Week 2 EOC: Pinochet and Advertising

Gen. Augusto Pinochet ran Chile with an iron fist. He first rose to power by having the Chilean military, aided by training and financing from the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, host Coup D’état starting on September 11, 1973 on the established regime, which ultimately led to President Salvador Allende killing himself. Pinochet assumed power and gained absolute control of the country in less than a week. When Allende was in control, he the first avowedly Marxist elected chief of state in the Western Hemisphere. Socialism, at the time, gave America the feeling that Chile would be a threat so they decided to help the military take power.
Following many months of economic chaos, recession, labor strife, hyperinflation, and middle-class protests, and over all political unrest. Leaving Allende’s government extremely unpopular and a revolution very welcome. However, this bloody coup was the start to a very violent rule.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/inatl/longterm/pinochet/overview.htm

Pinochet’s fifteen-year reign of Chile was a brutal dictatorship. During his rule, more than 3,200 people were executed or disappeared, and scores of thousands more were detained and tortured or exiled. These injustices fueled the flame of revolution in the hearts of many of the Chileans, but how are they to change the established order? Their opportunity came to take Old Augusto down a notch, when Pinochet held an election to rally his nation together in support of himself. The choice was between “Si”(Yes) in support of the Generalissimo for another eight more years or “No” I can not stand for this anymore.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/11/world/americas/11pinochet.html?pagewanted=all

Pinochet thought he had the vote sewn up. The vast majority of the country, he believed, were grateful to him for the firm action he had taken against the “enemies of the state”. How would one go about convincing the disenfranchised, poverty stricken, and terrified public to vote for what they want, without them fearing for their lives? Originally, the No Campaign wanted to show all the atrocities that have been done to the people of Chile. This was too negative and doesn’t “sell” to the audience. The solution was to provoke a feeling a hope, flip the negative connotation of the word “No”, and show what bright future there is in the future, if the people would just vote.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/9842723/How-Chiles-ad-men-ousted-Pinochet-the-real-life-story-behind-new-film-No.html