THE election of far-right Javier Milei as president of Argentina represents a clear and present danger to Argentinian trade unions, their members, the wider working class and indeed the overwhelming majority of Argentinian people.

President Milei’s central economic policy of “anarcho-capitalism” is an extreme variant of “neoliberalism” or “monetarism” — economic policies that for the past 40 years have facilitated the global transfer of wealth from working people to the super-rich and the corporate sector.

An essential and enduring feature of these policies is the restriction or even elimination of labour rights; usually a restriction on the right to organise, the right to collective bargaining and the right to strike. This fits in with Milei’s agenda of saying that protesters should face either “prison or bullet.” He is also known to have the country’s women’s and environmental movements in his sights, just as the far-right Bolsonaro presidency did in Brazil.