate the symbiotic and historical relationship between religion and 
science. 
Charlin, on the other hand, argued that if Fabre had attempted to move beyond 
explaining how insect behavior worked, he would have compromised his position as a 
scientist. Instead, he recognized his scientific limitations precisely because he was 
Catholic. As such, he served as a model of an ideal Catholic scientist. His experiments 
and findings were beyond reproach in their methodology and exactitude, but they did not 
veer into ideological territory. Thus, Charlin was able to support Catholic involvement in 
science by arguing that Fabre?s Catholic identity did not prevent his entering into 
scientific investigation. Rather, this belief informed his practice of science to ensure that 
it was done properly; recognizing its limitations. Though the divorcing of natural 
philosophy from the history of science was unusual in Charlin?s case, Chilean Catholics 
argued that this type of limited, moral science needed to be infused into the social 
sciences to resolve the social question. 
Even though Charlin professed to argue for the separateness of religion and 
science, he used a variety of examples that troubled this approach. First, he recognized 
that religious truth and scientific truth shared some similarities. ?Religious truth has been 
revealed over the passing of thousands of years, and it reveals itself to us day by day, if 
                                                
206 Ibid. 
 109 
you observe spiritual life, like the wise man observes material life.?207 Here, both science 
and philosophy were developed over thousands of years of human experience. It seems 
that Charlin was influenced by previous scholarship on the complementarity of science 
and religion just enough to offer this small reprieve from his overall argument. This 
statement implied that both explained human experience to some degree. However, 
Charlin still ultimately argued that neither religion nor science could fully explain that 
experience. 
Charlin also specifically engaged with the debate surrounding evolution to prove 
this point. When discussing the continued existence of a type of fern in southern Chile, in 
the face of multiple efforts to exterminate it, he argued that the fern thrived in southern 
Chile because it had adapted to that environment. Its ability to adapt, according to 
Charlin, was the result of intelligent design; mixing both religious and scientific concepts. 
?These small facts are the manifestation of a fundamental truth, of a first principle, of the 
great truth, of the divine phenomenon, just as the small truths of the biological sciences 
are the manifestation of a first principle, the vital phenomenon.?208 Using biological facts 
to support the existence of a Divine Creator was an approach that was common amongst 
Chilean Catholic scholars. After all, the seeming immortality of this type of fern, 
combined with the natural laws of Darwinism that explained this phenomenon, seemed to 
work in tandem to support that contention. In fact, Charlin continued to say that being 
Christian allowed one to see the relationship between scientific findings and 
                                                
207 Ibid 7. ?La verdad religiosa ha sido revelada en el curso de miles de a?os, y se nos revela d?a a 
d?a, si se observa la vida espiritual, como el sabio observa la vida de la materia.? 
 
208 Ibid 13. ?Estos peque?os hechos son la manifestaci?n de una verdad fundamental, de un 
principio matriz, de la gran verdad, del fen?meno divino, as? como las peque?as verdades de las ciencias 
biol?gicas son la manifestaci?n de un principio matriz, del fen?meno vital.? 
 
 110 
philosophical ideas more easily.209 Thus, even Charlin?s article that began by stating that 
religion and science had no relationship with each other, concluded on a more ambiguous 
note. This demonstrates the discursive power of the complementarity trope among 
Chilean Catholic intellectuals in the first half of the twentieth century. 
Catholic Scientists as Role Models 
 Charlin?s article is useful in another way as well. His discussion of Jean-Henri 
Fabre formed part of another discursive trend amongst Chilean Catholic intellectuals. 
Many writers illustrated the symbiotic relationship between Catholicism and science by 
profiling Catholic scientists who served as role models. These profiles were meant to 
counterbalance secularist rhetoric that denied Catholic contributions to scientific 
development. Louis Pasteur, French chemist and microbiologist, was the most popular 
example of this type. This was first and foremost because his work in epidemiology and 
vaccination was groundbreaking on an international scale for the entire scientific 
community in the latter half of the nineteenth century. Even more important, Catholics 
argued that Pasteur?s work was specifically motivated by his Catholic desire to better the 
lot of humanity. 
Appearing in the El Diario Popular (EDP), a daily newspaper designed for 
working class Catholics, a brief 1902 article stated that Pasteur, ?Infinitely piteous of the 
weak, for those who suffer; [his] genius was stimulated by the thought of diminishing, 
through his works, the miseries and the pains of humanity, that made him say one day: ?It 
will be truly beautiful and useful to use this part of my heart in the progress of 
                                                
209 Ibid. ?Los hombres con vida religiosa, con vida cristiana, est?n adaptados al mundo tal cual es, 
tal cual se nos ofrece a los hombres en esta tierra.? 
 
 111 
science.??210 Pasteur?s Catholic obligation to do good works motivated him to study 
disease in order to ease human suffering. For Catholic intellectuals, both inside and 
outside Chile, this was the best example of how the marriage of science and Catholicism 
could benefit humanity at large and solve the social question. While Catholics could 
appreciate scientific experimentation simply for the sake of discovery, science designed 
to help the Catholic mission to resolve the social question was all the more warmly 
received. 
In addition to Pasteur?s altruism in scientific experimentation, this author 
appreciated his reliance on ?common sense? in his experiments.  
[Pasteur?s experimental] hypotheses are modest, laborious, humble. And much 
later, when he makes his discoveries?is it for the grandeur of the unexpected 
illumination? No, all his work is nothing more than the application of a method 
that is with in everyone?s reach, that does not boast of being [newly] invented, 
and which honors the great experimenters of centuries past.211 
 
Pasteur combined the best qualities of Catholic science. His work could be attributed to 
the power of human reason, his experiments could be easily repeated by the common 
man, and they were tied to a long tradition of Catholic science and scholarship. Not only 
that, but both Catholic and secular scientific communities equally lauded Pasteur?s 
achievements. He was the model exemplar of contemporary Catholic science at the turn 
of the century. And, like Fabre before him, he recognized his limitations. He knew that he 
                                                
210 ?Estatua de Pasteur,? El Diario Popular, no. 17 (September 22, 1902): 2. 2. ?Infinitamente 
piadoso para los d?biles, para los que sufren; [Pasteur] sent?a su genio estimulado con el pensamiento de 
disminuir, con sus trabajos, las miserias y los dolores de la humanidad, lo que le hac?a decir un d?a: ?Ser? 
muy hermoso y ?til hacer esta parte del coraz?n en el progreso de las ciencias?.? 
 
211 Ibid. ??Los principios [de Pasteur] son modestos, laboriosos, penosos.  Y m?s tarde, cuando 
hace sus descubrimientos--?es por efecto de iluminaciones repentinas?  N?, toda su obra no es sino la 
aplicaci?n de un m?todo que est? al alcance de todos, que no se jacta de haberlo inventado, y del cual hace 
honor ? los grandes experimentadores de los siglos pasados.? 
 
 112 
could not elucidate the origins of life or humanity through scientific experimentation and 
he did not try.212 
Another example of a Catholic scientist as role model appeared in La Revista 
Cat?lica the same year. A two-paragraph article mentioned the growing scientific 
interests of Pope Leo XIII. People throughout Vatican City initially thought that the Pope 
might be ill because his doctor was seen entering his chambers with a large microscope 
and a variety of surgical equipment. However, it turned out that the Pope wanted to be 
acquainted with the most recent scientific discoveries of the day. ?In the Italian dailies 
they mention?how interested the old Pontiff is in the advancements of modern 
science.?213 This article was meant to connect Chilean Catholics to current scientific 
developments by showing how even the Pope himself, the highest officer of the Church, 
was both interested in and aware of scientific discoveries. Instead of portraying the Pope 
as the arbiter of Catholic tradition, this article described him as a curious, modern 
potentate interested in new ideas. 
This trend continued in much the same way throughout the first half of the 
twentieth century, though there was a notable emphasis on Catholics working in the life 
sciences. Appearing in a September 1926 issue of La Revista Cat?lica, an article entitled 
?Scientific Chronicle?The Works of Fr. Wasmann, SJ? highlighted the work of Austrian 
Jesuit entomologist, Erich Wasmann. The author, identified as ?A.F.L.? but who was 
                                                
212 Pasteur was, however, able to disprove the theory of spontaneous generation. This was very 
much motivated by his religious beliefs, but has typically been discussed in terms of his work with 
fermentation. See: Patrice Debr?. Louis Pasteur, Elborg Forster (trans). Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 
1998. Gerald L. Geison. The Private Science of Louis Pasteur. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1995.  
 
213 ?Leon XIII y los progresos de la ciencia,? La Revista Cat?lica, no. 30 (October 18, 1902): 384. 
384. ?En los diarios italianos se refiere un hecho que manifiesta todo el inter?s del anciano Pont?fice por los 
progresos de la ciencia moderna.? 
 113 
most likely Arturo Fontecilla Larra?n, credited Wasmann with providing convincing 
proof against materialist monogenism; in other words, the premise that all life on Earth 
arose from one, original single-celled organism. ?Thus refuted absolute evolution, that 
from a single cell all forms of life arose, as says Haeckelian monism, Father [Wasmann] 
constructed his system, that is also evolutionist to a point, in that it admits the possibility 
of transformism that is not in conflict with sane philosophy.?214 Wasmann was able to 
discredit materialism while still providing Catholic intellectuals with an acceptable form 
of evolutionary theory. Not only that, but this form was first mentioned in La Revista 
Cat?lica as early as 1904.215 This allowed for Catholics to enter into the field of biology, 
and related disciplines, with relative ease and paved the way for later Catholic scientific 
exploration into evolution, a theme that will be discussed in more detail in the following 
chapter. 
Wasmann himself characterized his scientific work in the following way, ?I lend 
my skills as a naturalist, for God, for his love I do the smallest things as best as I am able; 
I would not dare to offer him anything poorly done.?216 Much like Vergara Ant?nez, 
Vicu?a and Depassier, this quote shows that Wasmann himself believed that his Catholic 
identity was integral to his scientific explorations. In fact, he argued that his Catholic 
dedication held him to a professional scientific standard above and beyond that of secular 
                                                
214 A.F.L. ?Cr?nica cient?fica-Los trabajos de P. Wasmann SJ,? La Revista Cat?lica, no. 599 
(September 18, 1926): 446-449. 448. ?Rechazada as? la evoluci?n absoluta, que parte de una c?lula ?nica 
para todos los seres vivos, como dice el monismo haeckeliano, construy? el padre su sistema, que es 
tambi?n evolucionista en parte al menos, pues admite lo aceptable que tiene el transformismo y que no est? 
en pugna con la sana filosof?a.? 
 
215 Ibid. 
 
216 Ibid 449. ?Yo presto mis servicios como naturalista, por Dios, por su amor hago las cosas m?s 
menudas lo mejor que me es posible; no me atrever?a a ofrecerle algo mal hecho.? 
 114 
scientists. Fontecilla Larra?n?s choice to include this quote showed that Chilean Catholics 
not only believed in the mutually beneficial relationship between religion and science but 
that they saw themselves as part of a larger Catholic scientific community that was 
international in scope. As such, their scientific community was as rich and diverse as that 
of their secular detractors. To prove this point even further, Fontecilla Larra?n?s 
concluded this article by listing the various professional organizations Wasmann was a 
part of during his lifetime. 
 
Chilean Catholic social reformers did not engage with science to merely maintain 
their social cache. The examples above demonstrate that most of them believed that 
science and religion were fundamentally intertwined and mutually reinforcing. As such, 
they could not sit by and let scientific debates about social reform occur without them. In 
fact, they contended that their presence was central to the proper functioning and 
application of scientific principles. The opinions articulated by Vergara Ant?nez, 
Depassier, Charlin and others provided new ways of looking at the relationship between 
Catholicism and science that provided new opportunities for Catholic charity and social 
reform with a specifically scientific character. This foundational literature was critical for 
Chilean Catholics who wanted to use eugenics to address social problems. By 
establishing their membership to the larger scientific community in a general way, 
Chilean Catholics could then specifically engage with eugenic social reform discourse. 
 115 
Chapter Three 
 
Man, the Monkey without a Tail? 
Eugenics, the Social Question and Catholicism in Chile 
 
 
Figure 4: ?Raz?n de la fuerza,? Zig-Zag, no. 220 (May 8, 1909). This cartoon illustrates the ?rule of force? 
as many Chileans understood it. However, it also demonstrates how competition for resources was based on 
eugenic concepts of evolution and fitness. From the Biblioteca Nacional. 
 
The cartoon above (see Figure 4), published in the popular pictorial magazine 
Zig-Zag in 1909, speaks to the widespread acceptance and deployment of eugenic 
 116 
concepts in early-twentieth-century Chile.217 Most intellectuals, reformers and scientists 
who supported eugenics as a means of resolving the social question in Chile understood 
social problems, or degeneration, through the prism of either Darwinian or Lamarckian 
evolutionary theory. Latin Americans, Chileans included, generally preferred the 
Lamarckian evolutionary model that emphasized the role of the environment in the 
acquiring of characteristics in contrast to Darwinian evolution which emphasized 
competition for resources as the catalyst for speciation and trait development. Accepting 
Lamarckism allowed for the possibility of gradual population improvement over time 
with the application of eugenic social reform, rather than encouraging the separation of 
unfit individuals from the rest of society by negative eugenic measures. Lamarckism was 
widely popular during the interwar period among scholars not only in Latin America, but 
in Great Britain and the United States as well.218  Focusing on the interwar period in 
Chile illuminates why Lamarckism was more appealing to certain scientists. Lamarckism, 
after all, allowed for forms of intervention that a strict Darwinian approach would not. 
Regardless of theoretical preference, Chilean social reformers understood the 
purpose of eugenics to be the encouragement of natural selection for desirable traits 
through competition and access to resources. Those who were better adapted for this 
competition got access to better resources and were therefore more fit. The cartoon 
illustrates the popular reception of this conceptual framework. It shows dogs competing 
to eat a sausage link hanging from an open window. Each tableau has a bigger dog 
                                                
217 ?Raz?n de la fuerza,? Zig-Zag, no. 220 (May 8, 1909). 
 
218 Peter J. Bowler. ?Scientific Attitudes to Darwinism in Britain and America,? in The Darwinian 
Heritage, David Kohn (ed). Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985. 650. Pietro Corsi and Paul J. 
Weindling. ?Darwinism in Germany, France, and Italy,? in The Darwinian Heritage, David Kohn (ed). 
Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985. 701. William B. Provine. ?Adaptation and Mechanisms of 
Evolution after Darwin: a Study in Persistent Controversies,? in The Darwinian Heritage, David Kohn (ed). 
Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985. 854. 
 117 
scaring off its competition. In the end, the biggest dog goes home with the sausage. While 
this cartoon?s treatment of evolutionary competition might be trite, it demonstrates the 
diffusion of evolutionary and eugenic concepts into popular culture and elucidates the 
way popular Chilean culture understood competition for resources in nature worked. 
Finally, this cartoon shows Chileans that only the strong survive in the struggle for life. 
 This attitude flew in the face of Catholic teaching and practice. Catholics did not 
believe that being ill suited for competition indicated a lack of eugenic fitness. Instead 
cooperation, through charitable works, was central to Catholic recommendations for 
resolving the social question. This emphasis on charity was one of the most important 
divides between Catholic and secular social reformers who wanted to use eugenics to 
address social problems. In the first half of the twentieth century, some secular Chilean 
eugenicists began to argue that Darwinian evolutionary theory proved that charity was 
not only useless, but verged on cruel. This position not only served to discredit Catholic 
charitable organizations such as hospitals, orphanages, and schools that had existed in 
Chile for almost a century, it also sought to curtail Catholic influence in the political 
debates about the social question. Catholic reformers countered these arguments, stating 
that while Darwinian evolutionary theory was faulty, Lamarckian evolutionary principles 
were sound. Thus, the field of eugenic science in Chile was turned into a battleground 
between experts who ultimately agreed that eugenics must be used to modernize the 
social order, but disagreed in their scientific ideologies. 
Skepticism regarding the possibility of evolutionary theory was not restricted to 
the upper echelons of Catholic intellectuals. The popular classes in Chile also were aware 
of this debate. The photo below, which also appeared in Zig-Zag, demonstrated the 
 118 
incredulity many Chileans felt at the idea that humans and primates shared a common 
ancestry (see Figure 5). Both children respond to the spider monkey in animal-like ways 
themselves. Their faces mirror that of the monkey. The photograph alone might be 
interpreted to suggest that evolution was a valid scientific theory by showing the facial 
similarities of the children and the monkey. However, when combined with the caption, 
?Could this be our cousin?? it implied the absurdity of evolutionary theory. These 
children bare no actual resemblance to the monkey that they are, in all likelihood, 
tormenting. Rather, their exaggerated mugs only point out the vast difference between 
humans and primates. The fact that the title of the photo was a question, rather  
 
Figure 5: F. de N. Krizwan, ?Este ser? nuestro primo?? Zig-Zag, no. 7 (April 2, 1905). The children aping 
the monkey are meant to emphasize the absurdity of premising that humans evolved from lesser animals. 
From the Biblioteca Nacional. 
 
than a statement, contributed all the more to the idea that evolution was not a creditable 
 119 
scientific theory.219 Therefore, it is clear that the anti-evolution position of some Chilean 
intellectuals was also understood on a popular level. It is important to remember that the 
elite debates regarding evolution and eugenics were intimately linked to real world issues 
such as hunger, poverty, and venereal disease. As such, popular notions of eugenics 
affected what social phenomena were identified as problems by both elite reformers and 
the people they sought to help. 
Chilean Eugenics: Local and Transnational Ideologies 
Debates about eugenic expertise often focused on what eugenic science actually 
was or the terminology that experts used. Both secular and Catholic Chilean social 
reformers typically cited Francis Galton?s definition of eugenics as the most accurate. 
This definition was available in the English-language text, An Introduction to Eugenics 
(1912), by the British scientists William Cecil Dampier Whetham and Catherine Durning 
Whetham. Galton defined eugenics as, ?the study of agencies under social control that 
may improve or impair the racial qualities of future generations either physically or 
mentally.?220 This definition did not mention competition for resources as a part of 
eugenic considerations. Rather, it focused on the social institutions that had an effect on 
human development. Whetham and Whetham continued on to say that, 
As thus defined, the subject [eugenics] includes the study of all agencies which 
have racial importance, whether those agencies are concerned with nature or with 
nurture, that is, with the natural qualities and gifts implanted in mankind by 
heredity, or with the development or suppression of those qualities or gifts by the 
outward circumstances of the life either of the individual or his parents. In other 
                                                
219 F. de N. Krizwan. ?Este ser? nuestro primo?? Zig-Zag, no. 7 (April 2, 1905): 16. 16. 
 
220 W.C.D. Whetham and C.D. Whetham. An Introduction to Eugenics. London: MacMillan & 
Co., Ltd., 1912. 1. 
 120 
words, it includes the study of the influence on race both of heredity and 
environment.221 
 
This definition was especially important for Chilean Catholic involvement in, and 
acceptance of, eugenics. Because eugenics was concerned with environment as well as 
heredity, Catholics felt that they had a place in debates regarding how to improve Chilean 
society. After all, they had been responsible for alleviating environmental factors in 
eugenic development for centuries through their charitable institutions. The focus on the 
environment also better fit with Lamarckian evolutionary theory, to which Catholics were 
more open. 
 Whetham and Whetham?s work, however, was also problematic for eugenicists 
who favored environmental reform efforts. The authors did not value the impact of 
environment in the same way that they did heredity. They argued that, ?Galton satisfied 
himself that heredity was far more powerful than environment?Hence Eugenics is 
concerned chiefly, though not exclusively, with the study of heredity and its bearing on 
social problems.?222 For them, heredity was far more important to eugenics than was the 
environment. However, Whetham and Whetham recognized that the connections between 
inheritable traits such as intelligence or dependability and social problems like poverty 
were complicated. In this concession, they allowed space for eugenicists who focused on 
environmental factors to play a role in the discipline. This illuminates how, even among 
more hard-line eugenicists, the boundary between environment and heredity was blurry. 
In Chile, this meant Catholics had space to use eugenic arguments to weigh in on the 
social question. 
                                                
221 Ibid. 
 
222 Ibid. 
 121 
 Perhaps most important to the development of a Catholic eugenics in Chile was 
Whetham and Whetham?s own recognition that some religious development was 
necessary for the, ?successful evolution of human society.?223 This admission 
demonstrated that religion and morality still mattered greatly to hard-line eugenicists, 
even if they believed that the environment was not terribly important to eugenic progress. 
A society with no moral compass whatsoever gave them pause. They were not alone in 
this. Many eugenicists who advocated a strictly secular approach to science and 
government welfare programming did not go so far as to condemn religion outright. They 
believed religious thinking was important to general social order. Not only that, but 
religious instruction encouraged a belief in the collective good that was vital to the 
success of any eugenic program in Chile or elsewhere.224 In this grey area, Chilean 
Catholic intellectuals flourished. 
While Chilean eugenicists created their own form of eugenic science, this was in 
conversation with developments in the North Atlantic eugenic community. Lothrop 
Stoddard?s The Revolt Against Civilization: The Menace of the Under Man (1922) arrived 
in Chile (as La amenaza del sub-hombre) in 1923. It was translated by Dr. Lucas Sierra to 
acquaint Chileans with foreign eugenic trends.225 Foreign eugenic monographs were 
available in Chile and to the Chileans who were interested in foreign eugenic discourse. 
Specifically, Stoddard?s book was originally published in the national daily newspaper, 
El Mercurio, making it available for widespread public consumption on the part of the 
                                                
223 Ibid 61. 
 
224 Nathan Hallanger. ?Eugenics and the Question of Religion,? in The Evolution of Evil.  
Gaymon Bennett, et al (eds). Gottingen, Germany: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2008. 307. 
 
225 Jos? Mar?a Caro R. ?Conferencia sobre el origen del hombre dada por el Sr. Obispo D. Jos? 
Mar?a Caro R.,? La Revista Cat?lica, no. 370 (January 6, 1917): 5-19. 16. 
 122 
Chilean populace as well.226 Even the most extreme forms of negative eugenic science 
were available for Chilean scientists and intellectuals to debate, illuminating how 
transnational eugenic discourse circulated in the country. The fact that negative eugenics 
was not practiced in Chile shows how Catholicism at the local level influenced the 
reception of North Atlantic texts and ideologies. 
 One of the ways that Stoddard?s book was unsuccessful in popularizing negative 
eugenics in Chile was his emphasis on whiteness. Stoddard?s argument was influenced by 
his belief in the protection and supremacy of whiteness as central to the practice of 
eugenic science, ?the inconvenience that we encounter at effecting, thanks to the 
advancements and progress of modern medicine, a social, charitable and pious selection,-
 -without permitting nature to affect it, as it did in previous times, natural selection,--that 
which drives us in many cases to not protect the most fit but the contrary.?227 Stoddard 
was not unusual in his belief that social welfare programming did not solve social 
problems. What is striking is that Sierra tacitly agreed to this assessment by translating 
Stoddard?s work. As a surgeon and government worker who proposed government social 
welfare programs to resolve this social question, this seems out of character. Sierra?s 
translation and dissemination of this work showed that he was not necessarily convinced 
that social reform would fix all of Chile?s social problems. However, Sierra?s opinion on 
this matter was not popular among other Chilean social reformers. 
                                                
226 Ibid 15-16. 
 
227 Lothrop Stoddard. La amenaza del sub-hombre, Lucas Sierra (trans). Santiago: Editorial 
Nascimento, 1923. 11. ?...el inconveniente que afrontamos al estar efectuando, merced a los adelantos y 
progresos de la medicina moderna, una selecci?n social, caritativa y de piedad,--sin permitir que la 
naturaleza efect?e, como en tiempos pret?ritos, la selecci?n natural,--lo que nos conduce en much?simos 
casos no a conservar al m?s apto sino por el contrario...? 
 123 
Stoddard?s work was also important because, though he was a relatively 
traditional eugenicist, he believed in the power of environment to affect change. ?The 
environment has much less importance to man then it does to inferior animals. This fact 
is of enormous importance.?228 As a strict Darwinist, he should not have posited that the 
environment affected animals differently than it did humans. Rather, the environment 
ought to have had the same influence for all living organisms. Stoddard?s argument 
illuminated how, even among hard-line eugenicists, ideas about the impact of the 
environment on evolution were muddled, allowing a wider interpretation of evolutionary 
proofs.229 His statement also shows that he believed there was an important difference 
between humans and animals, even if evolution applied to them both. This meant 
Catholic eugenicists who preferred Lamarckism could comfortably enter into debates 
about social reform with equally meaningful scientific data to back their position. 
 By the 1930s, the foreign texts that arrived in Chile were mostly concerned with 
what North Atlantic eugenicists considered to be Latin American confusion about how 
evolution and heredity actually worked together. Leonard Darwin?s ?Qu? es la 
eugenesia? was designed to address this concern. One of Charles Darwin?s sons, Leonard 
Darwin spent his early life as a solider and then became a politician in the 1890s. In 
1911, he succeeded his cousin Francis Galton as the Chairman of the British Eugenic 
                                                
228 Ibid. ?El medio ambiente tiene mucho menos importancia en el hombre que en los animales 
inferiores.  Este hecho es de una enorme importancia.? 
 
229 Stoddard also mentions how important scientific proofs are to modern times. ?En otras edades 
se busc? la verdad en los labios de los visionarios y de los profetas; en nuestra ?poca se la busca en la 
prueba cient?fica.? 38. 
 
 124 
Society and remained in that position until 1928.230 What is Eugenics? was originally 
published in London in 1928 and was published in Santiago in 1930. Swiss 
anthropologist Eugene Pittard wrote the introduction for the version that issued in Chile. 
Pittard was a professor at the University of Geneva and became famous for his study of 
skulls from a variety of European cultures. In his introduction, Pittard stated that, ?This 
little book by Darwin is simple, clear and well organized, therefore, accessible to 
everyone, even the least informed reader. My wish would be that it amply diffuse among 
Latin peoples, where eugenic concerns have been less established.?231 From Pittard?s 
perspective, Latin eugenics was not developing properly. By introducing Darwin?s book 
to Latin scholars, Pittard hoped to correct this problem by explaining how heredity, 
evolution, and eugenics worked together. 
 In the book, Darwin first approached the problem regarding a lack of evidence 
supporting evolutionary theory. ?We accept the facts [of evolution] as evident, though 
doubts and difficulties constantly present themselves when one tries to apply to man the 
knowledge we possess about animals.?232 While he recognized that the application of 
laws governing animal development to human development might be difficult, he argued 
that this was the truth. The growing evidence that did exist and the undeniable logic of 
                                                
230 A.W.F. Edwards. ?Darwin, Leonard (1850-1943),? Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. 
New York: Oxford University Press, 2004. 
 
231 Eugene Pittard. ?Introduction,? in Leonard Darwin, ?Qu? es la eugenesia? Modo de mejorar 
la Raza Humana. Madrid: Ediciones Morata, 1930. 13. ?Este librito de Leonard Darwin es sencillo, claro y 
bien ordenado; por tanto, accesible a todo el mundo, aun al lector menos informado. Mi deseo ser?a que se 
difundiera ampliamente entre los pueblos latinos, por ser donde las preocupaciones eugen?sicas han 
arraigado menos.? 
 
232 Leonard Darwin. ?Qu? es la eugenesia? Modo de mejorar la Raza Humana. Madrid: 
Ediciones Morata, 1930. 37. ?Nosotros aceptamos estos hechos [de la evoluci?n] como evidentes, si bien se 
presentan constantemente dudas y dificultades cuando se trata de aplicar al hombre los conocimientos que 
poseemos acerca de los animales.? 
 125 
evolutionary theory were enough to counteract any doubts one might have regarding its 
validity. After all, accomplished and well recognized scientists accepted evolution as fact, 
once again demonstrating that science was increasingly seen as a discipline controlled by 
a small group of experts. When those experts reached a consensus, the debate was 
considered resolved. Whether common people understood, or accepted, the scientific 
findings was irrelevant to Darwin. 
 Darwin shared the opinion of Whetham and Whetham that eugenics indicated that 
social reform and welfare programs were useless. ?If we accept the scientific truth we 
cannot agree with the opinion that care and education given to man constitute a practical 
method of improving the race.?233 Allowing undesirables to continue to survive on 
government handouts did nothing to help them, nor did it help the race. Rather, it allowed 
unfit individuals to thrive, ultimately weakening the race. To combat this, Darwin 
recommended two methods of discouraging undesirables from having children. The first 
was moral suasion; the second, legislation. He argued that persuasion was always 
preferable to imposing upon the rights of individuals.234 However, he was not completely 
opposed to the use of legal force if it were necessary. 
This of course raised issues about what was appropriate intervention into the 
private lives and reproductive decisions of individuals. Darwin responded by writing, ?It 
is clear that locking up a human is repugnant to us at an instinctive level, because of the 
fact that all of us aspire to be free; but, in reality can we really call a mental defective 
                                                
233 Ibid 42. ?Si aceptamos la verdad cient?fica no se puede estar de acuerdo con la opini?n de que 
los cuidados y educaci?n dados al hombre constituyen un m?todo pr?ctico de mejora de la raza.? 
 
234 Ibid 80. 
 126 
free??235 Though he was writing about the incarceration of mentally challenged 
individuals, this premise could be expanded to apply to any unfit individuals. By virtue of 
one?s status as unfit Darwin argued that one was not truly free to make his or her own 
decisions. In these cases, then, it ought not be a concern that government experts 
compelled individuals to accept eugenic intervention into their private lives. After all, 
stipulated Darwin, ?Each and every one of us suffers the consequences that derive from 
the presets of incapables and inferiors.?236 Social problems and unfit individuals affected 
the whole nation in a negative way. Thus, it was the responsibility of the government to 
monitor these individuals. 
 Secular Chilean scientists were also confronted with how to resolve eugenics, 
which focused on the comparison and competition of individuals, with social reform, 
which focused on improving the lives of all Chileans collectively. Bernardino Quijada 
Burr, a professor of the natural sciences, who served as director of the zoology and 
botany division of the Museo Nacional, and was a self-proclaimed Darwinist, explored 
these issues in two books, Curso de Zooloj?a and La teor?a de la evoluci?n.237 Curso de 
Zooloj?a (1913) included humans in the same table as primates and other mammals, 
showing that he believed humans were a part of the evolutionary process. 238 However, it 
                                                
235 Ibid 117-118. ?Claro est? que el encerrar un ser humano nos repugna de manera instintiva, por 
el hecho de que todos aspiramos a la libertad; pero ?es que en realidad puede darse el nombre de libre a un 
d?bil mental aun cuando est? en libertad?? 
 
236 Ibid 161. ?Todos y cada uno de nosotros sufrimos las consecuencias que se derivan de la 
presencia de incapaces e inferiores.? 
 
237 Carlos Pinto Duran (ed). Diccionario Personal de Chile. Santiago de Chile: Imp. Claret, 1921. 
210-211. 
 
238 Bernardino Quijada Burr. Curso de Zooloj?a. Santiago de Chile: Imprenta Universitaria, 1913. 
115. 
 127 
was clear that humans were the pinnacle of that process and held a special place in the 
natural world. Considering humans to be special animals allowed Quijada Burr to 
straddle the supposed divide between eugenics and social reform. While animals were 
always subject to the Darwinian laws of selection, Lamarckian laws could apply to 
humans. This conceded that environment did seem to play a role in how humans 
developed more than it did for animals. 
Quijada Burr argued that Darwinian evolutionary theory was supported by the 
numerous morphological similarities between certain species and an increasingly 
complete fossil record.239 Yet, he recognized that there were certain obstacles standing in 
the way of general, popular Chilean acceptance of evolutionary theory. One such 
difficulty was the, ?Impossibility of explaining with natural selection, the differentiation 
of purely morphological characteristics.?240 While environmental factors might explain 
the development of certain forms and structures in biology natural selection did not. 
Quijada Burr noted that it was easy to find morphological similarities between organisms 
that developed in similar environments, but that did not necessarily guarantee that those 
similarities arose from natural selection. In fact, the similarities of organic structures 
might actually imply that environment played a more important role in deciding how new 
traits emerged than natural selection or heredity. 
Another problem facing Quijada Burr when trying to popularize Darwinism in 
Chile was that it was very hard to find visible proof of evolution at work. ?It is 
impossible to prove by direct observation, the certainty of evolutionary theory of wild 
                                                
239 Bernardino Quijada Burr. La teor?a de la evoluci?n. Santiago de Chile: Imprenta Universitaria, 
1917. 7. 
 
240 Ibid 8. ?Imposibilidad de esplicar mediante la selecci?n natural, la diferenciaci?n de las 
caract?res puramente morfol?jicos?? 
 128 
animals, because for the transformation of organic forms under the natural conditions of 
life, one needs time lapses that do not allow man to confirm the variations that have 
happened in organisms.?241 Darwinian evolution required thousands of years for a new 
trait to develop and even longer to differentiate a new species. Therefore, there was no 
direct observable data that scientists could collect to prove evolution was occurring at all. 
Lack of observable proof went against standard scientific practice in the period, which 
lauded the scientific method of experimentation and direct observation.242 Quijada Burr 
was not the only scientist to accept Darwinism without this sort of proof, but his 
acceptance of Darwinian evolutionary theory demonstrates how the practice of science 
itself had begun to change. Common sense and direct observation that any person could 
do (theoretically) were starting to lose ground to the belief that scientific expertise was 
specialized and limited to a select few. 
 Quijada Burr also felt that too many Chileans disagreed with Darwinian evolution 
on religious grounds. But he explained that religion and evolution were not mutually 
exclusive. He wrote, ?This idea that an evolution or gradual progressive development of 
the species in the diverse paleontological ages, is a very ancient philosophical concept 
and it has never invaded religious terrain nor has it ever pretended to alter the essence of 
                                                
241 Ibid 78. ?Imposible es comprobar por la observaci?n directa, la certeza de la teor?a de la 
evoluci?n de los seres silvestres; porque para la trasformaci?n de la formas org?nicas bajo condiciones 
naturales de la vida, se exijen lapsos de tiempo de que no dispone el hombre para constatar las variaciones 
que en los organismos se han operado.? 
 
242 Edward J. Larson. Summer for the Gods: the Scopes Trial and America?s Continuing Debate 
Over Science and Religion. New York: Basic Books, 1997. Larson argues that William Jennings Bryant 
was ultimately unsuccessful in his case against John Thomas Scopes because he did not recognize that the 
practice of science had changed. He contends that Jennings Bryant clung to the scientific method, while the 
scientific community and the American people had increasingly accepted that science was meant for 
experts. 
 129 
the sacred books, as is generally believed.?243 Quijada Burr argued that the idea that 
species became more complicated over time was one that had existed long before 
Darwin. It was proven in the fossil record and the historical record that species had 
changed or gone extinct. For him, this bore no relation to religious faith or practice. As 
such, he felt Chilean Catholics could accept Darwinian evolutionary theory with no 
difficulty. 
 He specifically noted that the work of Saint Augustine of Hippo connected 
religious thinking to evolutionary theory. Quijada Burr argued that Saint Augustine 
posited that the word ?day? in Genesis was meant to imply an incalculable amount of 
time. This allowed for Catholic cosmovisions to include evolutionary theory. He also 
argued that Saint Augustine believed that life on Earth evolved from ?original germs? 
which were created by God.244 According to Quijada Burr, Christian thinkers already 
accepted that evolution from simple to complex life forms occurred. He felt contended 
that religious objections to evolution were misplaced. In fact, he stated, religious men had 
actually been arguing for centuries that something like evolution existed, Chilean 
Catholics simply needed to be reminded of what their own thinkers wrote. This was a 
rather unusual position among secular scientists, but it suggests that there was enough 
flexibility in the science to allow for religious interpretations of the same facts. 
 While Quijada Burr believed that Catholics did not accept evolutionary theory, 
many Chilean Catholic intellectuals of the period did believe in evolution and discussed it 
                                                
243 Quijada Burr, Evoluci?n, 9. ?Esta idea de una evoluci?n o desarrollo progresivo gradual de las 
especies en las diversas edades paleontol?jicas, es un concepto filos?fico mui antiguo i nunca ha invadido 
el terreno relijioso ni jam?s ha pretendido alterar el sentido de los libros sagrados, como se cree 
jeneralmente.? 
 
244 Ibid 10. 
 130 
in much the same terms he did. In an article in La Revista Cat?lica appearing in the same 
year as Quijada Burr?s book, Jos? Mar?a Caro R. wrote, ?we do not reject an evolutionary 
movement that has God at its origin, Supreme Being, independently intelligent, we do not 
reject that living organisms have been born from inorganic material, but obeying the 
creative will of God.?245 Caro R.?s argument was almost exactly that of Saint Augustine?s 
original germs. His article demonstrates that some Chilean Catholics accepted the 
premise that life arose from inert material, much like scientists of the period did. 
However, Catholic scientists attributed evolution to the power of God, whereas secular 
scientists believed evolution was the result of a random series of events. 
To combat this latter belief, Caro R. argued that believing in a rational form of 
evolution actually proved God?s existence.246 After all, if one accepted that humans were 
the ultimate expression of evolutionary development, as Quijada Burr seemed to, then 
there had to be some sort of ordering force or principle to the evolutionary process. 
Humans were so clearly the pinnacle of the evolutionary process, this could not have 
happened at random. Human reason affirmed humanity?s uniqueness among the various 
forms of life on Earth and this implied the existence of a divine plan and creator. Human 
exceptionalism created common ground because very few intellectuals, secular or 
religious, could accept the idea that humans were not the ultimate and intended goal of 
evolution. 
 Though secular and Catholic scientists agreed that humans were special, there was 
still disagreement about the mechanisms of evolution. Materialism, the belief that the 
                                                
245 Caro R. 6. ??no rechazamos un movimiento de evoluci?n que tiene por principio a Dios, Ser 
Supremo, soberanamente inteligente, no rechazamos que los organismos vivientes hayan nacido de la 
materia inorg?nica, pero obedeciendo a la voluntad creadora de Dios?? 
 
246 Ibid 7. 
 131 
universe was the result of random and unpredictable interactions between matter, was not 
something Catholic intellectuals could accept. Returning to evolutionary theory, Caro R. 
used the term ?materialist? to discuss those individuals who believed evolution was the 
result of random chance. This terminology was widely used among Catholic intellectuals 
at the time in denouncing strict Darwinian evolution and the eugenic reforms growing 
from it. Materialists were often the reformers who favored the most uncompromising 
negative eugenic measures to resolve the social question. Caro R. disagreed with 
materialist philosophy most strongly on this point. Materialism proposed that all matter in 
the universe was subject to the same laws, making human beings not unique and thus 
incapable of truly managing social problems. This went against the religious ideal that all 
humans are inherently free and can make choices based on rational thought.247 Though 
Catholics believed in a divine plan, they also stressed that the free will of the individual 
and the dignity of the human person were central to this larger plan. This explains the 
potential for confrontation between eugenics and Catholic thinking. Eugenics proposed 
that no one was free from their hereditary make-up and, as a result, people should be 
monitored and controlled by outside parties in order to reproduce effectively. This was in 
conflict with virtually all Catholic teachings regarding free will, family and marriage.248 
                                                
247 Ibid 12. 
 
248 For an analysis of free will in relationship to marriage partners, see: Patricia Seed. To Love, 
Honor, and Obey in Colonial Mexico: Conflicts Over Marriage Choice, 1574-1821. Stanford: Stanford 
University Press, 1988. Ann Twinam. Public Lives, Private Citizens: Gender, Honor, Sexuality, and 
Illegitimacy in Colonial Spanish America. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1999. For general 
discussions of how Catholicism conceptualized human agency in relationship to God?s plan see: Margaret 
Chowning. Rebellious Nuns: The Troubled History of a Mexican Convent, 1752-1863. New York: Oxford 
University Press, 2006. Jacques Maritain. The Rights of Man and Natural Law. New York: Scribner, 1943. 
Pamela Voekel. Alone Before God: the Religious Origins of Modern Mexico. Durham: Duke University 
Press, 2002. 
 
 
 132 
Additionally, secular and Catholic social reformers disagreed about who these outside 
parties would be.  
 Most Chilean Catholic social reformers placed a premium on the role 
environment played in the development of the individual and the race. Julio Restat C. 
wrote in his 1924 article, ?El evolucionismo frente a la existencia de Dios demostrada por 
el origen de la vida,? ?Lamarckism considers the organism as active; Darwinism, merely 
passive; Lamarckism is vitalist; Darwinism materialist.?249 Appearing in La Revista 
Cat?lica, this series of articles showed that Catholic thinkers did not object to 
evolutionary ideas outright. Instead, they believed that the primary factor in evolutionary 
development was environment, not heredity. The emphasis on vitalism, or the ideology 
that all living things are inherently different from non-living things based on the 
possession of a special energy that some argued was the soul, also further proved that 
human and animal life was the result of a divine plan. Finally, emphasis on the 
environment allowed for the existence of charitable social institutions and, in fact, 
supported the idea that they were necessary to the advancement and perfection of the 
race. 
 To support this, Restat C. wrote that heredity was not important to the evolution 
of traits but, rather, was only the means by which traits were transmitted from parent to 
offspring.250 This meant that environment was much more important to the evolution and 
progress of the human species. Yet he also cautioned against believing that environment 
                                                
249 Julio Restat C. ?ESTUDIOS FILOS?FICOS-El evolucionismo frente a la existencia de Dios 
demostrada por el origen de la vida,? Article 2 La Revista Cat?lica, no. 550 (July 5, 1924): 24-37. 25. ??el 
Lamarckismo considera el organismo activo; el Darwinismo, meramente pasivo; el Lamarckismo es 
vitalista; el Darwinismo materialista.? 
 
250 Ibid 26. 
 133 
alone could affect human evolution. ?But to no one is it hidden that the environment 
alone is enough and it is not capable of developing existing aptitudes and far from 
producing them. It is to exaggerate the influence of the environment to believe them 
capable of creating species.?251 While the environment played an important role in human 
evolution, it was God that ultimately controlled this process. Restat C. argued that an 
organ as complex as the human eye could not develop from the random process of use 
and disuse of organs that Lamarck proposed.252 Nor could Darwin?s natural selection be 
held responsible for the creation of an entirely new species.253 These developments and 
the apparent perfection of organisms in nature proved the existence of a divine creator. 
 In addition to championing the role of the environment, Restat C. specifically 
attacked Darwinian evolutionary theory. He argued that the theory was flawed because 
the strong did not always survive. Dinosaurs, seemingly quite strong animals, did not 
survive.254 This indicated that natural selection, as envisioned by Darwin, did not 
function. Second, Darwin stated that the variations in a given individual trait were very 
small. If they were so small, then how could they be said to offer any advantage at all?255 
In this light, natural selection could not possibly occur because there was no new trait to 
select. Finally, he mentioned that there was still no observable proof of natural selection 
                                                
251 Ibid 29. ?Pero a nadie se le oculta que el ambiente por s? solo no basta y no es capaz sino de 
desarrollar aptitudes ya existentes lejos de producirlas. Es exagerar la influencia de los medios creerlos tan 
poderosos para atribu?rles la creaci?n de las especies.? 
 
252 Ibid. 
 
253 Ibid. ?La selecci?n o elecci?n de los procreadores y otros diferentes factores han producido 
una nueva variedad o raza; pero jam?s se ha logrado constitu?r una nueva especie.? 31. 
 
254 Ibid 32. 
 
255 Ibid 35. 
 134 
at work.256 Restat C. argued that those who did believe in Darwinian evolution had 
misinterpreted the evidence available to them. ?The important thing is, as said Lamarck, 
the father of Evolutionism, not to confuse the watch with the watchmaker, nature with its 
author, the effect with its cause.?257 The apparent perfection of nature did not prove the 
existence of a set of natural laws, but the existence of a divine order created by a 
supernatural force. 
Secular Chilean eugenicists were not concerned about proving the existence of 
God. In fact, they often blamed the relative failure to institute or legislate eugenic 
programs and measures on Catholic preoccupation with religious issues. Luis Hern?ndez 
Alfonso?s Eugenesia y Derecho a Vivir (1933) argued against what he perceived to be 
Catholic opposition to eugenic legislation. ?We are not, nor can be we enemies of 
Eugenics; but we are supporters of justice; and as both are compatible?We believe the 
Church?s (or better said its ministers) opposition to the eugenic campaign is stupid.?258 
This statement implied that Catholic clergy members were wrong headed in their active 
blocking of eugenic legislation efforts. Hern?ndez Alfonso?s statement showed how 
secular intellectuals used Catholic objections to certain aspects of negative eugenics as a 
heuristic tool to discredit all Catholic efforts at eugenic social reform. Secular writers 
                                                
256 Julio Restat C. ?ESTUDIOS FILOS?FICOS-El evolucionismo Frente a la existencia de Dios 
demostrada por el origen de la vida,? Article 3, La Revista Cat?lica, no. 552 (August 2, 1924): 163-172. 
163. 
 
257 Julio Restat C. ?ESTUDIOS FILOS?FICOS-El evolucionismo Frente a la existencia de Dios 
demostrada por el origen de la vida,? Article 4, La Revista Cat?lica, no. 553 (August 16, 1924): 250-257. 
257. ??lo que interesa es, como dec?a Lamarck, el padre del Evolucionismo, no confundir el reloj con el 
relojero, la naturaleza con su autor, el efecto con su causa...? 
 
258 Luis Hern?ndez Alfonso. Eugenesia y Derecho a Vivir. Madrid: Ediciones Morata, 1933. 16. 
?No somos, no podemos ser enemigos de la Eugenesia; pero somos partidarios de la justicia; y como ambas 
cosas son compatibles?Creemos est?pida la oposici?n hecha por la Iglesia (o mejor dicho por sus 
ministros) a la campa?a eugenista.? 
 135 
argued that Catholics categorically opposed all eugenic science and the corresponding 
social renewal and progress it would foster. 
 Hern?ndez Alfonso was sensitive to certain difficulties eugenic reform efforts 
presented. He candidly discussed the challenges in controlling sexual contact between 
people. He argued that eugenicists typically discussed sex only in terms of reproduction 
and that many political liberals discussed sex as a purely pleasurable encounter. 
Hern?ndez Alfonso argued, ?Both interpretations are unacceptable?To suggest that the 
sexual act is, simply, a function to perpetuate the species, is to negate the quality that 
distinguishes man from beast; to affirm that the only objective of sex is pleasure, is to 
consider man a being apart, without being subject to the biological principles of 
reproduction.?259 He recognized that there were other factors involved in human sexual 
behavior than the desire for procreation or pleasure. Treating humans like animals did not 
recognize the complexity of human interaction and behavior. Treating sex as only a 
means of getting pleasure freed humans from their eugenic reproductive responsibilities. 
Only an awareness of the emotional and physical sexual impulses could hope to inform a 
responsible eugenic program. A comprehensive eugenic sexual reform program had to 
see and accept the complexities of human sexual behavior. 
He also argued that if and when eugenicists did address the issue of sexual 
impulses, they discussed them in terms of trying to stamp out the spontaneity of the 
sexual encounter to encourage responsible reproduction. Hern?ndez Alfonso had a very 
dim view of this approach. ?It is a fatal error to proceed as though instincts and desires do 
                                                
259 Ibid 53-54. ?Ambas interpretaciones son inaceptables?Sostener que el acto sexual es, 
simplemente, una funci?n para perpetuar la especie, es negar al hombre cualidad alguna que lo distinga de 
los irracionales; mas afirmar que el objetivo ?nico de lo sexual es el placer, equivale a considerar al hombre 
como ser aparte, sin sometimiento a los principios biol?gicos de la reproducci?n.? 
 136 
not exist?It is and will always be stupid to think that suppressing the symptoms 
suppresses the disease. If instinct exists, the natural thing [to do] is to adequately satisfy 
it.?260 He advocated for better understanding sexual impulses, so that they could be 
properly and eugenically controlled. Discussing sex only in terms of reproduction ignored 
the fact that most human beings engaged in sexual activities for a myriad of reasons. For 
Hern?ndez Alfonso, to discuss sex only terms of reproduction actually made eugenicists 
no better than religious figures who advocated the same thing though for different 
reasons. 
Where secular and Catholic social reformers fundamentally disagreed was the 
subject of sterilization to achieve eugenic goals. The secular academy?s position 
regarding sterilization and eugenics generally was somewhat open to sterilization in 
theory.261 Ernesto Hechenleitner Trautmann?s undergraduate law thesis for the 
Universidad de Chile, Herencia morbosa y su correctivo eugenesico (1936), represented 
a favorable attitude toward sterilization. He argued that, ?sterilization, is the product not 
of a unique principle but the consequence of scientific, social, religious, political and 
economic ideas of the era and current societies. It is the law of evolution that all change, 
                                                
260 Ibid 67. ?Es un error funesto proceder como si no existiesen instintos y deseos?Es y ser? 
siempre est?pido pensar que suprimiendo los s?ntomas se suprime el mal. Si el instinto existe, lo natural es 
alcanzarlo adecuadamente.? 
 
261 Sterilization in Chile can be contextualized in a growing global effort to manage population 
size. In fact, it was often a part of debates about birth control and responsible motherhood, see: Laura 
Briggs. Reproducing Empire: Race, Sex, Science, and U.S. Imperialism in Puerto Rico. Berkeley: 
University of California Press, 2002. Matthew Connelly. Fatal Misconception: the Struggle to Control 
World Population. Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2008. Jadwiga E. Pieper 
Mooney. The Politics of Motherhood: Maternity and Women?s Right?s in Twentieth-Century Chile. 
Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2009. Rosen 2008. However, sterilization also has a negative 
eugenic context that was informed by the popularity of fascism and Nazism in Chile, see: P. Baccheta and 
Margaret Power. Right Wing Women: From Conservatives to Extremists around the World. New York: 
Routledge, 2002. Stein Ugelvik Larsen. Fascism Outside Europe: the European Impulse against Domestic 
Conditions in the Diffusion of Global Fascism. New York: Columbia University Press, 2001. 
 137 
modify or transform.?262 He believed that sterilization was a tool that ought to be used to 
improve the quality of Chilean citizens. With judicious application of sterilization, 
unwanted traits would be effectively weeded out much more quickly than by positive 
eugenic measures alone. And, as such, the need for sterilizations would subsequently 
diminish in a corresponding manner.263 Hechenleitner Trautmann?s thesis was primarily 
an analysis of the effectiveness of the German sterilization law, passed in July 1933. He 
contended that sterilization was the highest form of humanitarianism because it would not 
condemn unfit individuals to a life of hardship.264 Those who were unfit were not capable 
of adapting to modern life and its demands. Their only options were to live in poverty or 
die as a result of disease. Why curse them to a future of reproduction to only make more 
people who would suffer the same fate? For Hechenleitner Trautmann, it was more 
humane to prevent them from having children who would only continue this cycle of 
misery. This perspective was the most extreme among secular Chilean eugenicists and 
the most distasteful to Chilean Catholics. 
Guillermo Millas Parada?s Eugenesia y Derecho, a thesis to receive his bachelor?s 
degree in law and social science from the Universidad de Chile, was more conservative 
regarding negative eugenic measures. He stated that eugenics (of a sort) had been 
practiced for thousands of years by various cultures, specifically mentioning ancient 
Spartan traditions as examples to demonstrate that eugenics was not a new phenomenon 
                                                
262 Ernesto Hechenleitner Trautmann. Herencia morbosa y su correctivo eugenesico. Santiago: 
Universidad de Chile, 1936. ??la esterilizaci?n, es un producto no resultante de un principio ?nico sino 
consecuencia de las ideas cient?ficas, sociales, religiosas, pol?ticas y econ?micas de la ?poca y sociedades 
actuales. Es la ley de la evoluci?n que todo lo cambia, modifica o transforma.? 
 
263 Ibid 55. 
 
264 Ibid. 
 138 
and should not be considered amoral.265 Rather, he argued, modern eugenics was the 
scientific application of the principles of natural selection proven by the work of both 
Darwin and Lamarck to human beings.266 This position was striking for a number of 
reasons. First, Millas Parada combined the theories of Darwinian and Lamarckian 
evolution. Most Chilean eugenicists favored one theory or the other. Millas Parada?s 
mixture of Lamarck and Darwin was unique among Chilean eugenicists. This position 
allowed him to pick and choose certain aspects of eugenics as viable in the Chilean 
national context. 
Overall, Millas Parada did not support negative eugenics. In fact, he argued, ?But 
reality also imposes on one the negative action of Eugenics?having to then employ 
energetic and cruel measures, like sterilization. On this point, without fortunate Eugenics, 
one easily runs the risk of failure, but one cannot reject its general aim.?267 He believed 
that the end result of eugenics was too promising to shy away from potentially 
uncomfortable actions. Nonetheless, he considered it a failure of eugenic programming if 
negative eugenic measures got out of control. Negative eugenics was a tool that ought to 
be used only when all other positive eugenic measures had failed. The utility of negative 
eugenic measures, especially sterilization, could not be denied but they were distasteful to 
Millas Parada and many other Chilean eugenicists because of their obvious disregard for 
an individual?s rights or well being. He felt that most effective eugenic practices relied on 
                                                
265 Guillermo Millas Parada. Eugenesia y Derecho. Santiago de Chile: Empresa Periodistica <La 
Nacion>, S.A., 1936. 11-12.  
 
266 Ibid 13. 
 
267 Ibid 16. ?Pero la realidad le impone tambi?n la acci?n negativa de la Eugenesia?teniendo 
entonces que emplear medidas en?rgicas y cruentas, como la esterilizaci?n. En este punto, menos 
afortunada la Eugenesia, llega con facilidad a correr el riesgo de un fracaso, pero no por esto puede 
renunciar a su fin general.? 
 139 
individuals integrating positive eugenic teachings into their lives. As a result, he 
advocated for sex education for young adults.268 Sterilization would be unnecessary if sex 
education programs instructed people how to effectively select eugenic partners. 
Like all secular Chilean eugenicists, Millas Parada argued that the state should 
intervene in the private sphere to administer positive eugenic programs. ?It is a juridical 
axiom that in all Legal conflicts that which represents the most general interest must 
triumph. It is therefore evident that the interests of society in this case, must take 
precedence over the interests of each defective individual.?269 While expressed in a more 
diplomatic way, this position is not far from those of Leonard Darwin, Stoddard and 
Hechenleitner Trautmann. The threat that an unfit individual posed to the rest of society 
made it the responsibility of the Chilean state to manage that person. This created a 
situation in which state intervention into the private sphere of the family to monitor the 
reproductive health and choices of all people, but especially women, became the ideal 
goal of eugenics. After all, Millas Parada stated that marriage was not just between a man 
and woman but was also about the children they would produce.270 To this end, he argued 
that the best way to ensure that offspring would be protected was by requiring a medical 
examination prior to getting married for both parties.271 While Millas Parada was hesitant 
to support negative eugenic reforms, his acceptance and encouragement of government 
                                                
268 Ibid 17. 
 
269 Ibid 19. ?Es un axioma jur?dico el de que en todo conflicto de Derecho debe triunfar aquel que 
representa un inter?s m?s general. Resulta entonces evidente que el inter?s de la sociedad en este caso, debe 
colocarse por encima del inter?s de cada individuo tarado.? 
 
270 Ibid 55. 
 
271 Ibid 69. Allende also proposed legislation requiring a prenuptial certificate of health in 
November of 1939 This was designed to decrease the spread of venereal disease. Stepan 1991. 
 
 140 
oversight of domestic life and sexuality demonstrated how many secular eugenicists in 
Chile felt the social question would be resolved with the application of eugenic 
principles. 
The hostility secular eugenicists had for Catholic eugenics was palpable. As a 
result, most Catholics who believed that eugenics could renew Chilean society had a hard 
time convincing popular audiences of their commitment to eugenics. Appearing in 
Estudios in 1936, Roberto Barahona?s ?Los Cat?licos ante el problema cient?fico de la 
Eugenesia? tried to address this issue. ?This is not a capricious affirmation on my part: I 
do not believe I err if I maintain that in more than 95% of the books, magazines and 
conferences that exist in Santiago, on eugenics, the Catholic Church appears as the 
receptacle of obscurity, stubbornness and wickedness.?272 Barahona was displeased by 
the image of the Church being propagated by secular detractors. He made an effort to 
show that the Church did not object to eugenics as a whole, but rather select aspects of it, 
?the Church is the best help to Eugenics, in that, it defends the familial institution, it 
oversees the economic-social rights of the lower classes and it consecrates the activity of 
many of its best men for the healthy education of the youth, it makes Eugenics true, solid 
and disinterested.?273 For Barahona, the Church was the only institution capable of 
making eugenics work effectively in Chile. It already had centuries of experience dealing 
with the private lives of Chileans and running the necessary social programming. Most 
                                                
272 Roberto Barahona. ?Los Cat?licos ante el problema cient?fico de la Eugenesia,? Estudios, no. 
47 (October 15, 1936): 35-45. 36-37. ?No es ?sta una afirmaci?n antojadiza de mi parte: creo no 
equivocarme si sostengo que en m?s del 95% de los libros, revistas y conferencias que se conocen en 
Santiago, sobre la [eugenesia], la Iglesia Cat?lica aparece como el recept?culo del obscurantismo, la 
testarudez y la maldad.? 
 
273 Ibid 37. ??la Iglesia es la mejor ayuda de la Eugenesia, por cuanto, al defender la instituci?n 
familiar, al velar por los derechos econ?mico-sociales de las clases desvalidas y al consagrar la actividad de 
muchos de sus mejores hombres a la educaci?n sana de la juventud, hace Eugenesia verdadera, s?lida y 
desinteresada.? 
 141 
importantly, eugenics was a science that required a moral guide to properly apply its 
principles. 
Barahona believed that the duty of Catholic eugenicists was to ensure that 
negative eugenics was never practiced. ?Instead, the Church intervenes and is obligated 
to do so, when certain eugenic methods try to be applied, that signify a loss of human 
freedom. And this does not mean that she negates the foundations of Eugenics nor its 
utility.?274 Barahona stipulated that it was up to the Church to protect the free will and 
bodily integrity of its followers above all else. As such, Catholic eugenicists spoke out 
against abortion, birth control and sterilization because they were artificial interventions 
into natural, God-given bodily processes.275 This was wrong because it was the 
responsibility of governments and social institutions, like the Church, to provide the 
means for all individuals to realize their full hereditary potential.276 Barahona meant that 
if an individual wanted to have a child then that person was allowed to, regardless of their 
eugenic fitness. It was their God-given right. No force, particularly legal force, could 
change this. 
I believe, instead, that robust Eugenics is born from a conscientious nation, 
patriotic and Christian; from a nation that has renewed internally, by the 
perfecting of each individual. I believe in Eugenics that results in the millionaire 
that complies with his duties, not just of charity, but of social justice also?I 
believe in Eugenics of honorable governments, whose sobriety and justice make 
the people believe in the existence of virtue; finally, I believe in priestly Eugenics, 
                                                
274 Ibid 40. ?En cambio, la Iglesia interviene, y est? obligada a hacerlo, cuando se trata de aplicar 
determinados m?todos eug?nicos, que significan una p?rdida de la libertad humana?Y esto no quiere decir 
que ella niegue las bases de la Eugenesia ni su utilidad?? 
 
275 Ibid 40. 
 
276 Ibid 44. 
 142 
which upon drawing the sign of the Cross in absolution, uplifts the fallen man and 
launches to the world a New son of God.277 
 
This was Barahona?s summation of what the Catholic approach to eugenics should be in 
Chile. Eugenics was a valid science that complemented Catholic doctrine to restore man 
from his fallen position. As such, neither could function without the other. In fact, both 
were necessary so that the Church could administer to the fallen responsibly. The 
discourse surrounding the social question had been so imbued with scientific language, 
even Catholic reformers used it to support their position. 
Barahona rejected the idea that the Church was anti-science. ?Those hordes do not 
have, then, scientific or moral authority to say that he Church opposes scientific 
advancement, much less when they owe to Mendel, Augustinian friar from Moravia, the 
discovery of the laws of genetics.?278 He felt it was entirely unfair that secular eugenicists 
touted Mendel as an impeccable scientist while they ignored the fact that he was a monk. 
According to Barahona, these secular individuals were being disingenuous with 
themselves and their intellectual acolytes. Christianity had always been linked to 
scientific developments, particularly the field of eugenics, which depended on the work 
of religious men like Mendel. 
 By the early 1940s, intellectuals who favored eugenics had not drastically 
changed their opinions. In Amanda Grossi Aninat?s monograph, Eugenesia y su 
                                                
277 Ibid 45. ?Creo, en cambio, en la Eugenesia robusta que nace de una naci?n consciente, patriota 
y cristiana; de una naci?n que se ha renovado interiormente, por el perfeccionamiento de cada individuo. 
Creo en la Eugenesia que realiza el millonario que cumple con sus deberes, no s?lo de caridad, sino 
tambi?n de justicia social?creo en la Eugenesia de los gobiernos honrados, cuya sobriedad y justicia hacen 
creer al pueblo en la existencia de la virtud; creo, finalmente, en la Eugenesia del sacerdote, que al trazar el 
signo de la Cruz en la absoluci?n, levanta a un hombre ca?do y lanza al mundo un Nuevo hijo de Dios.? 
 
278 Ibid 38. ?Esas hordas no tienen, pues, autoridad cient?fica ni moral para decir que la Iglesia se 
opone al avance de las ciencias; mucho menos cuando se deben a Mendel, fraile agustino de Moravia, el 
descubrimiento de las leyes de la gen?tica?? 
 143 
legislaci?n (1941), we see a recapitulation of arguments that had been made since the 
1910s. She argued against the idea that eugenics was only negative, ?For many Eugenics 
is just about the elimination of the unfit (negative eugenics), but it is not like that, even in 
its eagerness for perfection of the race, it tries to encourage unions under the prism of the 
species, seeking to protect the physical integrity of the fruit to benefit the collective by a 
conscious and directed selection (positive eugenics).?279 It is likely that Grossi Aninat 
had to remind her readers about the positive aspects to eugenics because by 1941 
information about Nazi abuse of eugenic legislation had started to leak out of Germany. 
Due to this news, she recognized many potential weaknesses in evolutionary theory and 
eugenics. These weaknesses were most often the ones mentioned by Catholic eugenicists 
as well. ?However, in spite of his fascinating theory, Darwin did not manage to explain 
why selection does not always produce new and set forms and, how once the selective 
action is over, many times the [trait] returns to the starting point.?280 Grossi Aninat 
accepted the fact that natural selection did not seem to explain all the developments in the 
animal kingdom. In addition, ?No constituye, en ning?n caso, la herencia una concepci?n 
ideal, matem?tica, complic?ndose su desenvolvimiento a medida que ascendemos de los 
seres m?s simples a los m?s complicados como es el hombre.?281 Grossi Aninat 
demonstrated that heredity as a concept was probably not enough to explain all the 
                                                
279 Amanda Grossi Aninat. Eugenesia y su legislaci?n. Santiago: Editorial Nascimento, 1941. 12. 
?Para muchos la Eugenesia s?lo lleva por fin la eliminaci?n de los incapaces (eugenesia negativa), pero no 
es as?, pese en su af?n de perfeccionamiento de la raza, procura alentar las uniones bajo un prisma de 
especie, buscando de resguardar la integridad f?sica del fruto en beneficio de la colectividad por una 
selecci?n consciente y hasta dirigida (eugenesia positiva).? 
 
280 Ibid 19. ?Sin embargo, a pesar de la fascinaci?n de su teor?a, Darwin no consegu?a explicar por 
qu? la selecci?n no produce siempre formas fijas y nuevas y que, una vez cesada la acci?n selectiva, se 
volv?a muchas veces al punto de partida.? 
 
281 Ibid 23. 
 144 
developments of an individual human being. While she supported eugenics herself, she 
was well aware of the various objections raised by Catholic intellectuals and shared some 
of these concerns. 
 Grossi Aninat also shared typical opinions secular eugenicists held. This was best 
illustrated by her belief in innate racial characteristics that placed white races at the top of 
a racial hierarchy. For example, black skin protected individuals from the strong tropical 
sun; sebaceous glands in Eskimos protected them from harsh cold; intelligence allowed 
Europeans to take part in commerce and adventure.282 This was a typical opinion because 
it reads racist conceptions of the differences between races into a scientific register. It 
also demonstrated a strong belief in the idea that even humans adapted to their 
environments. 
 What was new in Grossi Aninat?s monograph was an attempt to reconcile 
eugenics with morality. ?Upon analyzing the foundations of eugenic laws, we must touch 
a very delicate and debated point: Morality. The law and morality pursue the same 
objective, injustice, or, the conforming of our will or actions with the natural or written 
law.?283 While she did not necessarily mean that the Catholic Church should intervene in 
eugenics, a certain level of morality needed to be maintained for Chileans to progress 
responsibly. Eugenic social reform depended on morality, particularly continence and 
self-sacrifice on the part of the individual, in order to properly function. As a result, 
Grossi Aninat was reluctant to completely write off the utility of moral thinking and 
institutions. 
                                                
282 Ibid 30-31. 
 
283 Ibid 74. ?Al analizar los fundamentos de las leyes eug?nicas, tenemos que tocar un punto muy 
delicado y discutido: la Moral. El derecho y la moral persiguen un mismo objeto, la justicia, o sea, la 
conformidad de nuestra voluntad o de nuestras acciones con la ley natural o escrita.? 
 145 
She did, however, disagree with the Catholic Church?s position regarding 
sterilization. ?The Roman Church has pronounced itself against the imposition of a 
practice of this kind [sterilization] in the encyclical ?Casti Connubii? in which it explicitly 
manifests that the German sterilization law is contrary to the dogmas of the Roman 
Catholic Church.?284 It is telling that Grossi Aninat had it backwards. Casti Connubii was 
published in December 1930, while the German sterilization law was passed in 1933. In 
no way was the Catholic Church responding to German actions. The Church had already 
assessed eugenic reproduction and found it to be against the tenets of Catholic faith. This 
oversight by Grossi Aninat aptly shows how secular critics of Catholic social reform 
would shift the discourse of eugenics to their advantage. She argued that Catholics had 
made a blanket statement against eugenic reproduction control and that this position did 
not correctly interpret the variety of sensitive issues resulting from allowing unfit 
individuals to procreate. Instead, she felt that if Chile chose to institute a sterilization law, 
it ought only be used in very specific cases to prevent abuse in contrast to what had 
occurred in Germany.285 This position regarding eugenics represents a fairly typical 
secular Chilean interpretation of how eugenics could be used in the Chilean context to 
further progress. It mixed religious and secular ideals to make eugenics palatable to 
almost all secular Chilean social reformers. 
 
 
                                                
284 Ibid 149. ?La Iglesia romana se ha pronunciado en contra de la imposici?n de una pr?ctica de 
esta naturaleza en la enc?clica ?Casti Connubi? en que manifiesta expl?citamente que la esterilizaci?n 
introducida por la ley alemana es contraria a los dogmas de la Iglesia Cat?lica Romana.? 
 
285 Ibid 156. 
 146 
Anti-Eugenic Responses in Chile 
 The previous section demonstrates that both secular and Catholic intellectuals 
interpreted evolution and eugenics in a variety of different ways. That said, the previous 
actors all supported the contention that eugenics was the only way to resolve the social 
question in Chile. This was not, however, a unanimous opinion among Chilean social 
reformers. A number of intellectuals responded with vitriol and skepticism to the new 
science. In virtually all cases, the objections to eugenics resulted from a disbelief in 
Darwinian evolution and a rejection of the idea that humans and animals shared any 
similar traits. The following documents, all anti-eugenic, represent a variety of thinkers 
just as the previous section did. That is to say, not all of the following anti-eugenic 
writers were Catholic. Some secular authors did not support eugenic methods to resolve 
the social question. 
 One of the earliest Catholic examples of this response was Alfredo Gumucio?s El 
transformismo darwiniano (1904), published by La Revista Cat?lica?s press. The purpose 
of this monograph was to discredit evolutionary theory. ?But, does the materialist concept 
of the universe and Darwinian theory really have true scientific foundations? To 
demonstrate that they do not is the objective of this present work, and I hope to be able to 
produce in he who reads me the conviction that science will never break the bonds of 
nature, nor overthrow the need to believe in the mysterious.?286 Materialist theories of 
evolution rid the world of its mystery by proposing to explain all natural processes in 
                                                
286 Alfredo Gumucio. El transformismo darviniano. Santiago de Chile: Imprenta de la Revista 
Cat?lica, 1904. np-III. ?Pero, ?tienen verdadero fundamento cient?fico la concepci?n materialista del 
universo y la teor?a darwiniana?...Demostrar que no lo tienen es el objeto del presente trabajo, y espero 
poder producir en quien me lea el convencimiento de que la ciencia nunca romper? los sellos de la 
naturaleza, ni suprimir? la necesidad de creer en lo misterioso.? 
 147 
terms of scientific laws. To discredit Darwinian evolutionary theory, Gumucio sought to 
prove that the workings of nature were more complicated and mysterious than scientists 
chose to believe, reflecting the role of the Divine in nature and its creation. Gumucio 
rejected the premise that humans were in any way related to primates by providing 
copious osteological measurements comparing various primates to human beings. From 
these findings, he argued, ?Between the most uncultured man and the most elevated 
monkey, enormous differences exist, even considering nothing more than the absolute 
weight and mass [of the brain].?287 Gumucio noted that there was no correlation between 
the skulls of even the most brutish human being and the most sophisticated primate. His 
work suggests that even though he disagreed with evolutionary theory he had some 
notion of a natural order that went from least complicated to most complicated, including 
between different groups of human beings. 
 One of the ways Gumucio sought to discredit intellectuals who supported 
evolutionary theory was by demonstrating that it proposed a set of coincidences verging 
on the absurd. ?This theory, I will call it for now, contains the absurd idea that the 
appearance of life in the world is a phenomenon of the same order as the production of 
any compound mineral?and makes God a useless hypothesis?whose intervention is 
replaced with the hypothesis, in all lights absurd and inadmissible, of spontaneous 
generation.?288 His choice of spontaneous generation as a concept was not accidental. 
Spontaneous generation had been a popular theory to explain how the natural world came 
                                                
287 Ibid 14. ?Entre el del hombre m?s inculto y el del mono m?s elevado, existen enormes 
diferencias, aun consider?ndolas nada m?s que desde el punto de vista de la masa y el peso absoluto.? 
 
288 Ibid 80. ?Esta teor?a, lo dir? de paso, contiene la absurda idea de que la aparici?n de la vida en 
el mundo es un fen?meno del mismo orden que la producci?n de cualquier mineral compuesto?y ? 
convertir ? Dios en una hip?tesis in?til?cuya intervenci?n reemplaza con la hip?tesis, ? todas luces 
absurda ? inadmisible, de la generaci?n espont?nea.? 
 148 
into being throughout the first half of the nineteenth century. This theory was so popular, 
in fact, that it inspired French Catholic microbiologist Louis Pasteur to test it. Pasteur 
successfully demonstrated that life could not arise out of pure air in 1859.289 By 
mentioning a debunked theory, disproven by an ardent Catholic, Gumucio wanted to 
demonstrate the absurdity of those secular intellectuals that accepted the world was the 
result of a random series of events. 
 Central to the Chilean anti-evolution discourse was the contention that the fossil 
record did not support Darwinian claims. Arturo Fontecilla L. ?El Hombre Fosil? for La 
Revista Cat?lica was written in 1909 to contest the fossil proofs of a connection between 
primates and humans. ?It is, then, confirmed by the discoveries of our own human 
remains, the existence of man before the flood?it shows that modern scientific 
investigations are in perfect agreement and concordance with biblical tradition.?290 
Fossils demonstrated that humans existed prior to an ancient flood, which proved that the 
Bible?s rendering of creation was true. Thus, there was no reason to suppose that human 
beings were connected to primates at all because the Bible did not explicitly say so. God 
created all life on earth, including human beings, but that did not mean that a common 
ancestry connected them. If they were connected, it was by divine, intelligent design. 
Primates and, by extension, all animal life were not connected to human beings. 
                                                
289 On spontaneous generation and Pasteur see: Patrice Debr?. Louis Pasteur. Baltimore: Johns 
Hopkins University Press, 1998. Iris Fry. The Emergence of Life on Earth: a Historical and Scientific 
Overview. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 2000. Gerald L. Geison. The Private Science of Louis 
Pasteur. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1995. 
 
290 Arturo Fontecilla L. ?El hombre fosil,? La Revista Cat?lica, no. 194 (August 21, 1909): 141-
 146. 142-143. ?Resulta, pues, confirmada por los descubrimientos de los propios despojos humanos, la 
existencia del hombre con anterioridad al diluvio?resulta que las investigaciones cient?ficas modernas 
est?n en perfecto acuerdo y concordancia con la tradicci?n b?blica.? 
 149 
 Fontecilla L. contended that the fossil record provided no proof of the connection 
between primates and humans. This was used to discredit evolutionary theory entirely. 
However, the fossil record had already shown that evolution was the most likely 
explanation for the development and disappearance of traits in animals. It was debatable 
whether there was enough fossil evidence to prove the human-primate connection in the 
first half of the twentieth century. By 1900, nine instances of early human species had 
been discovered. By 1950, that number had increased to forty-four. While it might be true 
that fossils discovered prior to 1900 might not have been understood to be early human 
remains, evidence continued to pile up favoring evolutionary theory for animals, 
supporting the idea that there was a link between humans and primates. The problem 
facing evolutionary theory that Fontecilla L. and other anti-evolutionists used to their 
advantage was that, as convincing as Darwin?s theory was, no matter how well it seemed 
to explain a variety of relationships in the natural world, there was virtually no testable 
proof that this was how nature worked. The fossil record could be debated since there 
was no observational test to prove evolution through natural selection or survival of the 
fittest was actually taking place. 
 Appearing shortly after Fontecilla L.?s article, also in La Revista Cat?lica, ?Mono 
sin cola,? was a series of articles that denied evolutionary theory. One article in particular 
denounced the possibility of a relationship between heredity and evolution. The author, 
identified only as ?L.C.Pbo.,? or a member of the Presiding Bishop?s Office, argued that 
heredity could not possibly contribute to the evolutionary process. Heredity was 
responsible for forming the most basic and primal characteristics of each individual in a 
species. In other words, heredity ensured that all species retained their identifying 
 150 
characteristics; chickens would always look like chickens. Heredity did not, however, 
explain the development of new traits or speciation.291 If heredity contributed to 
evolutionary change, then the changes between parent and child ought to be noticeable. 
However, experience and evidence seemed to prove the opposite. Based on this logic, 
eugenic programs that focused on improving hereditary traits alone served no purpose in 
the improvement of the human race or resolution of the social question. From this it is 
clear that L.C. was not necessarily against social reform, but did object to its 
commodification by scientific trends. 
 To further prove this point, L.C. attacked Darwinism by arguing that it did not 
meet the requirements of scientific inquiry. In fact, it was anti-scientific because it did not 
adhere to any of the accepted rules regarding scientific knowledge production. First, to be 
considered legitimate, scientific disciplines needed to have a firm evidentiary base, such 
as fossil proof. He believed Darwinism did not. Second, the scientific community must 
agree on the theory and all of its particulars. Evolutionary scientists did not. Third, 
devotees all had to use the same teaching method. Finally, evidence had to be the result 
of the application of the scientific method or thorough experiments of observable 
phenomena. Darwinism failed to comply with this last expectation in particular. In all 
these ways, L.C. argued, Darwinism did not meet the rigors of legitimate scientific 
research.292 This was another way many Catholic intellectuals fought against 
evolutionary theory, and eugenics in particular. Since neither evolution nor eugenics 
could demonstrate observable proof of their claims, anti-eugenicists argued that these 
                                                
291 L.C. Pbo. ?CHARLAS CIENT?FICAS - Mono sin cola,? La Revista Cat?lica, no. 234 (May 6, 
1911): 532-536. 534. 
 
292 L.C. Pbo. ?CHARLAS CIENT?FICAS ? Mono sin cola,? La Revista Cat?lica, no. 238 (July 1, 
1911): 873-877. 874-876. 
 151 
were not sciences at all. That being the case, the opinions of eugenicists were no more 
important or valid than those of anti-eugenicists when it came to the resolution of the 
social question. In fact, the Catholic intellectuals in the anti-eugenics camp argued that 
their teachings were more important because they were steeped in tradition and common 
sense, rather than nonsensical jargon. 
 As time passed, anti-evolution writers began to change their approach. This might 
suggest that denying the existence of a fossil record was increasingly difficult. Alejandro 
Vicu?a?s 1918 publication, La teoria de la evoluci?n, pointed out a variety of failings that 
evolutionary theory had. Most importantly, he contended that evolutionary theory had 
fallen out of favor in Europe while it was still being taught in Chile.293 His approach, 
unique among anti-evolutionists, hinged on the idea that the most cutting edge science 
was taking place in Europe and that Chile was behind in its development. Vicu?a also 
argued that the strength of evolutionary theory was only on its acceptance among a 
foreign scientific community. As such, Vicu?a effectively dismissed the Chilean 
scientific community while arguing for its survival. 
But this was not his main objection to evolutionary theory. The main thrust of 
Vicu?a?s article was that evolution was primarily a means of discrediting Catholic social 
authority. In a footnote, he wrote, ?Do not doubt that Evolutionism, disproven on any 
serious basis, has however made the world passionate [about it], because the materialists 
have made from it a flag, removing it from purely scientific terrain, to throw it to the field 
of philosophical religious struggle.?294 For him, evolution was not so much a scientific 
                                                
293 Alejandro Vicu?a. La teor?a de la evoluci?n (Conferencias dictadas en el ?Liceo de 
Aplicaci?n?). Santiago de Chile: Imprenta Chile, 1918. np. 
 
 152 
theory as it was a rallying cry for those who opposed the Catholic Church?s social 
influence. Therefore, it stood to reason that Vicu?a would question the scientific validity 
of the theory itself. By discussing an evolutionary model to explain how to address social 
problems, secular reformers could write the Church out of one of their most important 
social functions, providing charitable support to individuals deemed unfit by eugenic 
standards. However, ?Fortunately evolutionist morality does not keep up; charity still 
delivers inexhaustible treasures, and everything makes us respect more and more the poor 
and sick fallen in the struggle for life.?295 Vicu?a believed that charity played too 
important a role in social progress to ever be completely stamped out. Though he 
objected to Darwinian evolution, his use of the term ?fight for life? shows that Darwinian 
notions of competition had permeated even the most conservative Chilean Catholic 
intellectual circles. 
 A later example of a similar approach was Teodoro Drathen?s 1934 article ?El 
pretendido origen simio del hombre,? appearing in Estudios. In a series of articles, 
Drathen explained exactly how and why evolutionary theory was mistaken. Like Vicu?a, 
he argued that instructors in Chile had clung to evolutionary theory for the wrong 
reasons, ?naturally many professors teach their students those doctrines just as they bring 
texts and books that are generally not serious and rather sectarian that, exclusively, are 
valuable for their information.?296 Just as Vicu?a did, Drathen argued that people who 
                                                                                                                                            
294 Ibid 38. ?No ya duda que el Evolucionismo, desprovisto de cualquier base seria, ha apasionado 
sin embargo al mundo, porque los materialistas han hecho de ?l una bandera, sustray?ndose del terreno 
puramente cient?fico, para arrojarlo al campo de la lucha filos?fico religiosa.? 
 
295 Ibid 60. ?Afortunadamente la moral evolucionista no se abre paso; la caridad reparte a?n sus 
inagotables tesoros, y todo nos lleva a respetar m?s y m?s a los pobres y enfermos ca?dos en el combate de 
la vida.? 
 
 153 
continued to teach evolutionary theory were more sectarian than they were scientific; 
they were more interested in opposing Catholic interests than they were in science itself. 
To close, he argued, ?In sum we could leave each person with his opinion; but we cannot 
permit that they propagate opinions, probably hypotheses as certain knowledge, as 
proven facts, overall this can cause damage.?297 Eugenics most certainly had a potentially 
lethal and dangerous outcome, so it could not be accepted as a panacea to all social 
problems. 
 In addition to questioning the validity of evolution as a theory, the 1930s also saw 
an increase in objections to eugenics in its own right. Waldemar E. Coutts, a longtime 
government functionary and doctor, opposed forced sterilization in the Revista Medica de 
Chile. In the article, ?El problema de la esterilizaci?n desde el punto de vista bio-social? 
he wrote, ?we cannot accept that the individual, depends exclusively on heredity, if it 
were that way, we would have to accept the existence of superior men, castes or races.?298 
This might be considered a somewhat surprising position for a secular government 
official to take. After all, previous secular documents would suggest that Coutts ought to 
support eugenic sterilization, and other eugenic programming, precisely because he 
wanted to encourage the development of better quality Chileans. However, Coutts was 
                                                                                                                                            
296 Teodoro Drathen. ?El pretendido origen simio del hombre,? Article 1, Estudios, no. 20 (July 
1934): 9-12. 9. ??naturalmente muchos profesores ense?an a sus alumnos tales doctrinas como las traen 
los textos y los libros generalmente poco serios y bastante sectarios de que, exclusivamente, se valen para 
su informaci?n.? 
 
297 Ibid. ?En fin podr?amos dejar a cada uno con su opini?n; pero no podemos permitir que se 
propaguen opiniones, construcciones probables hip?tesis como conocimientos ciertos, como enunciaciones 
de hechos, sobre todo si pueden causar da?os.? 
 
298 Waldemar E. Coutts. ?El problema de la esterilizaci?n desde el punto de vista bio-social,? 
Revista M?dica de Chile, no. 7 (July 1934): 391-405. 392. ??no podemos aceptar que lo individual, 
dependa exclusivamente de la herencia, pues si as? fuere, tendr?amos que aceptar la existencia de hombres, 
de casas o de razas superiores.? 
 154 
leery of eugenics precisely because he anticipated some of its negative social outcomes 
and he firmly believed in the power of environment to play an integral role in the 
development of an individual. Negative eugenic measures might result in creating new 
social problems. If the social question was caused by class conflict and capitalist 
expansion, creating a new way for men to divide themselves was counterproductive. 
 For all his secular veneer, Coutts seemed to be a fairly religious man. In this 
article, he argued, ? ?Be fruitful and multiply,? Genesis commands and it does not set 
limits, nor signal restrictions for complying with its mandate. The sexual nature, 
biologically one has the right to reproduce, obeying the impulse of the interior world, 
which for perpetuation, it needs to be.?299 Clearly, he believed that all people should be 
allowed to procreate if they so chose. After all, it was God-willed and a product of 
inward-looking spirituality and communion with God. He particularly argued this 
because he contended that geniuses often arose out of dysgenic unions.300 One could not 
anticipate what the result of all sexual unions would be. If mandatory, state-controlled 
sterilizations and negative eugenic programs took effect then the Chilean race would not 
produce the highest form of intellectual, the genius. This presented a much greater threat 
to Chilean development than continued births of unfit individuals. However, Coutts did 
allow that voluntary sterilization should be permitted. If an individual recognized that he 
or she would not produce fit offspring, then it was his or her choice and responsibility to 
                                                
299 Ibid 396. ? ?Creced y multiplicaos?, ordena el G?nesis y no fija l?mites, ni se?ala restricciones 
para cumplir con su mandato. En la naturaleza sexual, tiene biol?gicamente el derecho de reproducirse, 
obedeciendo al impulso de su mundo interior, que para perpetuarse, as? lo necesita.? 
 
300 Ibid 404. 
 155 
be sterilized.301 He was not against sterilization per se, but he wanted individuals to be 
free of state coercion when making these choices. 
 
 The documents above show that the debates about eugenics and its application to 
the social question in Chile was not strictly a debate between secular intellectuals on the 
pro-eugenics side and Catholic intellectuals on the other. Rather, both secular and 
Catholic writers accepted eugenic science in a variety of ways. Most Catholics accepted 
principles of eugenics such as the environmental improvement of individuals. They did 
not accepted forced sterilization, euthanasia or evolutionary theory as applied to humans. 
Many secular intellectuals objected to these same things. Some secular intellectuals were 
virtually indistinguishable from their Catholic counterparts. There were even a small 
number of both groups of reformers that did not believe that eugenics was the way to 
resolve the social question. However, what all interested parties did agree upon was that 
Chile was suffering a major social change resulting for capitalist economic changes that 
needed to be managed. These changes had disrupted the natural patriarchal social order 
and eugenics was the way to restore it. This meant that social reform had to focus on the 
Chilean family and especially women?s roles in it. 
                                                
301 Ibid 405. 
 156 
Chapter Four 
 
Natural Partners 
Eugenics and the Modernization of Chilean Patriarchy 
 
 
Figure 6: C. Zozzi, ?Entre conyuges,? Zig-Zag, no. 544 (July 24, 1915). The caption below husband and 
wife reads as follows, ?El marido (leyendo) ? Debemos mucho a la ciencia. La mujer (distra?da) - ?Y a 
qui?n no debemos nosotros?? From the Biblioteca Nacional. 
 
Chilean eugenicists disagreed about many aspects of eugenic science; however, 
their beliefs regarding the purpose of a eugenic social reform program were much more 
uniform. Virtually all of the historical actors discussed in this chapter, Catholic and 
 157 
secular, believed that the key to resolving social problems in Chile was the modernization 
of patriarchal gender models to rationalize the Chilean social order. Experts understood 
gender role modernization as the organization of male and female behavior around the 
workplace and the home respectively. Chilean social reformers used eugenics to 
naturalize this gendered separation of duties. Though Catholics further stipulated that this 
natural order was God-given, they still maintained that eugenic science was the means of 
modernizing gender roles. These social reformers also agreed that female sexuality was 
the most manageable means of achieving social order. This approach rested on the belief 
that modern life had disrupted natural gender relationships. Therefore, those relationships 
needed to be modernized, while still being aware of the natural abilities of men and 
women. 
Most social reformers believed that the family was the building block to an 
orderly society. As such, they spent a lot of their time explaining how both Chilean men 
and women should act within the family structure. They used eugenics as a tool to 
support a deterministic approach to gender that argued that women were naturally 
designed to be homemakers and nurturers while men were best suited to work outside the 
home. Historians have pointed out that the early twentieth century in Latin America was 
characterized by modernizing patriarchal social structures.302 I add to this literature by 
showing the integral role that eugenic science played in the development of Chilean 
gender roles. However, I add to this an examination of how this interacted with other 
                                                
302 Susan K. Besse. Restructuring Patriarchy: the Modernization of Gender Inequality in Brazil, 
1914-1940. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1996. Sueann Caulfield. In Defense of Honor: 
Sexuality Morality, Modernity, and the Nation in Early-Twentieth Century Brazil. Durham: Duke 
University Press, 2000. Karin Alejandra Rosemblatt. Gendered Compromises: Political Cultures and the 
State in Chile, 1920-1950. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2000. Mary Kay Vaughan.  
?Modernizing Patriarchy: State Policies, Rural Households and Women in Mexico, 1930-1940,? in Hidden 
Histories of Gender and the State in Latin America, Elizabeth Dore & Maxine Molyneux (eds).  Durham: 
Duke University Press, 2000. 
 158 
gendered discourses about women and the practice of Catholicism. As a result of the 
combined sexism of Catholic and secular social reformers, Chilean social reform efforts 
were a critical component in undercutting the social influence of Catholics and women in 
the construction of the modern, Chilean welfare state. 
Chilean intellectuals described natural gender roles to be mutually exclusive and 
complementary, as shown in the cartoon above (see Figure 6). When the husband absent-
 mindedly looks up from his newspaper and mentions how much humanity owes to 
science, his wife replies, ?And to whom don?t we owe??303 The dialogue makes clear that 
the wife is distracted and not really paying attention to her husband, presumably because 
she is busy with the female task of arranging flowers. On the face of it, this cartoon 
reinforced the idea that a woman?s proper place was in the home and the husband?s was 
interacting with the larger world. However, the cartoon also carried another message. It 
illuminated the common assumption that women were not a part of the public sphere, 
which included not only the scientific community, but the political, legal, and financial 
sectors as well. As such, women were characterized as passive agents in the resolution of 
the social question. Nor were they conceptualized as a citizen-worker. Instead, they were 
managers of the household. Finally, this cartoon demonstrated that men and women were 
expected to share responsibilities as married partners, though they played different roles 
in Chilean society. Men and women were naturally designed to have different skills. The 
intellectuals discussed in this chapter believed that the application of eugenic social 
programs to help Chilean men and women to return to their natural gender roles would 
restore the necessary social order vital to economic progress. Reorganizing society 
                                                
303 C. Zozzi, ?Entre conyuges,? Zig-Zag, no. 544 (July 24, 1915). 
 159 
according to a patriarchal system that was portrayed as both natural and modern would 
resolve the social question. 
Problems Facing the Chilean Family 
 
Catholic and secular social reformers were first and foremost concerned with the 
creation of stable Chilean families, the foundation of the larger society. They imagined 
the ideal Chilean family as a husband and wife raising eugenic children. As such, these 
intellectuals wanted to better understand and control how sexual relationships between 
Chilean men and women were conducted. Both sets of intellectuals were concerned about 
the fact that individuals from the upper classes seemed less interested, and less capable, 
of having children. This was often discussed in concert with concerns about how lower 
class individuals seemed to be disproportionately fertile. Therefore, many Chilean 
intellectuals tried to address how to encourage ?better? people to have more children. 
Most intellectuals agreed that this ideal was achieved by encouraging heterosexual 
marriage with a social equal or better that followed eugenic gender norms: where women 
stayed home to ensure hygienic care of both the home and the children while men 
worked. 
There were a variety of difficulties that hampered the creation of eugenic families. 
One of the biggest concerns among Chilean eugenicists, Catholic and secular, was the 
supposed infertility of the higher classes. Dr. Van Lennep, member of the Sociedad 
M?dica de Valpara?so, discussed this in his 1917 article, ?Esterilidad del matrimonio.? 
Appearing in the Chilean Medical Review (CMR), this article was written for a 
professional, medical community and did not include any religious references. In 
addition, Van Lennep did not divulge anything that indicated his own personal sentiments 
 160 
regarding religion or eugenics. Instead, this article was strictly concerned with the issue 
of infertility in married couples. He argued that most physicians typically blamed women 
for fertility problems though men were equally prone to having them.304 He contended 
that a common cause of infertility in women, problems affecting the fallopian tubes, 
were, ?generally acquired by infections caused by the husband, which it is important to 
communicate to him, the wife being many times treated poorly, being accused of being 
useless, while the first cause [of the issue] is in him, even though his sperm may appear 
normal.?305 More often than not, Van Lennep believed, men caused infections in their 
wives? reproductive organs without presenting any symptoms themselves. As such, he 
felt they should not be allowed to accuse their wives of infidelity or blame them for 
difficulty conceiving. Van Lennep also implied that it was a poorly trained doctor who 
only looked at female patients as the cause of infertility. The most important issue was 
resolving the infertility so that the couple could conceive successfully, most likely 
because this would foster proper gender and familial relationships between husbands and 
wives, parents and children. While holding men accountable for their sexual 
indiscretions, this approach still placed a premium on female health as strictly 
reproductive. A woman?s only real value to society was as a mother while a man might 
work to contribute to society. 
Many eugenicists believed that women?s behavior was the most threatening to 
family creation. Bernardo Gentilini, a Catholic public intellectual, wrote a book for 
young women to inculcate them in proper behavior. El libro de la joven, O sea: 
                                                
304 Dr. Van Lennep. ?Esterilidad del matrimonio,? Revista M?dica de Chile, no. 9 (September 
1917): 340-347. 340. 
 
305 Ibid 343. 
 161 
Preparaci?n moral de la joven para la vida (1920) was for an audience of young, single 
women. It stressed obedience to one?s parents above all. ?[The daughter] should be an 
angel, not by attractive exteriors, almost always ephemeral, but rather due to her interior 
beauty that endows her with innocence, purity, virtue. She must be docile, obedient and 
submissive.?306 Gentilini felt that young women were no longer being encouraged to 
cultivate desirable traits like fidelity. Rather, young women were prone to being flighty 
and irresponsible. Parents should teach their daughters that a young woman?s looks were 
not important. Her moral fiber and virtue were but, even more so, was her obedience to 
the rules and guidance of her parents. 
This was because obedience was not only prized in young women. It was a trait 
that all women were expected to possess. In Alejandro Vicu?a?s 1922 La Revista 
Cat?lica article, ?Reflexiones acerca del hogar,? he wrote, ?natural law gives the male 
preeminence and authority over the woman.?307 This opinion was certainly not new. 
Social reformers historically argued that women must submit to the authority of men for a 
more orderly society. What was new in Vicu?a?s article was the fact that invoking the 
concept of natural laws had a new scientific authority that had not previously existed. A 
patriarchal society as the natural social order was no longer a heuristic tool intellectuals 
used to talk about social structures, but a reality proven by eugenics, biology, and 
evolutionary theory. Women had a specific place in the social structure below men and 
their obedience to men was required for the survival and good of the species as a whole. 
Pointing to scientific proofs of the importance of patriarchal social roles helped Catholic 
                                                
306 Bernardo Gentilini. El libro de la joven, O sea: Preparaci?n moral de la joven para la vida. 
Santiago de Chile: Apostolado de la Prensa, 1920. 104. 
 
307 Alejandro Vicu?a. ?Oratoria sagrada-Reflexiones acerca del hogar.? La Revista Cat?lica no. 
509 (October 21, 1922): 598-605. 599. 
 162 
intellectuals to demonstrate they were far from old fashioned. 
However, Vicu?a felt that Chilean daughters were far from obedient. Rather, they 
had a privileged place in the family unit, which encouraged indulgent and flighty 
behavior. The relationship between mothers and daughters was too close and daughters 
benefited from this closeness. Sons, however, lacked a close relationship with either 
parent. ?The tenderness of mothers finds an obsession in their daughters?While the sons 
are abandoned?to their own fortunes, the daughters are treated like queens of the home 
and no sacrifice is avoided to please them and place them well in society.?308 This 
favoritism toward daughters had consequences. On the one hand, daughters were the 
future mothers of Chilean citizens, so they were special members of society and had to be 
treated accordingly. They had to have good marriage partners and parents had to be 
involved in those choices.309 However, according to Vicu?a, this gave daughters the false 
impression that their own decisions and whims were more important than the obedience 
they owed to their parents. They were not required to marry men their parents might 
choose for them. This situation also left sons without any sort of parental guidance when 
choosing a marriage partner. As a result, both young men and women compromised the 
Chilean social order by not fully understanding or accepting their duties to society. 
Parents could not raise small princesses and delinquents. They had to discipline their 
daughters and pay attention to their sons. 
                                                
308 Ibid 601. 
 
309 Vicu?a also stated, ?En el Ex?do, se proh?be a los jud?os casarse con personas de inferior 
condici?n social; y esta legislaci?n hebrea tiene en su favor la experiencia de cuatro mil a?os.?No soy 
partidario de las clases privilegiadas, pero tengo fe en un hecho indiscutible: la sangre es el m?s poderoso 
elemento de los que constituyen la moral del individuo.? 604. This demonstrates that even he had some 
notion that blood carried character traits. 
 
 163 
Another obstacle to creating eugenic Chilean families was the use and availability 
of birth control. ?If the [betrothed] only look to marriage for the satisfaction of their 
sensual appetites, they will fall into the very sad practice of neo-Malthusianism and anti-
 conceptive precautions.?310 Pierre Barbet?s 1924 monograph, Preparaci?n del Joven al 
Matrimonio, lamented the use of birth control methods among Chilean married couples. 
Barbet was a French physician who became most known for his authentication of the 
Shroud of Turin.311 His monograph, translated and published by the Liga Chilena de 
Higiene Social, did not equate birth control usage with a greed for maintaining material 
wealth. Rather, Barbet argued that birth control methods allowed a couple to enjoy the 
physical pleasures of sexual intercourse without the responsibility of bearing children. 
Using birth control would encourage an indulgent and immoral attitude, which Barbet 
believed to be dangerous to the social order. In particular, a casual attitude about sex 
would result in the use of prostitutes among men, further threatening the health of 
Chilean citizens.312 Barbet believed in sexual continence for all people, both men and 
women, as the solution to this problem. However, his book was directed at men, 
suggesting that he believed they had more difficulty with this task than women. 
Sexual promiscuity was not the only issue affecting the Chilean family. Another 
problem men faced was the use and abuse of alcohol. Some social reformers mentioned 
                                                
310 Pierre Barbet. Preparaci?n del Joven al Matrimonio. Santiago: Liga Chilena de Higiene 
Social, 1924. 28. 
 
311 Frederick T. Zugibe. The Crucifixion of Jesus: a Forensic Inquiry. New York: M. Evans & 
Co., 2005. 
  
312 Ibid 30. ?El n?mero de abortos es muy elevado entre nosotros, constituyendo un problema 
digno de la mayor atenci?n, por lo que socialmente significa y porque origina una mortalidad y una 
morbilidad muy altas.? This was a similar argument to that of Salvador Allende in La realidad medico-
 social chilena, Hern?n Soto, Mar?a Ang?lica Illanes y Mariano Requena (eds). Santiago, Chile: Editorial 
Cuarto Propio, 1999 (1939). 117. It also matches what Susan Besse wrote about the supposed marriage 
crisis of the 1910s and 1920s. 39. 
 164 
alcohol consumption in the context of men visiting bars and brothels as the real problem, 
while others made it the centerpiece of their reform efforts. These intellectuals agreed 
that alcohol was a poison to which the lower classes in particular were susceptible.313 An 
example of this type of thinking can be found in a 1931 cartoon publish in the Revista de 
la Cruz Roja Chilena. Appearing on the back pages of the magazine, the proper fatherly 
behavior was contrasted with inappropriate behavior caused by alcoholism.314 The first 
cartoon, depicts a family being terrorized by an alcoholic father. The children cling to 
their mother as their father breaks a bottle over the table (see Figure 7).  The table, a 
meager affair, has only one loaf of bread on it. 
 
Figure 7: ?Ense?anzas de la vida,? Revista de la Cruz Roja Chilena, no. 4-5 (April-May 1931). This image 
depicts the unhappy outcome of male alcoholism for the people that depend on him. From the Biblioteca 
Nacional. 
 
The second cartoon shows a similar family group, but in very different circumstances 
(see Figure 8). This family has a comfortable home and a table with a variety of foods on 
                                                
313 See Stepan?s discussion regarding racial poisons in ?The Hour of Eugenics.? 63-101. 
 
314 ?Ense?anzas de la vida,? Revista de la Cruz Roja Chilena, no. 4-5 (April-May 1931). 
 165 
it. The implication is clear: alcohol takes money that could be used for the family, 
making it a threat to the Chilean social order.  
 
Figure 8: ?Ense?anzas de la vida,? Revista de la Cruz Roja Chilena, no. 4-5 (April-May 1931). This 
cartoon shows what families can expect of sober fathers and providers. From the Biblioteca Nacional. 
 
The father who could not control his alcohol consumption was unable to perform his 
masculine duty to provide. Finally, these cartoons also depicted the common trope that 
alcoholism was a strictly male disease. To combat these social problems, Chilean 
eugenicists targeted the inappropriate gender behavior of both men and women by 
characterizing misbehavior as unnatural. 
Obstacles to Ideal Masculine Behavior 
While both men and women had to change their behavior, men presented specific 
challenges to social reformers and eugenicists. Men were perceived to be free and 
sexually indiscriminate by nature. Presumably, they would object to state or religious 
intervention into their lives, especially their sexual lives. Catholic and secular social 
 166 
reformers responded to this issue in different ways. In El Diario Popular (EDP), a 1902 
article, ?Los que son hombres,? argued that men were quite capable in the world of 
business, finance, and politics but were helpless in domestic settings. The anonymous, 
?North American? author wrote, ?[The man] is valiant as a lion, in the face of real 
danger, but a simple headache?frightens him in an extraordinary way.?315 Statements 
like this naturalized men and women?s roles both in the home and outside it. Men were 
strong when it came to their own areas of expertise in the public sphere. When at home, 
however, they were no more than an additional child that the woman of the house had to 
manage. In fact, the author went on to say that men could not even care for the children 
that they fathered. He or she did not consider this to be a failure on the part of men. Their 
natural skills did not include care giving. Instead, the men who were not able to help at 
home were the best suited to survival in the public sphere.  Because PN was aimed at the 
working classes, the author?s position is not surprising. Most working class activists were 
interested in shoring up male laborers as heads of household at this time.316 
Catholic reformers, however, argued that Chilean men did have social and 
familial obligations that they were expected to perform beyond their public duties as 
citizens and workers. Catholic eugenicists all agreed that men were responsible for more 
than economically providing for their families. Father Samuel de Santa Teresa wrote that 
                                                
315 ?Lo que son hombres.? El Diario Popular no. 33 (October 11, 1902): 1. 
 
316 Klubock 1998. Rosemblatt 2000. Most masculinity studies, for both the right and left, focus on 
men as workers and not fathers. However, there are a few that try and demonstrate how fatherhood was 
important to masculinity in the early twentieth century, see: Norma Fuller. ?The Social Construction of 
Gender Identity among Peruvian Males,? in Changing Men and Masculinities in Latin America, Matthew 
Gutmann (ed). Durham: Duke University Press, 2000. Jos? Olivarr?a, ?Men at Home? Child Rearing and 
Housekeeping among Chilean Working-Class Fathers,? in Changing Men and Masculinities in Latin 
America, Matthew Gutmann (ed). Durham: Duke University Press, 2000.   
 
 167 
a man?s chief duties as a father were comprised of the task of educating his children and 
encouraging them to live moral lives.317 While de Santa Teresa was unclear about how 
fathers might encourage this behavior, one of the most important ways was through 
religious instruction. Catholicism, according to him, instilled the ability to tell right from 
wrong and make choices based on one?s estimation of a given situation. Unfortunately, 
however, being Catholic was not always a guarantee of appropriate behavior. ?[T]here 
are all sorts of Catholics, good Catholics and Catholics who practice little, very little, and, 
there are Catholics and Catholicism, which are very different things.?318 Simply being 
born Catholic was not enough. Parents, particularly fathers, had to raise their children in 
the proper Catholic tradition. Unlike secular reformers who argued that only women were 
the conduits of Catholic faith, de Santa Teresa posited that men played an equally 
important role in the religious instruction of their children. 
 His position was important for three reasons. First, it recognized that there were a 
wide variety of opinions regarding the practice of Catholicism among Catholics in Chile. 
Second, this variation was because Chileans were culturally Catholic. For de Santa 
Teresa, anyone born into the Catholic tradition was also Catholic whether they practiced 
their faith or not. Treating Catholicism as an ethnicity implied that there was an 
inheritable Catholic character that encouraged a certain set of moral behaviors such as 
charity, sexual continence, obedience, and piety. Even as de Santa Teresa realized that 
there was a wide variety among Chilean Catholics, he also argued that Catholicism was 
                                                
317 Samuel de Santa Teresa. ?El cat?lico de hoy d?a tambi?n es el hombre de hoy d?a.? La Revista 
Cat?lica no. 218 (August 20, 1910): 101-108. 103. 
 
318 Ibid 106. 
 
 168 
the only means of instructing men in their proper domestic roles.319 Without the 
emotional and moral message of Catholic instruction, men would believe that their only 
responsibility to their families was a financial one. Catholic men were supposed to be 
engaged parents, ensuring not only that the financial security of their children but their 
moral and scholastic instruction. 
Gentilini, as a Catholic reformer, shared this opinion. In his El libro del hombre 
varonil: Como Cristiano y Caballero, Esposo, Padre y Educador, Hombre de profesi?n y 
de negocios, Ciudadano y Ap?stol social (1918), he argued that men were the masters of 
the house and, as such, should be examples of Catholic devotion for their households and 
pray often.320 However, Gentilini noted that there were some challenges to this ideal. The 
first, and perhaps most important, was the problem of male sexual desire. ?Otherwise 
passions will dominate reason, and man would practically become a beast.?321 He 
believed that in the face of sexual desire, men were not able to use reason just as secular 
reformers did. Gentilini contended that combating this weakness was the responsibility of 
women. He considered all-male spaces like bars and clubs to be concepts popularized by 
foreigners that were dangerous for Chilean men?s sexual continence.322 Therefore, 
Chilean women had to make their homes welcoming enough to keep their sons and 
                                                
319 Ibid. 
 
320 Bernardo Gentilini. El libro del hombre varonil: Como Cristiano y Caballero, Esposo, Padre y 
Educador, Hombre de profesi?n y de negocios, Ciudadano y Ap?stol social. Santiago de Chile: Apostolado 
de la Prensa, 1918. 35. 
 
321 Ibid 56. ?De otro modo las pasiones dominar?an la raz?n, y pr?cticamente volver?an al hombre 
una bestia.? 
 
322 Ibid 84-85. 
 
 169 
husbands in them.323 Men depended on women?s natural homemaking skills to protect 
them from their own natural failing, sexual promiscuity. 
 Many secular reformers also contended that men were naturally compelled by 
their sexual urges and were virtually incapable of controlling them. In a 1921 book, 
Alfred Fournier argued that, ?from the instant that [puberty] arrives, a new preoccupation 
has taken over you. A hope agitates you: pure or impure, a desire solicits you. Let?s be 
frank: the woman has been born for you.?324 As a French dermatologist specializing in 
the treatment of syphilis, Fournier was not interested in whether or not male sexual desire 
was sinful, but he noted that it was a biological fact that had to be addressed. He also 
stated that his interest in talking about sexual education for young men was born of a 
strictly medical background.325 Fournier believed that a doctor would have a very 
different opinion regarding male sexual behavior than a religious figure. He also stated 
that his interest in talking about sexual education for young men was born of a strictly 
medical background. ?The woman! How little I would have to discuss with you about her 
if I were a moralist, philosopher, religious educator, etc.! But I am no more than a doctor, 
and as such, I am in charge of talking with you.?326 Fournier therefore saw the doctor as 
confessor and counselor and sought to replace Catholic influence with medical influence 
in resolving the social question. His opinion would be based on medical facts, not moral 
judgments or attempts to shame young men and this was vital to providing them with the 
                                                
323 Ibid 88. 
 
324 Alfred Fournier. Para nuestros hijos cuando tengan 18 a?os: Algunos consejos del Profesor 
Fournier, Emilio R. Coni (trans). Buenos Aires: Liga Argentina de Profilaxis Social, 1921. 4. 
 
325 Ibid 4-5. 
 
326 Ibid. ??La mujer! ?Cu?nto no tendr?a que hablaros sobre ella si fuera moralista, fil?sofo, 
educador religioso, etc.! Pero no soy m?s que m?dico, y como tal, he recibido encargo de hablaros.? 
 170 
information they needed to control their lust. 
 Fournier advocated for a new social position for doctors. He created this new 
territory by discussing venereal disease. He argued that young men should have all the 
medically relevant facts about sexually transmitted diseases in order to avoid contracting 
them. He even went so far as to say that he was not interested in scaring young men from 
engaging in sexual activity outside marriage. After all, their urges were naturally 
compelled, but they deserved to know the unadulterated medical truths about the risks sex 
outside marriage entailed.327 He then provided his readers with a variety of specific 
descriptions about sexually transmitted diseases, focusing mostly on syphilis. Syphilis 
was by far the most popularly discussed sexually transmitted disease at this time. While 
other sexually transmitted diseases were unfortunate, syphilis was considered to have the 
power to alter an individual so much that it was a threat to the future of the species. 
Syphilis was initially thought to be hereditary. While a child might not be born 
with syphilis, doctors attributed certain birth defects such as blindness, rickets, and body 
sores to the fact that one or both parents suffered from syphilis. This was especially true 
if the mother had any syphilitic lesions on, or around, her vaginal canal at the time of 
birth.328 ?In sum, recent investigations show that syphilis can constitute, due to hereditary 
consequences, a factor in the bastardization and degeneration of the species, giving birth 
to inferior, decadent, dystrophic, degenerate beings.?329 Syphilis had the power to 
                                                
327 Ibid 6. 
 
328 Carmela Katz M. Distrofias conj?nitas. Santiago de Chile: Imprenta y En. "Victoria" 1910. E. 
Prado Tagle. ?Sifilis conjenita tardia,? Revista M?dica de Chile, no. 12 (December 1915): 440-445. 
 
329 Fournier 38. ?En fin, resulta de recientes investigaciones que la s?filis puede constituir, por sus 
consecuencias hereditarias, causa para bastardear y degenerar la especie, dando nacimiento a seres 
inferiores, decadentes, distr?ficos, degenerados.? 
 171 
transform an individual as well as his or her offspring, making it a serious threat to the 
healthy development and progress of the Chilean people.  
As such, men had to be instructed in proper sexual conduct. This was especially 
important because, ?syphilis, with all its consequences, even the most serious, arises not 
from repeated, reiterated, accumulated exposures, but from just one contact, from one 
only.?330 Men needed only to engage in sex with a questionable partner once and they 
jeopardized their future offspring forever. Syphilis was such a serious threat to the health 
of the Chilean population at large that Fournier also argued that young people should not 
hide if they contracted the disease. Nothing was gained by waiting until it was too late to 
receive effective treatment.331 Fournier?s approach was straightforward and privileged the 
idea of honesty in educating young men about sex to prevent disease, while still implying 
that sex within the confines of marriage was best. He also avoided discussing sex 
education for women. 
Barbet?s Preparaci?n del Joven al Matrimonio agreed with the work of Fournier, 
though from an explicitly Catholic perspective. In it, Barbet wrote, ?We have, in essence, 
the advantage, as doctors and as Catholics, the ability to approach the sex issue with 
complete knowledge in its dual aspects, scientific and moral.?332 This statement mirrored 
what Fournier argued, but also added a Catholic element. Barbet felt that, as a doctor and 
a Catholic, he would be able to provide both truthful medical advice and interpret it into 
proper moral behavior. One of the first differences in his approach from that of Fournier 
                                                
330 Ibid 42. ??la s?filis, con todas sus consecuencias, aun las m?s graves, deriva no de contagios 
repetidos, reiterados, acumulados, pero s? de un contacto ?nico, de un solo.? 
 
331 Ibid 51. 
 
332 Barbet 6. ?Nosotros tenemos, en efecto, la ventaja, como m?dicos y como cat?licos, de poder 
abordar la cuesti?n [del sexo] con pleno conocimiento de causa en su doble aspecto cient?fico y moral.? 
 172 
was that Barbet believed young men were not physically mature enough for sexual 
intercourse until they were twenty-one years old; three years older than Fournier. 
Additionally, Barbet believed sexual contact should only occur within the confines of 
marriage while Fournier understood that this might not always happen.333 Here, though 
both men privileged their medical expertise, the difference between Catholic and secular 
understandings of sexuality become apparent. 
Though all eugenicists discussed reproduction within marriage as the ideal sexual 
encounter, many eugenicists knew this ideal did not often match reality. Waldemar E. 
Coutts, a government official and doctor, approached the reality of sexual relationships 
between men and women in his 1926 book, El instinto sexual y la vida contempor?nea: 
Su influencia en los actos delictuosos. Coutts explored how a primordial instinct could be 
adapted to fit a modern world that demanded more care in choosing eugenic sexual 
partners. First, he argued, ?The daily struggle for life, is the struggle for the conservation 
of the species. All manifestations of human power are subordinated to sexual tyranny.?334 
Coutts was not the only intellectual to discuss the sexual impulse as a natural tyranny. 
This was considered to be especially true for men. The rationality that typically 
controlled male behavior was lost in the pursuit of sexual satisfaction and conquest. 
While Coutts recognized the evolutionary purpose of male sexual desire to perpetuate the 
species, he believed that this urge no longer properly aligned with the nature of modern 
living. Male sexual urges needed to be domesticated to fit the new social reality. Men 
could not simply engage in sexual intercourse with any woman they wanted; this 
                                                
333 Ibid 11. 
 
334 W.E. Coutts. El instinto sexual y la vida contempor?nea: Su influencia en los actos 
delictuosos. Buenos Aires, Argentina: Talleres Gr?ficos de la Penitenciar?a Nacional, 1926. 5. 
 173 
behavior spread disease and produced dysgenic individuals. Proper, eugenic matches 
needed to be made between social equals and sexual encounters needed to be restricted to 
heterosexual marriage. According to Coutts, this was the only way to control sexual 
behavior, a position that could hardly be considered very different from that of Catholic 
social reformers of the period. 
Coutts?s monograph also gendered sexual desire by not recognizing it as a 
feminine characteristic. In a series of statements about how sexual desire played a role in 
the evolution of all species, he noted that females were important as catalysts to and 
objects of male sexual desire, but not as sexual beings themselves. Whether among 
animals or humans, females demonstrated no strong desire for sexual intercourse. Coutts 
wrote, ?the male, liberal with his flesh, has always been tyrannized by the female.?335 
Men were unable to fight their sexual attraction to women, so eugenicists had to find a 
way to manage this desire. His opinion was notable because secular reformers charged 
male professionals with controlling male sexuality. In a system where sex was restricted 
to marriage, the professionals responsible for managing this would be all male 
professions: priests, justices of the peace, lawyers, and doctors,. For Coutts, this 
presented no predicament, as men were the sources of all Chilean sexual desire. 
However, we can certainly see how putting men in charge of regulating their own sexual 
behavior might be problematic. 
Coutts considered male sexual desire to be dangerous to the Chilean social order. 
He argued that, ?one kills, robs, cheats, tricks, suffers, works and fights for love. Love is 
                                                
335 Ibid 8. ?...el hombre, pr?digo de su carne, ha vivido siempre tiranizado por la hembra.? 
Another example of this is the following, ?As? en todos los casos [ha discutido una variedad de insectos], 
en todas las especies, en mayor o menor grado, observamos que sus m?ltiples actividades, su existencia 
misma, est?n orientadas hacia la incesante lucha por la posesi?n de la hembra y la eterna conservaci?n de la 
forma y los caracteres.? 7.  
 174 
the basis of life; whoever does not feel it is not worthy of life.?336 While love might also 
inspire noble behavior, he was more worried about the negative results of men pursuing 
women. Coutts believed that most of the social problems affecting Chile in the 1920s 
were the result of sexual desire and irresponsible behavior on the part of men trying to 
satisfy sexual urges with little concern for the consequences.337 Thus, young men and 
women had to be instructed in how to manage those urges. However, Coutts offered no 
suggestion as to how to do so. 
Catholic reformers argued that the best way to confront natural sexual urges was 
to practice chastity. Gentilini wrote an educational manual about how young people 
ought to control their sexuality, ?Sed Puros! Educaci?n de la castidad: Gobierno de las 
pasiones (1936). ?As there is hygiene to protect the health of the body, there is just such a 
[hygiene] for the preservation of the soul. This hygiene consists in carefully avoiding the 
morbid influences of passions.?338 Much like Coutts, Gentilini recognized that male 
sexual desire could incite behaviors that were dangerous for the individual and Chilean 
society as a whole. To combat this social degeneration, he argued that the best method 
was to advocate abstinence before marriage for both men and women. This was a 
                                                
336 Ibid 44. ?...por amor se mata, se roba, se estafa, se enga?a, se sufre, se trabaja y se lucha.  El 
amor es la base de la vida; quien no lo siente no es digno de vivir.? 
 
337 In a book written two years after El instinto sexual y la vida contemporanea, Coutts also 
argued that venereal disease should stop any rational woman from sexual intercourse and marriage with a 
potential husband. ?Al encontrarnos frente a un caso en que se nos solicita permiso para contraer 
matrimonio y comprobamos y sospechamos la existencia de una enfermedad venereal, debemos hacernos 
sordos a todas las consideraciones sociales personales y de conveniencia del novio, por el propio bien suyo 
y en defensa de la inocente ni?a que llena de ilusiones se cubrir? con los velos nupciales. Lanzar a una 
inocente al Holocausto ser?a una cobard?a moral de nuestra parte.? Therefore, love and emotion could also 
contribute to the spread of dangerous social diseases. W.E. Coutts. Las Enfermedades Ven?reas y El 
Matrimonio. Santiago de Chile: Imprenta Nacional, 1928. 18. 
 
338 Bernardo Gentilini. ?Sed Puros! Educaci?n de la castidad: Gobierno de las pasiones. Santiago 
de Chile: Apostolado de la Prensa, 1936. 63. 
 175 
particularly difficult proposition, Gentilini believed, because contemporary social mores 
allowed for men and women to socially interact in potentially compromising ways. ?One 
can never insist enough on the immorality in amassing a crowd in a dark room, men and 
women before whose eyes, parade films of a certain erotic flavor.?339 While he chose the 
specific location of a movie theatre to make his example, the general point was more 
important. Men and women were increasingly in each other?s company and this created 
situations in which they could closely interact. New patterns of socialization that were the 
result of capitalist economic expansion, such as women working in factories and shops, 
caused familiarity between genders that too often resulted in sex outside the confines of 
marriage. 
Gentilini believed that this was because men were subject to the whims of their 
sexual urges. ?Very few men exist that have not experienced the insolent rebellions of the 
beast.?340 However, he believed that men were capable of controlling this instinct. He 
advocated for a new sexual standard for men that encouraged male chastity and fidelity as 
the new model of strength and masculinity.341 Fighting against one?s natural sexual urges 
showed real strength and would allow men to better manage their sexual desires which 
would keep them healthy. With this new sexual standard, venereal disease and 
illegitimacy (among other social problems) would resolve themselves. This sexual 
continence would also prevent social degeneration because, ?There are contagions that 
                                                
339 Ibid 76. 
 
340 Ibid 88. 
 
341 Ibid 114. 
 
 176 
stigmatize not only individuals, but families and entire generations.?342 This statement 
shows that Gentilini accepted general tenets of evolution and eugenics while applying his 
own, Catholic understanding as to how to resolve social problems by encouraging male 
chastity. 
Barbet also felt that men needed to learn how to control their sexual desires. He 
called for an end to the sexual double standard that allowed men to visit prostitutes while 
women were expected to sleep only with their husbands. ?For a man to be able to demand 
of she that will be his wife, a pure body and soul, he needs to be able to lead by example 
and give her the same.?343 A man could not expect purity from his wife when he did not 
maintain his own. This idea matched with a variety of other social commentators, mostly 
women, who argued that the sexual double standard contributed to the existence of 
prostitution, rape and white slavery.344 Barbet even went on to argue that every person, 
no matter what the circumstances, was capable of living a chaste life.345 Chastity was not 
necessarily the ideal state for all people, but it was possible for everyone for a period of 
time. He argued that this showed that all people were capable of controlling their sexual 
urges, including men. While he did not say that chastity was natural, he did believe that 
chastity before marriage was important to properly develop Chilean society. 
                                                
342 Ibid 110. 
 
343 Barbet 34. ?Para que un hombre pueda exigir de la que ser? su mujer, un alma y un cuerpo 
puro, necesita poder darle el ejemplo y aportarle el equivalente.? 
 
344 Fournier also lamented this sexual double standard in ?La sifilis de las mujeres honradas,? 
Revista M?dica de Chile, no. 11 (November 1906): 341-343. See also items such as: Liga Chilena de 
Higiene Social. Memorial de la Liga Chilena de Higiene Social sobre el Problema de la Esclavitud Blanca 
en relaci?n con el T?tulo IV del Nuevo C?digo Sanitario de Chile. Santiago de Chile: Imprenta Nascimento, 
1926. Rafael Edwards. La continencia y la juventud. Santiago de Chile: Librer?a y Casa Editorial de la 
Federaci?n de Obras Cat?licas, 1918. 
 
345 Ibid 43. 
 177 
 The seeming obsession with male sexuality on the part of public intellectuals was 
explained by the fact that men were expected to naturally have active sexual appetites. 
The issue, for virtually all of these intellectuals was how to control and modify those 
appetites. Coutts weighed in on this issue in his 1929 publication, A los j?venes. He 
wrote, ?step by step, the multitudes come to realize that the vast majority of social 
problems that are still to be resolved, are intimately linked to the issue of sex.?346 His 
opinion about the socially transcendent nature of sex explains why so many eugenicists 
of the day sought to manage this aspect of private life. If sex could be rationalized and 
controlled, then Chileans would begin to form proper family units, the building block to 
an orderly society. Chilean men had to engage in responsible sexual interactions, fully 
aware of the fact that their actions would have repercussions not only for themselves but 
also the children of those unions. The effects irresponsible sexual practices had on 
women were incidental and only applied when women became mothers. 
 Coutts also argued that individuals who underestimated the power of male sexual 
desire were not being truthful with themselves. The sexual impulse was strong in men 
and could not be denied. In fact, attempts to deny this natural imperative would only 
result in disaster. 347 All efforts to manage male sexuality had to be based upon the 
understanding that men naturally needed to have sex regularly. However, Coutts did not 
believe in masturbation. Masturbation was the gateway to homosexuality, which was in 
diametric opposition to his vision of a rationalized sexuality. ?In the moment, 
masturbators are frightened to have sex, from there grows a perseverance in their vice 
                                                
346 W.E. Coutts. A los j?venes. Santiago de Chile: Talleres de San Vicente, 1929. 4. 
 
347 Ibid 4-5. 
 
 178 
and the ease with which they engage in abnormal practices, especially sodomy.?348 The 
emphasis on sexuality within marriage and the creation of family units as the goal of 
social reform explains why homosexuality was considered to be especially dangerous to 
the resolution of the social question. Homosexual relationships, almost always 
understood to be between men, allowed for non-reproductive sex outside the confines of 
marriage that was not as easily managed by state or religious institutions. 
While Coutts did not make explicit his position regarding morality, his vision of 
appropriate sexual behavior was similar to both Fournier and Barbet. This was best 
exemplified when he wrote, ?No, young men, the most virile man, the ?most manly? is he 
who takes his true place in life, he who works most and best defeats the other men in the 
struggle for existence and not he who makes of life a field of pleasures, and especially 
not pleasures of a sexual nature.?349 Coutts wanted to change the meaning of being a real 
man from a sexual to a social significance. A real man was someone who was able to 
manage all the passions with which nature had endowed him. That was real strength. He 
naturalized and scientized that version of masculine strength by discussing it in the 
context of the Darwinian struggle for life. All of the reformers mentioned above, both 
Catholic and secular, believed that sex within the confines of heterosexual marriage was 
the best (and only) way to express sexual desire for all people. They believed this was so 
because it conformed with a social order designed by nature. However, modern living 
                                                
348 Ibid 6. ?(Los masturbadores est?n asustados en el momento de hacerlo, de aqu? nace la 
perseverancia en su vicio y la facilidad con que se entregan a pr?cticas anormales, especialmente la 
sodom?a).? 
 
349 Ibid 7-8. ?N?, j?venes, el hombre m?s viril, el ?m?s hombre? es el que toma su verdadero 
puesto en la vida, el que trabaja m?s y vence mejor a los dem?s hombres en la lucha por la existencia y n? 
aquel que hace de ella un campo de placeres, y especialmente de placeres de naturaleza sexual.? 
 
 179 
had caused Chilean men and women to move away from their biologically determined 
roles, which necessitated eugenic social reforms and intervention. 
Teaching Chilean Women their Place 
Women, unlike men, did not need to be taught sexual continence. Rather, 
eugenicists contended that Chilean women needed only to pay better attention to their 
natural skills and inclinations. This discourse focused mostly on women?s abilities to 
nurture and raise healthy children. In ?Mar?a y la mujer chilena,? the gendered 
expectations for modern Chilean women were made very clear. Written in 1905, this 
article appeared in LRC and discussed how women should use the Virgin Mary as their 
role model. ?We are going to begin this essay proposing the Virgin Saint as the perfect 
model of virtue, and a divine panacea, able to remedy the evils of all humanity.?350 The 
Virgin?s qualities?altruism, piety and chastity?were what would cure Chilean society 
of its ills. 
Sofia del Campo, the pen name of the article?s author Juan Ramon Ramirez that 
meant Knowledge of Nature, recognized the importance of Chilean women to improving 
social conditions by arguing that their natural feminine qualities should be used to fix 
social problems. While men were admonished to change their sexual behavior, masculine 
qualities were not defined as central to renewing Chilean society. Men were expected to 
be workers and providers for their nation and families. They were concerned with self-
 preservation first. This was understood to be a characteristic determined by biology and 
could, at best, be modified. Women, on the other hand, had moved away from their 
                                                
350 Sofia del Campo (Juan Ramon Ramirez). ?Mar?a y la mujer chilena.? La Revista Cat?lica no. 
87 (March 4, 1905): 185-205. 185. 
 
 180 
natural social roles and had begun to work and live in the male-dominated public sphere. 
As such, Chilean women were the recipients of more social reform programs specifically 
focusing on their sexual behavior. Their behavior and social expectations were what had 
most drastically changed as a result of capitalist expansion. The most profound social 
problems affecting Chile were more associated with female misbehavior rather than that 
of men. Though the previous section indicates that male sexuality was a concern, the 
quantity of writing about men did not even compare to the number of items written about 
female behavior, sexual or otherwise.351 
 Returning to del Campo, ?she? argued that women and men were naturally 
dependent on each other. ?Feminine weakness finds strength in masculine robustness, 
and, in exchange, she with her affability softens and tempers in him the roughness of his 
character and energy of his passions.?352 Men and women had their spheres of expertise 
and those spheres were designed to complement each other while also being mutually 
exclusive. As such, women had a very important social role to play. For del Campo, this 
role was as workers and leaders only in charitable organizations. While men could work 
as politicians, doctors, lawyers, or priests to resolve the social question, women were 
restricted to the field of charitable work alone. They were not to stray further into the 
public sphere or they might put their femininity at risk. However, del Campo argued that 
charity work was vital to the proper functioning of society as a whole and Chilean social 
renewal. ?But this also indicates that the Christian woman is the first factor in the great 
                                                
351 Out of a total of 387 documents that discussed idealized gender norms and behaviors, 251 
were about women. Only fifty focused on male misbehavior. 
 
352 del Campo 188. ?La debilidad de la mujer encuentra apoyo en la robustez del hombre, y, en 
cambio, aqu?lla con su afabilidad suaviza y modera en ?ste la aspereza del car?cter y el ?mpetu de las 
pasiones.? 
 
 181 
works of charity and beneficence.?353 While women might be considered second-class 
citizens in terms of the public sphere, they were still critical to the resolution of social 
problems. Even more important, they were called upon as more than wives and mothers. 
In 1912, Catholic writer Esteban Lamy argued that women had been 
systematically pushed from positions of social power over time and that this imbalance 
needed to be addressed. In a series of articles entitled ?La mujer de ma?ana,? which 
appeared in LRC, Lamy contended that women had been pushed out of scientific 
disciplines in two ways. First, women had generally been discouraged from pursuing any 
sort of education. He blamed women?s inability to access educational opportunities on 
secular notions that were against education for women.354  Lamy argued that women 
ought to be educated and there was nothing wrong with that pursuit. Second, he stated 
that secularists had convinced women that scientific disciplines were anti-Catholic. As a 
result, most women were not interested in pursuing scientific educations.355 The 
assumption that women placed their religious interests over educational development 
demonstrated Lamy?s own beliefs about the relationship between gender and Catholicism 
in Chile, but he still believed women ought to play a central role in scientific study. 
Perhaps, he might argue, female scientists would be more able to combine the study of 
science with that of moral fortitude. 
                                                
353 Ibid 197. ?Pero esto tambi?n indica que la mujer cristiana es como el primer factor en las 
grandes obras de caridad y de beneficencia.? 
 
354 Esteban Lamy. ?La mujer de ma?ana,? La Revista Cat?lica, no. 261 (June 15, 1912): 970-978. 
971. 
 
355 Ibid 972. 
 
 182 
 Catholic reformers, like Lamy, felt social renewal was a special duty of the 
Chilean Catholic woman. An article written by an anonymous author appearing in La 
Cruzada, the newspaper produced by the Liga de Damas Chilenas, in 1917 claimed, 
?Keeping your children from evil and making them love virtue, that is a true science.?356 
This statement demonstrated that Catholic women were expected to raise their children 
according to a high moral standard. Not only that, the author argued that this task was a 
science in itself. Discussing child rearing as a science recognized the iconic and 
discursive power of science as a social tool for progress. Even more important, this 
author went on to argue, ?How serious is the mission of a mother! Terrible when we 
consider how on her management depends the salvation of the souls of her children, and 
even the children of these.?357 Mixing a Catholic woman?s religious duty to inculcate her 
children in Catholic tradition with an evolutionary statement about offspring 
demonstrates the popularity and power of eugenic discourse in the first half of the 
twentieth century.358 
Both Catholic and secular intellectuals agreed that a woman?s primary social 
obligation was to bear and raise eugenic children. This was her natural duty and most 
writers discussed a woman?s desire to conceive in the same way they discussed male 
sexual desire, as a biological imperative. They differed in how to raise children, but most 
                                                
356 ?La mujer Cat?lica.? La Cruzada no. 106 (March 15, 1917): 5. 
 
357 Ibid. 
 
358 Erika Maza Valenzuela. ?Catolicismo, anticlericalismo y la tensi?n del sufragio a la mujer en 
Chile,? Estudios P?blicos, no. 58 (Oto?o 1995): 137-195. Power 2002. Ericka Verba. Catholic Feminism 
and the Social Question in Chile, 1910-1917: the Liga de Damas Chilenas. Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen 
Press, 2003. Pamela Voekel. Alone Before God: The Religious Origins of Modernity in Mexico. Durham: 
Duke University Press, 2002. 
 
 
 183 
Catholic authors agreed that the most important aspect of this task was the education of 
children in Catholic values and customs. In El Libro de la Mujer: Como Cristiana, 
Esposa, Madre, Educadora y Ap?stol (1917), Gentilini argued that women were designed 
to lavish love upon their families.359 Based on a series of lectures given at the 
Universidad Cat?lica for mothers and educators, this monograph was aimed at an 
audience Gentilini believed to be sorely in need of help. Like his counterparts, he argued 
that a Christian woman?s most important characteristic was her charitable nature and that 
social renewal would be the result of Catholic charity.360 Because women were naturally 
equipped to be nurturers and caregivers, they were also naturally equipped to work in 
charities. After all, they did charitable work not for monetary gain but for the satisfaction 
they would get from caring for others. 
 However, women had to be educated about how to properly fulfill their social 
obligations. Natural inclination could only carry them so far. Gentilini argued that women 
were far from the weaker sex in religious matters. Rather, they far surpassed men in their 
piety and dedication to religious observance.361 However, this was only true when women 
were raised in a moral environment. Like Lamy before him, Gentilini was disturbed by 
the apparent lack of interest in female education, religious or otherwise. He argued, ?This 
[religious ignorance] would be unspeakable for all Christians, but especially in the 
woman, destined by her mission to give the heat of her soul and the fire of her mind to 
                                                
359 Bernardo Gentilini. El Libro de la Mujer: Como Cristiana, Esposa, Madre, Educadora y 
Ap?stol. Santiago de Chile: Apostolado de la Prensa, 1917. 9.  
 
360 Ibid 14-15. 
 
361 Ibid 30. 
 184 
the future generation.?362 While women were naturally inclined to a religious life and 
upbringing, nothing could help them if they were raised in a secular environment. Their 
natural predisposition toward piety would be lost and the hope of Chilean social progress 
with it. This was particularly dangerous to the future generations of Chilean children that 
needed pious mothers to properly raise them to accept their social obligations like 
choosing a eugenic marriage partner. 
 Gentilini believed that a fundamental part of this education ought to be about how 
to manage a home, specifically some type of home economics course. ?When saying that 
home economics is the science of women, we do not want to say that which Moli?re in 
his times supported, that the only obligation of women is to know how to make a good 
soup. But rather this domestic science must be an integral part of the vast educational 
program for women.?363 This statement demonstrated that Gentilini believed women 
were far more capable than secular reformers gave them credit for. Running a household 
required more than cooking good meals. Instead, household management was a science 
that women practiced. Much like intellectuals in the United States who advocated for the 
recognition of domestic tasks as a science, Gentilini argued that women?s work ought not 
be shortchanged or overlooked.364 
                                                
362 Ibid 37. ?Esto [ignorancia religiosa] ser?a incalificable en todo cristiano, pero especialmente en 
la mujer, destinada por su misi?n a dar a la futura prole el calor de su alma y la lumbre de su mente.? 
 
363 Ibid 93. ?Al decir que la econom?a dom?stica es la ciencia propia de las mujeres, no queremos 
decir lo que en sus tiempos sosten?a Moli?re, que la sola obligaci?n de las mujeres era saber condimentar 
una buena sopa. Sino que esta ciencia dom?stica ha de ser parte integral del vasto programa educativo de la 
mujer.? 
 
364 Scholars who examine the development and discourse surrounding home economics include: 
Rima D. Apple. Perfect Motherhood: Science and Childrearing in America. New Brunswick: Rutgers 
University Press, 2006. Megan J. Elias. Stir It Up: Home Economics in American Culture. Philadelphia: 
University of Pennsylvania Press, 2008. Sarah Stage and Virginia Bramble Vincenti. Rethinking Home 
Economics: Women and the History of a Profession. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1997. One of the 
 185 
 Social reformers also discussed how to prevent the most problematic gender issue 
in Chile, the sexual double standard. Many, typically female, social reformers argued 
against the social mores that allowed different sexual rules for men and women. Women 
had to protect their bodies because they were the carriers of the future human race. Men, 
however, were often left free to behave however they chose. Cora Mayers?s La mujer 
defensora de la raza argued that women were to blame for this situation because they did 
not demand the same standard of purity from their partners. ?From birth, the woman must 
prepare to comply with the most sacred and delicate of missions; she should arrive to 
marriage demanding the same conditions of purity of body and soul of he who will be her 
husband as she has observed.?365 By expecting their partners to be as pure as they were, 
Chilean women could actively work to improve the Chilean race.   
According to Mayers, women were actually the cause of most of Chile?s social 
problems because they allowed men to behave badly. She argued that by refusing to 
marry impure men, women could change this double standard. This approach did 
empower women to some extent. They were able to refuse marriage. However, her 
argument was also problematic in a number of ways. First, it assumed that men were 
equally interested in marriage as women, so they would respond to female refusals. 
However, we can surmise that men were not necessarily as interested, based on the 
previous analysis regarding male sexual desire. In fact, women may not have been as 
concerned about marriage either, since many social reformers lamented rising rates of 
                                                                                                                                            
foundational texts of the discipline in the United States was: Madalyn Avery. Household Physics: a 
Textbook for College Students in Home Economics. New York: Macmillan, 1955. 
 
365 Cora Mayers. La mujer: defensora de la raza. Santiago de Chile: Imprenta Santiago, 1925. 12. 
 186 
illegitimacy.366 Second, Mayers assumed that women could move beyond emotional 
attachment to their male partners and end relationships for strictly medical reasons. 
Finally, this recommendation overlooked the possibility that Chilean women may have 
preferred their male partners to have some sexual experience. 
 Intellectual opinions about how women should behave did not change much over 
time, either among Catholic or secular intellectuals. Violeta Martinez wrote in Servicio 
Social, ?In scientific investigation, in artistic creation and in political manifestations, we 
can always find a woman as the muse.?367 Martinez, a secular writer, characterized 
women?s roles as important to society, but only as helpmates and inspiration to the work 
of men. Sarah I. de Phillippi wrote that, ?the woman is under her husband?s power, 
because this is how nature ordains it,? in 1951.368 Though writing in Estudios, a Catholic 
biblical study periodical, we see that de Phillippi?s opinion about gender relations was not 
exclusively Catholic. As has been demonstrated in previous examples, women were 
thought to be naturally subordinate to men.369 De Phillippi, however, added a religious 
imperative to this patriarchal social order. It was not only natural, but moral. Even though 
decades had passed between de Phillippi?s writing and that of Vicu?a, their opinions 
remained more or less the same. The consistency of this argument throughout the period 
                                                
366 ?El primer aspecto de este problema es entonces la ilegitimidad que implica deficientes 
condiciones de Resistencia fisiol?gica ya que son hijos?en su mayor parte?de madres solteras privadas 
del apoyo econ?mico del padre?De ah? la preocupaci?n de este Ministerio por el desarrollo de una pol?tica 
de protecci?n a la madre soltera y la normal constituci?n de las familias de nuestra clase trabajadora, por lo 
que ella significa para el provenir de la madre y del ni?o.? Allende 105. 
 
367 Violeta Martinez. ?La mujer,? Servicio Social, no. 1 (January-April 1944): 53-59. 55. ?En la 
investigaci?n cient?fica, en la creaci?n art?stica y en las realizaciones pol?ticas, hallamos siempre a una 
mujer como inspiradora, como tonificante?? 
 
368 Sara I de Phillippi. ?La misi?n de la mujer,? Estudios no. 212 (April-May 1951): 25-40. 26. 
 
369 Donna Guy. Women Build the Welfare State: Performing Charity and Creating Rights in 
Argentina, 1880-1955. Durham: Duke University Press, 2009. 
 187 
might suggest the ahistorical timelessness and dogmatism that secular reformers accused 
Catholics of espousing. 
?Solving? the Gender Question 
 Many social reformers gave advice about what constituted proper gender 
behavior, however, some eugenicists were more concrete in their discussion of solutions 
to the problems regarding male and female sexual interaction and behavior. Though 
eugenicists argued that both men and women needed to adjust their behaviors, female 
behavior was considered the most problematic. The documentary imbalance mentioned 
previously also suggests that women were thought to be more manageable and more 
amenable to state or religious interventions into their personal lives. Though men also 
needed instruction as to proper gender behavior, it seems that reformers were unsure 
about how to best proceed. Typically, they encouraged men to live up to their 
expectations as breadwinners and practice sexual responsibility if not continence. 
However, there were few social reform programs aimed at men. This was most likely 
because men?s roles in modern life had not deviated much from their natural inclinations. 
 In a series of articles about poverty, Adela Edwards de Salas advocated for the 
construction of schools to instruct new mothers. She believed that poor women not only 
did not know the best child rearing techniques but, also, were incapable of providing the 
necessary resources for their children. Edwards de Salas was the founder of the Cruz 
Blanca, a charitable organization aimed at helping Chilean women in a number of 
ways.370 She also was behind a successful campaign to unify Catholic women in the 
                                                
370 This included job training, help leaving prostitution, support for single mothers, and aiding 
victims of domestic abuse. Valenzuela 166-167. 
 188 
group, Acci?n Nacional de Mujeres, which had 18,000 members by 1935.371 Edwards de 
Salas envisioned that these schools would, ?consist of giving practical lessons to poor 
women about how to wash, dress and feed their child, and on the first steps in caring for 
the sick before the doctor arrives.?372 Edwards de Salas believed poor women were 
unaware of proper hygiene and nutrition practices and this needed to be corrected. She 
also illuminated the growing belief among most Chileans that a doctor, not a druggist or 
midwife, was necessary when a child became sick. This speaks to the increasing 
prejudice against non-traditional remedies and women who practiced medicine. Even the 
poor were expected to call a doctor.373  
 Ver?nica, writing for El Eco de las Damas Chilenas, was of a similar opinion. As 
the publication representing the Liga de Damas Chilenas, she represented the upper class 
Chilean Catholic women who felt compelled to address social problems. She believed, as 
Edwards de Salas did, that women needed instruction to be good housewives. In her case, 
this was not just aimed at poor women. This was for all women and was to be limited to 
domestic training only. ?This instruction is not professional instruction that specializes in 
a science so that with it she can earn a living; this is a general knowledge of all that she 
                                                
371 Asunci?n Lavrin. Women, Feminism, and Social Change in Argentina, Chile, and Uruguay, 
1890-1940. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1995. 305. 
 
372 Adela Edwards de Salas. ?Nuestros pobres y sus hijos ? Escuelas maternales,? La Revista 
Cat?lica, no. 206 (February 18, 1910): 170-174. 173. ??consisten en dar lecciones practicas ? las pobres 
sobre la manera de lavar, vestir y alimentar ? su ni?o, y sobre los primeros cuidados en caso de enfermedad 
antes que llegue el medico.? 
 
373 Mar?a Soledad Z?rate C. Dar a luz en Chile, siglo XIX: De la ?ciencia de hembra? a la 
ciencia obst?trica. Santiago, Chile: Ediciones de la Direcci?n de Bibliotecas, Archivos y Museos, 2007. 
 
 189 
needs to know to be an excellent housewife.?374 She stipulated that domestic instruction 
for mothers should not be confused with professional education. She did not want to give 
the impression that a program of study regarding home economics should lead to women 
working outside the home. Rather, the proper education would allow women to better 
serve in their roles as wives and mothers. Ver?nica also added, ?Even more so; this 
instruction though it appears material, prosaic, and positive, it may on the contrary 
spiritualize and become real moral and religious propaganda.?375 Much like previous 
writers, Veronica believed that teaching women to care for their homes and their bodies 
would result in spiritual growth and health for the whole country. This second benefit 
was even more important to the social progress of Chile than the first. 
Another solution eugenicists proposed was sex education for young Chileans. For 
example, Barbet believed that sexual education was a vital part of encouraging young 
men to maintain their chastity until marriage.376 Barbet concluded his book by insisting 
that scientific or medical information about sexuality was not enough. Young men also 
had to have moral instruction to encourage the best behavior. If young men were not 
acquainted with the benefits of chastity and sexual continence, ?Without chastity, the 
young man will start to become accustomed to birth control and, much later, being 
logical, legitimate abortion, divorce and free love; immorality will reign and 
                                                
374 Ver?nica. ?La ense?anza dom?stica,? El Eco de la Liga de Damas Chilenas, no. 26 
(September 15, 1913): 1. 1. ?No es esta ense?anza la ense?anza profesional que se especializa en una 
ciencia para poder con ella ganar la vida; es un conocimiento general de todo lo que necesita saber una 
excelente due?a de casa.? 
 
375 Ibid. ?M?s a?n; esta ense?anza al parecer material, prosaica y positiva, puede al contrario 
espiritualizarse y convertirse en verdadera propaganda moral y religiosa.? 
 
376 Barbet 49. 
 190 
depopulation will come with her.?377 If young men were able to receive the benefits of 
sex with none of the responsibilities, then the social order would be threatened because 
families would not be formed. 
In many ways, this opinion matched that of the secular reformer and juvenile 
court judge Samuel Gajardo. La educaci?n sexual del ni?o y del adolescente (1940) 
stated that embarrassment and morals had no place in sex education.378 Gajardo believed 
that holding preconceived notions about the immorality of sex education would result in 
disaster for young people in the form of sexually transmitted diseases. Additionally, he 
did not see the conflict between moral instruction and sex education. ?Catholic dogma 
does not contain any principle that is incompatible with sexual education for boys, this is 
teaching natural laws.?379 He argued that one of religion?s primary goals was to teach 
about how the natural world worked and humanity?s place in that world. As such, sex 
education was nothing more than acquainting young men with natural laws they ought to 
know. This instruction was all the more important because marriage was the only proper 
way to confront and control the natural sexual urges in all people.380 Gajardo recognized 
that reality did not always work out this way. People did have sex outside the confines of 
marriage.381 However, he still argued that marriage was the best expression of natural 
sexual desire, not much differently from Catholic intellectuals of the period. 
                                                
377 Ibid 55. 
 
378 Samuel Gajardo. La educacion sexual del ni?o y del adolescente. Santiago: Direcci?n General 
de Prisiones, 1940. 7. 
 
379 Ibid 10. 
 
380 Ibid 15. 
 
 191 
According to Gajardo, one of the primary ways parents could help their children 
was by instructing them in proper sexual behavior. He accepted the fact that men had a 
powerful sexual drive that attracted them to women. However, he argued, they did not 
know how to properly consummate physical relationships.382 This meant that men 
improperly understood sex to be about personal pleasure and nothing else. Gajardo 
believed men needed to be acquainted with the pleasures and responsibilities of sex early 
on. In fact, Gajardo argued against waiting until puberty to tell young boys about sex.383 
By then, the sexual urges in them would be too strong to effectively educate them in 
proper sexual behavior.384 The tyranny of the sexual impulse would bring young men to 
their downfall if parents waited until sexual interest was already present in their sons to 
discuss appropriate sexual behavior. Instead, parents ought to educate them about sex 
before they were interested in it. 
Gajardo did not believe that women suffered from the same sexual tyranny. He 
wrote, ?In the woman, the problem [of puberty] is normally less serious because in her 
the sexual instinct is more attenuated and because social life does not offer her the 
tyrannical stimuli that surrounds men.?385 Women were not as strongly compelled by 
their instincts to have sex. This did not necessarily mean that women did not need sex 
education, or have sexual urges, but rather their program of study should be different. 
                                                                                                                                            
381 Ibid 114. ?No vacilamos al aceptar ese ideal [no hacerlo antes del matrimonio] y ya lo hemos 
recomendado.  La educaci?n debe infundir esa norma saludable; pero, la soluci?n de los problemas sociales 
no est? en construir sobre ideales, sino tambi?n sobre la realidad.? 
 
382 Ibid 51. 
 
383 Ibid 93. 
 
384 Ibid 103. 
 
385 Ibid 97. 
 192 
Most often, sexual education for women focused on how the reproductive cycle worked. 
Virtually every intellectual, Catholic and secular, was of the same opinion. 
How to prepare men and women for responsible sexual encounters continued to 
be an issue throughout the first half of the twentieth century. In 1941, Gustavo Weigel 
wrote an article for Estudios about how to properly prepare young men and women for 
marriage. ?Preparaci?n al matrimonio? explained that young men were quite educated in 
terms of their future careers but unaware about how to manage the most important aspect 
of their lives, their sexual relationships. 
This is a shame but it is a sad truth. We prepare the youth to be an engineer or to 
become a mechanic, but not to be a husband, which is how his most urgent 
problem must be resolved, his sexual problem. Even worse, we allow him to work 
sexually in such a way that he arrives at marriage completely disoriented and 
badly directed.386 
 
Men were left to their own devices when it came to sex; friends and coworkers became 
experts and confidantes. They were never instructed about how to be responsible 
husbands. At best, men got some ribald jokes about how to be a good lover. Weigel 
thought this was irresponsible. Professionals should provide this information to young 
men because young men in particular were subject to obeying their baser instincts and 
listening to their friends? advice regarding sex. He believed that young men needed to be 
educated about sex by their fathers, who would instill in them the proper responsibility 
and respect for the act.387 Weigel believed fathers were more than breadwinners and this 
was one responsibility that could not be shirked. 
                                                
386 Gustavo Weigel. ?Preparaci?n al matrimonio,? Estudios, no. 102 (June 1941): 4-13. 5. ?Esto 
es una l?stima pero es un hecho tristemente cierto. Lo preparamos [el joven] para ser ingeniero o para 
hacerse mec?nico, pero no lo preparamos para esposo, que es como debe resolver su problema m?s urgente, 
su problema sexual. Peor aun, lo dejamos obrar sexualmente de tal manera que llegue al matrimonio 
completamente desorientado y mal dirigido.? 
 
 193 
 Weigel also believed young women needed to be better prepared for their sexual 
obligations. He lamented the fact that young girls were told that attracting a husband was 
their first priority. This encouraged flightiness and early sexual awareness that was 
dangerous for young women. Weigel advocated for giving young women more education 
and responsibilities to occupy their time and their minds, to keep them from becoming 
sexualized at an early age.388 He felt that Chilean society had started to place a premium 
on female sexual attractiveness and beauty over more important qualities, such as fealty, 
duty and responsibility. This inculcated in young women a disregard for social 
obligations and threatened their ability to properly raise eugenic children, which was a 
threat to the national progress social reform was supposed to achieve. 
This problem was exacerbated, according to Weigel, by the Chilean custom of 
pololeo, an exclusive romantic relationship between a young man and woman. He 
believed this was dangerous because it caused young people to form strong romantic 
attachments early on that did not result in marriage. In fact, Weigel pointed out that it was 
widely accepted that pololeos were not meant to end in marriage.389 Instead, he argued 
that young men should be friendly with many young women but should not form a 
specific connection to any one girl. Encouraging a relationship with just one girl would 
result in both parties developing feelings that were too mature for them and might lead 
them into trouble, e.g. a sexual relationship outside the confines of marriage.390 Weigel 
                                                                                                                                            
387 Ibid 6. 
 
388 Ibid 7. 
 
389 Ibid 8-9. 
 
390 Ibid 9. 
 194 
concluded by stating, ?Instead of pololeo easy and normal dealings between the sexes 
should be permitted and fomented in such a way that the environment produced by these 
dealings be spontaneous and natural, without any matrimonial color and without any 
explicitly erotic tendency.?391 This would allow young men and women to interact 
without fear of illicit sexual interactions. 
Educating young women about pregnancy, the reproductive cycle and sexual 
contact between men and women was another important tactic to discouraging premarital 
sex. Jeanne Leroy Allais?s De como he instruido a mis hijas sobre las cosas de la 
maternidad (1925) discussed these issues for young women. Most intellectuals agreed 
that some amount of sexual education needed to be given to both young men and women. 
They differed, however, on how detailed this information should be and believed that 
men and women needed different kinds of information. For example, Allais?s book was 
mostly concerned with the mechanics of menstruation and childbirth and avoided details 
about sexual intercourse and reproductive health. 
Allais began her book by saying that she was unsure how much information she 
should give her daughters about sex and reproduction. In fact, she hesitated to provide 
them any sort of sexual education at all. She was only convinced when her brother-in-
 law, a doctor, told her, ?With all these modern pretensions of comprehensive education 
for women, they put in their heads multitudes of sciences that will never serve and they 
leave them ignorant of what nature destines them to do, their principle function in life, 
which is to say, maternity.?392 This statement pointed to the fact that, while female 
                                                
391 Ibid 10. ?En lugar del pololeo debe permitirse y fomentarse un trato f?cil y normal entre los 
sexos de tal manera que el ambiente producido por tal trato sea espont?neo y natural, sin ning?n color 
matrimonial y sin ninguna tendencia expl?citamente er?tica.? 
 
 195 
educational opportunities were increasing, the most important lessons about being a 
woman were being ignored due to moral arguments or parental embarrassment. Young 
girls needed to learn how their bodies worked at an early age, to teach them their natural 
responsibility as future mothers. They did not need to be told everything, but they could 
not be left completely in the dark. 
In addition to sex education and child-rearing instruction, many eugenicists 
argued that environmental improvements would facilitate social change. The second 
article in Edwards de Salas?s series addressed how to follow up on the work of the 
maternal schools, which included a program of supervision of the families after the child 
was born. After all, it would be a waste of effort if the children who were saved by the 
maternal college ended up even worse off as young adults.393 If conditions in a child?s 
home were dangerous, Edwards de Salas advocated for the removal of the child from that 
environment. This was not only for the protection of the child, but of the race as well.394 
She believed that environments played an important role in the development of the 
individual. A poor child needed to be removed from his or her family for the good of the 
child, if that family could not provide the basic necessities required to maintain a 
hygienic environment.395 
                                                                                                                                            
392 Jeanne Leroy Allais. De como he instruido a mis hijas sobre las cosas de la maternidad, 
Emilio R. Coni (trans). Santiago de Chile: Liga Chilena de Higiene Social, 1925. 6. 
 
393 Adela Edwards de Salas. ?Nuestros pobres y sus hijos.? La Revista Cat?lica no. 208 (March 
19, 1910): 353-356. 354. 
 
394 Ibid 355. 
 
395 Nara B. Milanich explores how the Chilean state dealt with the removal of children from their 
parents. In particular, she points out that the Chilean state was not equipped with facilities of its own and 
depended on private institutions. See: Nara B. Milanich. Children of Fate: Childhood, Class, and the State 
in Chile, 1850-1930. Durham: Duke University Press, 2009. 
 196 
Gentilini also strongly believed in the power of the environment in shaping 
individuals, especially children. As a result, he argued that women needed to play an 
active role in the upbringing and education of their children. However, women required 
instruction about how to do this because correcting an improper upbringing was more 
difficult than instructing a proper one. 
The child is like soft wax, that receives the imprint of the breeze that blows, of the 
drop that falls or of the hand that shapes it. The first ideas, and feelings and acts, 
stay there encrusted?And if repeated, they begin to form roots, forming in this 
way a second nature. For this [reason] it was said that good habits are like a 
second nature that impresses upon the first, and makes the practice of virtue or the 
acceptance of obligations easy, natural and spontaneous.396 
 
Gentilini clearly understood childhood development in somewhat Lamarckian terms. The 
environment surrounding a child, especially its mother, played a critical role in the 
development of that child. With repeated exposure to moral behavior, a child would 
begin to naturally manifest moral behavior. The opposite was also true. As such, Gentilini 
advocated a naturalized morality as vital to the creation and stability of proper social 
order. 
 Morality was also important because Gentilini related moral behavior with 
physical health. ?In other words, make healthy bodies, with all the means hygiene gives 
us, so that they can be worthy instrument of the soul. Many times to miserable bodies 
correspond miserable souls.?397 It is unclear whether morality affected health in the sense 
                                                
396 Gentilini, Mujer, 114. El ni?o es como blanda cera, que recibe la huella de la brisa que sopla, 
de la gota que cae o de la mano que plasma. Las primeras ideas, y sentimientos y actos, quedan ah? 
incrustados...Y si repetidos, llegan a echar ra?ces, formando as? una segunda naturaleza. Por esto muy bien 
se dijo que los buenos h?bitos son como una segunda naturaleza que se sobrepone a la primera, y hace f?cil, 
natural y espont?nea la pr?ctica de las virtudes o el cumplimiento de los deberes. 
 
397 Ibid 136. ?En otras palabras, formad cuerpos sanos, con todos los medios que la higiene os 
proporciona, para que ellos puedan ser dignos instrumentos del alma. A cuerpos raqu?ticos corresponden 
muchas veces almas raqu?ticas.? 
 197 
that moral behavior prevented sexually transmitted diseases, or, if he believed that moral 
behavior actually affected the physical processes of the body. Nonetheless, Gentilini 
linked moral behavior with a healthy body and this morality was achieved through 
environmental (educational) instruction, the responsibility of mothers. Therefore, the 
religious formation of women contributed both to their own health and the health of their 
children. 
Gajardo also argued that the environment was a deciding factor in the 
development of the individual. ?We have extensively discussed the personality of the 
child. This is no less than the result of the environment. But for exceptions derived from 
pathological heredity, there are no good or bad children by birth.?398 While the debate 
about the importance of nature versus nurture continues in various scientific disciplines 
even today, it is interesting that Gajardo so strongly believed in the transformative power 
of the environment. This was most likely the result of his own work as a judge in the 
juvenile court system. He saw for himself that most of the youths brought before him 
were the product of virtually no parental involvement and incredible poverty. It is no 
surprise then, that he surmised that environment was the primary cause of juvenile 
delinquency. As such, he believed all of these children were capable of rehabilitation if 
placed in a hygienic and secure environment, a similar notion to that of Catholic 
eugenicists. 
                                                
398 Gajardo 34. This is also interesting because later in the same book, Gajardo argued that male 
sexual desire was compelled by a natural desire to perpetuate the species. As such, he clearly believed in 
some form of modified evolutionary theory, even when arguing that environment was most important. ?The 
libido or attraction to the opposite sex constitutes a psychological character of man and of almost all the 
living beings. It is a base instinct, in that it has been imposed by Nature for the perpetuation of the species.? 
103. 
 198 
 All Chilean social reformers in the early twentieth century believed that Chilean 
men and women were facing new challenges to their traditional gender roles. New social 
spaces like movie theatres, clubs and bars were opening and making room for new ways 
for men and women to interact with each other. An increasingly urban population also 
meant new customs and new ways to behave. More and more women were working 
outside the home. Some commentators believed that poverty born of capitalist expansion 
was the fundamental problem affecting the Chilean social order. Others believed that it 
was uncontrolled male sexual urges that caused trouble. Regardless of their opinions 
about what was causing social turmoil, all of them agreed that both men and women 
needed to be reminded of and instructed about their natural skills and responsibilities. 
These social reformers agreed that ideal sexual intercourse should be heterosexual and 
within the confines of marriage. This ensured a eugenic union that would result in healthy 
and strong children, which were the hope for Chile?s future. To achieve this goal, both 
Chilean men and women had to be encouraged to follow their natural instincts; for 
women, to nurture, for men, to work. 
 199 
Conclusion 
 
Social Reform, Chilean Progressivism and 
the Legacy of Catholic Eugenics 
 
?A vitalized people, healthy and cultured, I have here the task that all of us Chileans must 
attend to so we can serve the Fatherland as we ardently wish, and we fight without rest so 
the people will rise from the age of exploitation and ignorance in which they have 
languished.?399 
 
-Pedro Aguirre Cerda, Chilean president 1938-1941 (Radical Party & Frente Popular) 
 
?For these reasons the Teaching Authority of the Church does not forbid that, in 
conformity with the present state of human sciences and sacred theology, research and 
discussions, on the part of men experienced in both fields, take place with regard to the 
doctrine of evolution, in as far as it inquires into the origin of the human body as coming 
from pre-existent and living matter ? for the Catholic faith obliges us to hold that souls 
are immediately created by God.?400 
 
-Pope Pius XII, Humani Generis, 1950 
 
?I hate having to worry that being able to see a girl?s underwear will so addle the boys? 
brains that they will be unable to concentrate in science class.?401 
 
-Jessica Lahey, The Atlantic Monthly, 2013 
 
Pedro Aguirre Cerda?s ?To Govern is to Educate and Give Health to the People,? 
elucidated one way political progressives in Chile understood the relationship between 
physical health and economic liberation. He felt that the application of scientific methods 
                                                
399 Pedro Aguirre Cerda. ?Gobernar es educar y dar salud al pueblo,? in Salvador Allende, La 
realidad medico-social chilena. Hern?n Soto, Mar?a Ang?lica Illanes y Mariano Requena (eds). Santiago, 
Chile: Editorial Cuarto Propio, 1999 (1939). 5. ?Un pueblo vitalizado, sano y culto, he ah? la consigna a la 
cual debemos atenernos todos los chilenos que anhelamos ardientemente server a la patria, y que luchamos 
sin descanso porque el pueblo supere la etapa de explotaci?n y de ignorancia en que ha vegetado.? 
 
400 Papal Encyclicals Online. ?Humani Generis: Encyclical of Pope Pius XII Concerning Some 
False Opinions Threatening to Undermine the Foundations of Catholic Doctrine,? by Pope Pius XII, 
August 12, 1950, http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Pius12/P12HUMAN.HTM. 
 
401 Jessica Lahey. ?A Dress-Code Enforcer?s Struggle for the Soul of the Middle-School Girl,? 
The Atlantic Monthly, February 14, 2013, http://www.theatlantic.com/sexes/archive/2013/02/a-dress-code-
 enforcers-struggle-for-the-soul-of-the-middle-school-girl/273155/.  
 200 
was the best way to break oppressive economic relationships in order to create a new and 
egalitarian Chilean society. Salvador Allende, co-founder of the Socialist Party of Chile 
in 1933 and head of Aguirre Cerda?s 1938 electoral campaign, studied medicine while 
eugenics held sway as the most effective way to cure social ills. As Aguirre Cerda?s 
Minister of Health, Allende formulated his Socialist ideology to include tenets of eugenic 
science that supported male privilege and reinforced female submissiveness in order to 
overcome economic disparity. My dissertation illustrates how social reformers, like 
Allende, used eugenics to modernize the patriarchal social order in Chile between 1900 
and 1950. What neither Aguirre Cerda nor Allende recognized was that their 
conceptualization of social reform shared space in a discursive universe that included the 
work and ideas of Catholic Chileans, mostly political conservatives. 
The social reform discourse that Catholic and secular intellectuals created in the 
first half of the twentieth century in Chile was based on gendered concepts that they 
believed to be stable, natural, and scientifically proven. Women and men were different, 
both in terms of their capabilities and complementary talents. The differences between 
men and women were not the result of politics, education, or culture, but the direct result 
of inherent natural differences between the genders. While we can see that the belief in 
natural gender difference was premised upon the prejudices of the historical actors 
themselves, Chilean social reformers in the early twentieth century explained these 
differences using evolutionary theory that naturalized gender difference as their proof. 
Because evolutionary theory informed eugenic practices, the application of eugenics to 
resolve the social question allowed Chilean Catholics to play a central role in 
popularizing concepts that would later come to be identified with the Frente Popular and 
 201 
ultimately setting the stage for la via chilena, the peaceful and democratic road to 
Socialism that Chile was best known for prior to 1973. 
 Examining how Chilean Catholic social reformers engaged with eugenics shows 
how secularist discourse reinforced the idea that science and religion were mutually 
exclusive. Chilean social reform discourse actually complicated the distinctions both 
Catholic and secular reformers made between themselves. While social reformers treated 
the line between male and female as impenetrable, the line between Catholic 
(conservative) and secular (progressive) social reform became blurred. This illuminates 
not only how historical actors constructed gender difference but also how ideas such as 
secularism and Catholicism were socially constructed to appear as diametrically opposing 
forces. As demonstrated above, by 1950, the Catholic Church as an institution recognized 
that evolution was scientific fact. While perhaps behind secular intellectuals in this 
acceptance, my dissertation illuminates how Catholics came to accept evolutionary 
theory. In fact, evolutionary theory was not actually the issue for most Catholics. By 
1950, in the aftermath of Nazi eugenic experimentation, evolution, genetics, and eugenics 
had been separated making it possible for the Church as an institution to accept evolution 
while continuing to reject the most grievous aspects of negative eugenics. 
To better understand the relationship between Catholicism, eugenics, and gender, 
I delineated what constituted the social question for Catholic and secular social 
reformers. In order to understand how each group defined social problems, I did a close 
reading of various social reform documents. Overlapping concerns for both groups 
included education, modernity, and the results of capitalist economic growth. These 
intellectuals agreed that the best way to address these problems was with the application 
 202 
of eugenic science because they also agreed that gender confusion was a central 
contributor to most social problems. Chapter one shows that, though social reformers 
agreed about the parameters of the social question and the use of eugenics, they did not 
agree on the role that Chilean Catholics should play in the resolution of the social 
question. Secular reformers insisted that Catholic charity was an antiquated system that 
only dealt with problems as they arose and did nothing to prevent them. Catholics argued 
that they were especially fitted for using modern science to fix social problems, as they 
had both previous experience and a moral compass to guide their plans. Though some 
Catholics recognized the moralizing nature of secular social reform discourse, they still 
felt it to be lacking in comparison to their own brand of moral guidance. 
The insistence of Catholics on their ability to intervene in scientifically based 
social reform debates required that they explain how they understood the relationship 
between religion and science. The second chapter illustrates how Catholic intellectuals 
discussed science and its relationship to religion. While a few Chilean Catholics believed 
that religion and science had no relationship whatsoever, most contended that 
Catholicism and science were different means of exploring the same ideas. Most of the 
documents analyzed in this chapter demonstrate how Catholic intellectuals understood 
both science and Catholicism to be concerned with revealing the truth of God?s plan. This 
implied that both were about the revelation of a universal natural order by which all life 
was organized. Though Catholics often argued that the natural world and its laws were 
created by God and were therefore subject to his control, the historical actors in this 
dissertation typically characterized science and religion as working in tandem. Some of 
 203 
these reformers felt that religious truths trumped scientific truths but, even so, 
Catholicism and science were understood as mutually reinforcing. 
While science in general might be accepted as fitting with Catholic beliefs, 
eugenics was not so simple. After all, some of the more popular eugenic methods in the 
North Atlantic included sterilization, birth control, or euthanasia. These methods were 
anathema to Catholic belief, which might suggest that Chilean Catholics shied away from 
eugenics entirely. But, as chapter three demonstrates, this was not the case. Both before 
and after the Church?s 1930 decision against eugenics in the encyclical Casti Connubii, 
Chilean Catholics accepted large parts of eugenic science and indeed believed it was the 
most reliable way to resolve the social question. This was partially because eugenics 
depended on a certain level of altruism and interest in the collective good, traits that 
Catholicism also encouraged. Nonetheless, Catholics always argued that the individual?s 
free will and dignity were more important than abiding by eugenic legislation or 
prescriptions. After all, free will was given to humans by God to manifest his plan and no 
worldly institution could interfere in that plan. Finally, secular Chilean eugenicists were 
still very much influenced by the power of Catholic thought in Chile. Their descriptions 
and understandings of how eugenics worked were often imbued with religious metaphors 
and ideals. This allowed Catholics to engage in the creation of the discipline. 
The most clear area of agreement between Catholic and secular reformers was 
how both groups understood gender. I argue in chapter four that virtually all social 
reformers, regardless of their religious affiliations or acceptance of eugenics, agreed that 
Chilean gender behavior had to be rationalized into a modern patriarchal structure. 
Female sexuality in particular was labeled as both deviant and worthy of institutional 
 204 
intervention. While Chilean male sexuality was also seen as problematic, social reformers 
believed male sexuality was not controllable. Eugenic science had proven that gender 
difference was based in nature and that women were natural caregivers while men were 
natural workers. Male sexuality was protected by political ideologies that protected the 
agency of the citizen-worker and was thus beyond institutional efforts to control it. It also 
further illustrates how social reformers who identified themselves as progressive or 
Socialist actually agreed with social reformers who they identified as conservative. The 
male worker was normalized and privileged over the female reproducer. The acceptance 
of this modernized patriarchal structure had implications for the remainder of the 
twentieth century. As Chile moved toward Socialism, an even stronger identification of 
work outside the home as being a critical component of political agency and self-worth 
became normalized. 
 ?History is ours and people make history,? Salvador Allende said in his last 
speech to the Chilean people.402 He was not wrong. And his message had an especially 
poignant and powerful effect on historians who study Chile. Many took this as a call to 
study just how such an atypical moment, the election of a Socialist president, could come 
to such a tragic and predictably Latin American end. Authoritarianism, the age-old 
bogeyman of Latin American political histories, reared its ugly head and Chile?s 
relatively clean record of democratic tradition was forever tainted. In response to this 
event, a copious historical literature grew about a country whose relative size and 
isolation might suggest irrelevance to the larger field of Latin American history as 
practiced in the North Atlantic. Much of that literature studied Allende?s rise to power, 
                                                
402 Salvador Allende. ?Last Words to the Nation,? September 11, 1973, Marxists Internet Archive, 
http://www.marxists.org/archive/allende/1973/september/11.htm. 
 205 
his abbreviated presidency, or the influence of Socialism on Chilean history and politics. 
La via chilena was often a coded meaning for the way historians should analyze all 
historical events leading up to the election of Allende and the years following. But this 
approach does not match Allende?s last words. People make history and not just the 
people we find more heroic, brave, or palatable. History is a fabric made up of the actions 
of all people. 
Allende?s own history speaks to how important debates about eugenics, 
Catholicism, and gender were to social reform. His medical school thesis, Higiene mental 
y delincuencia (1933), explored how to apply eugenics to Chilean society to decrease 
crime.403 The existence of groups like the Izquierda Cristiana demonstrated that certain 
Catholic groups supported Allende?s politics even before 1973. Rather than see his 
eugenic past as an embarrassing misstep of a great leader, it should be understood as his 
first attempt to grapple with Chilean social problems. While he ultimately chose to 
address those problems through political (and not eugenic) means, this early period of 
Chilean social history identified the social problems that have dominated the debates 
about Chilean social welfare for the remainder of the twentieth century: health care, 
access to education, and income disparity to name a few. 
This project also explains how and why some Chilean Catholics were staunch 
supporters of Augusto Pinochet while, at the same time, the Church as an institution 
denounced his human rights violations. While parties like the Christian Democrats 
initially supported Pinochet, they came to be some of the most vociferous in their 
objections to his authoritarianism. This grew out of almost immediate disillusionment 
                                                
403 Salvador Allende Gossens. Higiene mental y delicuencia: tesis para optar al t?tulo de medico 
cirujano de la Universidad de Chile, Santiago: Ediciones ChileAm?rica CESOC 2005. 
 206 
with Pinochet?s promise of a return to democratic rule. The Christian Democrats objected 
to Allende?s economic plan, not his overall message of social welfare and revolution. 
They had actually been advocating that type of social revolution since their inception in 
the 1940s. In fact, when Eduardo Frei Montalva was finally elected in 1964, he made it 
clear that his political conservatism and that of his supporters would not affect the social 
revolution he planned. Looking at the way Chilean Catholics understood social reform 
helps to explain these later events. The story I have told in these previous pages is not an 
addendum that only tangentially relates to the most important Chilean historical moment 
of the twentieth century. Rather, it helps illuminate why Catholic social reform prior to 
the 1970s has been written out of the history of Chilean social welfare and social 
movements and why Chilean gender roles were the result of a combined effort between 
Catholic and secular reformers. 
 Social welfare reform, a primary focus of Chilean Socialism and the historians 
who study it, was not the result of only Socialist efforts. Social reform discourse was a 
mosaic of various opinions. Even more important, Chilean Catholics did not oppose 
social welfare programs. Due to Pinochet?s use of Catholicism as part of his brand of 
authoritarianism, and the generally conservative political positions maintained by some 
Catholic clergy members during his regime, many historians have overlooked the work 
that Chilean Catholics did to address social problems. This approach makes the 
significant role of the Catholic Church in ending the Pinochet dictatorship seem unusual 
or surprising when it was anything but, in fact, it was the natural outgrowth of a social 
movement that began much earlier. Examining Catholic engagement with social reform 
discourse thus opens a whole new set of questions to be asked. One of the most important 
 207 
is questioning the analytical utility of frameworks that reify the political categories of 
right and left. My dissertation problematizes this issue, but there is still much more to be 
done. Moving away from narratives that oppose the political categories of right and left 
allows Chileanists to approach 1973, and beyond, in new ways. 
 This dissertation also contributes to the history of science in Latin America. 
Though there is a longer historiography for Latin American-produced histories of 
science, this field is still relatively new among scholars in the North Atlantic. My work 
shows that science practiced in Chile was specific to that political, social, and cultural 
context. Though the practice of science is transnational in its very foundation, many 
histories of science that focus on Latin America examine the failure to properly execute 
or apply European or American science there, or, characterize science as a tool of 
oppression used by imperial invaders to subdue Latin Americans. This dissertation shows 
that the social reform discourse created in Chile was the product of internal scientific 
developments. Though foreigners were brought to Chile in order to advise and create 
social welfare projects and programs, they were only as successful as their ability to 
integrate into the Chilean context. The emphasis on the citizen-worker and his 
importance to national economic progress was a specifically Chilean outgrowth of 
eugenic social reform debates. 
 Though I do not explicitly discuss Chilean social reform discourse as it related to 
American or European developments, my work contributes to transnational history by 
showing how both eugenics and Catholicism interacted with each other in a local context. 
Eugenic science and Catholicism were both networks of transnational communities and 
institutions made up of millions of practitioners. Using a transnational framework, I 
 208 
illustrate how the United States was not hegemonic in the development of Chilean 
eugenics. The United States can often be portrayed as the bully of the western 
hemisphere, especially when studying the history of science. However, in chapters two 
and three it is clear that the United States was not the primary producer of scientific 
information arriving in Chile. In fact, for the first half of the twentieth century, France, 
Belgium, and Germany were far more important generators of popular scientific 
ideologies in Chile. The transnational perspective shows that local developments were 
critical to the creation of a social reform discourse and displaces the United States as the 
hegemon of the western hemisphere. 
 Finally, this dissertation adds to the sizable literature on the modernization and re-
 articulation of gender difference in the twentieth century. Chilean social reformers found 
fault with many aspects of Chilean culture, but the most worrisome was inappropriate 
gender behavior. This qualified as a disinterest in marriage or children, female sexual 
promiscuity, or the abuse of alcohol. Though gender misbehavior was a vague category, 
Chilean social reformers focused almost exclusively on controlling female sexuality. This 
was not a new tactic. The emphasis on female sexuality made women the guardians not 
only of their own modesty and bodily integrity but that of men as well. This notion has 
persisted not only in Chile but elsewhere. Journalist Jessica Lahey is just one example of 
a growing culture of modesty gaining ground in the United States. This movement still 
characterizes men as at the mercy of their voracious and uncontrollable sexuality. 
Women, on the other hand, are responsible for male moral failings and must cover or 
disregard their own sexuality to protect themselves. The themes addressed in this 
dissertation do not represent a distant past, but an all too familiar present. 
 209 
My work points to a few directions of new research. First, it demonstrates the 
need for a more careful study of the role the Catholic Church played throughout the 
twentieth century in Chile. One of the more intriguing aspects of Chilean history that has 
not received enough attention is how local clergy in Chile interacted with the Vatican. 
Contrary to what we might expect, Chilean Catholic clergy broke with Rome a number of 
times over a variety of different issues. Second, this suggests that new research about 
Catholicism at the national level and its relationship to the Church as a whole should be 
explored, both in Latin America and elsewhere. It would also be intriguing to see a 
renewed interest in liberation theology and its role in the return to democracy in Latin 
America. Third, Chile is sometimes considered one of the more secular nations in Latin 
America based on its fairly unblemished history of democracy. However, the lived 
experiences of many Chileans belie this reputation. Of the eighteen federal holidays 
recognized by the Chilean government, half are religious. Divorce only became legal in 
2005. Abortion remains illegal. This might be attributed to tradition, but that overlooks a 
wealth of historical reasons as to why a secular government upholds Catholic ideals. 
Ultimately, this project demonstrates that historians must be wary of 
unproblematically invoking the categories of analysis our subjects of study used. This is 
partially due to the fact that the categories historical actors create themselves only 
recognize one perspective, their own. Man, woman, Catholic, secular, these are all lines 
in the sand that social reformers imbued with meaning. While that meaning was true for 
them, to some extent, it is not true for the historians who study them. We must recognize 
that those categories are performative and malleable. They exist in a reality that was 
 210 
created by the historical actors. Analysis of those categories and their meanings better 
fulfills Allende?s hopes for the making and writing of history. 
 211 
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