Vicaría de la Solidaridad

   / Vicariate of Solidarity.

   A human-rights nongovernmental organization in Chile. Established in 1976 by Cardinal Raúl Silva Henríquez, the Vicaría documented human-rights violations and distributed humanitarian aid during the military government of General Augusto Pinochet Ugarte. It replaced the Comité de la Paz (COPACHI, Committee for Peace), which had been formed in 1973. Like COPACHI, the Vicaría was affiliated with the Catholic Church. Unlike COPACHI, however, the Vicaría enjoyed the full protection of the church, having been created under the auspices of the Archdiocese of Santiago. Since repression affected all aspects of Chilean life, the Vicaría addressed a wide range of problems—legal, medical, and social. Its legal program centered on collecting evidence of detention, torture, political execution, and disappearance. Its medical program provided health care to the poor as well as treatment for torture victims and those injured during demonstrations against the government. Indeed, torture victims were often left outside the Vicaría’s door. Its social programs gave material support both to human-rights victims and to workers displaced by the shock-treatment economics of Pinochet Ugarte’s Chicago Boys. Daily means were provided by ollas comunes (literally, “common pots,” or soup kitchens).

   The Vicaría’s activities, especially its efforts at documentation, antagonized the military. Unlike other human-rights organizations, which lost records to security raids, the Vicaría had the advantage of church protection. The military did, however, wage a campaign of harassment and terror against the legal staff. Lawyers were especially vulnerable because of their filings of amparos, or writs of habeas corpus, and were subject to arrest, exile, and relegación (internal exile).

   Throughout the dictatorship, the Vicaría was a source of inspiration to many Chileans. After the return to democrary in 1990, its legacy continued in the Comisión Nacional de Verdad y Reconciliación (National Commission on Truth and Reconciliation), which was charged with investigating human-rights abuses.