Juan José Arévalo
This article has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page. (Learn how and when to remove these template messages)
|
Juan José Arévalo | |
---|---|
24th President of Guatemala | |
In office 15 March 1945 – 15 March 1951 | |
Vice President | Mario Monteforte (1948–1949) |
Preceded by | Juan Federico Ponce Vaides |
Succeeded by | Jacobo Árbenz Guzmán |
Personal details | |
Born | Santa Rosa, Guatemala | 10 September 1904
Died | 8 October 1990 Guatemala City, Guatemala | (aged 86)
Political party | Revolutionary Action Party |
Spouse(s) |
Margarita de León (m. 1959) |
Children | 5 (including PhD ) |
Juan José Arévalo Bermejo (10 September 1904[1] – 8 October 1990) was a Guatemalan statesman and professor of philosophy who became Guatemala's first democratically elected president in 1945. He was elected following a popular uprising against the United States-backed dictator Jorge Ubico that began the Guatemalan Revolution. He remained in office until 1951, surviving 25 coup attempts. He did not contest the election of 1951, instead choosing to hand over power to Jacobo Árbenz. As president, he enacted several social reform policies, including an increase in the minimum wage and a series of literacy programs. He also oversaw the drafting of a new constitution in 1945. He is the father of the current President of Guatemala Bernardo Arévalo.
Biography
Arévalo was born in Taxisco, Santa Rosa, on 10 September 1904, son of Mariano Arévalo Bonilla and Elena Bermejo de Paz. He was born in a lower middle class family. From his childhood he showed leadership and intelligence; he was a fellow student of Luis Martínez Mont from the age of seventeen, with whom they were disciples of Professor Miguel Morazán at the Central Normal School for Boys, (from the Spanish "Escuela Normal Central para Varones"). Martínez Mont and Arévalo were since then close friends; they studied teaching together and by 1923 they were already exemplary teachers at the Central Normal School for Boys. They also embarked on the creation of a literary magazine, which they called Alba and although it only had four issues, it published texts by renowned Guatemalan writers Rafael Arévalo Martínez, Flavio Herrera and Carlos Wyld Ospina. In 1927, as part of their educational project, the government of General Lázaro Chacón had called a contest for teachers, where the best would be awarded scholarships to study pedagogy abroad; both won: Martínez Mont left for Switzerland and Arévalo for Argentina.
Arévalo served as president from 15 March 1945 to 15 March 1951. He was elected in 1944, in a contest which is generally reckoned as the first truly free election in the country's history. Arévalo won over 86 percent of the vote, garnering more than four times as many votes as the other candidates combined. It is still the largest margin of victory for a free election in the country's history.
Arévalo's administration was marked by unprecedented relatively free political life during his six-year term. Arévalo, an educator and philosopher, understood the need for advancement in individuals, communities, and nations by practical means. Before his presidency, Arévalo had been an exiled university professor. He returned to Guatemala to help in the reconstruction efforts of the new post-Ubíco government, especially in the areas of
Many foreign estates, especially those undeveloped for agriculture, were confiscated and redistributed to peasants; landowners were obliged to provide adequate housing for their workers; new schools, hospitals, and houses were built; and a new minimum wage was introduced.[2]
In Guatemala's cities, newly enfranchised labor unions accompanied reformist labor laws that greatly benefitted the urban lower and middle classes. Several parties and trade unions were formed. The enfranchisement of a large proportion of the population was a significant legacy of his term. The benefits did not spread to the rural agrarian areas where
Arévalo was succeeded by
On 27 March 1963 he returned to his country to announce his candidacy for the November presidential elections.
Spiritual socialism (Arevalismo)
Categorized as a dedicated democrat and nationalist, Juan José Arévalo defined his political philosophy as "spiritual socialism". The ideology was directed towards the moral development of Guatemalans with the intent to "liberate man psychologically".[7] Arévalo, the revolution's intellectual pillar, positioned his theoretical doctrine as integral to the construction of a progressive and peaceful Guatemalan society. Governments are capable of initiating the formation of an ideal society by allowing citizens the freedom to pursue their own opinions, property and way of life.[8] The revolution's first president asserted that safeguarding the free will of citizens generates popular support for governmental institutions, which ensure the security of the individual and collective equally.
Arevalismo did emphasize the importance of civil freedoms as the essential groundwork for human development, but the political principle maintained that "Individual liberty must be exercised within the limits of social order".[9] Democracy, according to Arévalo, was a social structure that required the restriction of civil rights in the event individual liberties conflict with national security and the will of the majority. The limit on civil rights appears contradictory to the notion of a Guatemalan government that expresses the free will of the people. However, the ambiguity is associated with Arévalo's dismissal of classical liberalism as an applicable guideline for Guatemalan governments.[10] Arévalo's rejection of Western oriented liberal individualism and apparent socialist inclinations led conservative sectors of the press to denounce the revolutionary president as a communist.
Arévalo opposed classical Marxism's materialist tendency and affirmed that "Communism is contrary to human nature, for it is contrary to the psychology of man".[11] Spiritual socialism's anti-communist stance was apparent through Arévalo's suppression of various communist influenced initiatives operating in Guatemala. The president exiled several communist activists, declined to legalize the Communist Party of Guatemala, removed government officials with ties to the communist newspaper and shut down the Marxist instruction facility known as Escuela Claridad.[12] Regardless of the aforementioned measures, Arévalo endured nearly 30 attempted coups from members of the Guatemalan military due to his perceived empathy for communists. He responded to anti-communists' attacks in a speech to the U.S. Congress in which he said, referring to World War II, "I fear the West has won the battle, but in its blind attacks on social welfare will lose the war to fascism."[13]
The character of the 1944 revolution, envisioned by Arévalo, was based on the development of a modern
Private life
Arévalo was married to Elisa Martínez Contreras, but at the time of her presidency, they were separated, yet Martínez assumed the role of first lady.[16] He had a relationship with Alaíde Foppa, by whom he had a son, Julio Solórzano Foppa.[17] At the time of his death, he was married to Margarita de Leon and had five children, including the current President of Guatemala Bernardo Arévalo.[18]
Works
He is the author of a scathing allegorical short story "The Shark and the Sardines," published in 1956. In 1963 he published a sequel entitled "Anti-Communism in Latin America".[19]
See also
- History of Guatemala
- Jacobo Árbenz Guzmán
- Jorge Ubico
- Operation PBSuccess
References and notes
- ISBN 9781615355167.
- ISBN 978-1-137-27694-0.
- ^ "Document #9: "Introduction to the Shark and the Sardines," Juan José Arévalo (1956)". Brown University Library. Retrieved 16 March 2022.
- ^ a b c Golden, Tim (8 October 1990). "Juan Jose Arevalo Is Dead at 86; Guatemala President in Late 40's". The New York Times. Retrieved 16 March 2022.
- ^ "Cuba: "Listen Yankee!"-a Review". Winter 1961. Retrieved 16 March 2022.
- ^ ISBN 080784764X.
- ISBN 9780896082472.
- ISBN 9780292710832.
- ^ Handy, Gift of the Devil, 107.
- ^ Immerman, The Revolutionary Governments, 47.
- ^ Handy, Gift of the Devil, 111.
- ISBN 0-8133-0614-0.
- ^ Relentless Persistence: Nonviolent Action in Latin America (McManus & Schlabach, eds., New Society, 1991).
- ^ Handy, Gift of the Devil, 103.
- ISBN 0896802159.
- ISBN 0-87451-557-2. Retrieved 20 June 2015.
- ^ Poniatowska, Elena (21 October 2012). "Alaíde Foppa: 31 años después". La Jornada (in Spanish). Mexico City, Mexico. Retrieved 22 April 2015.
- ^ "Ex-Guatemalan Leader Juan Jose Arevalo, 86". Chicago, Illinois: The Chicago Tribune. 8 October 1990. p. 7. Retrieved 20 June 2015.
- ^ Arévalo Bermejo, Juan José (24 January 2024). ""The Shark and the Sardines", Online Version". archive.org.
External links
- "Echoes from a Sardine". Time. 5 January 1962. Archived from the original on 30 September 2007. Retrieved 31 March 2007.