The parallels are striking: Two ruthless dictators who sacrificed human rights for political aims. Two men idolized by their followers and despised by the exiles they drove away. Two archetypes of the Latin American strongman, one in dark sunglasses, the other with that ever-present cigar. For the past half-century, no two leaders have so defined Latin America's political scene as Cuba's Fidel Castro and Chile's Gen. Augusto Pinochet.

They ruled from opposite ends of the spectrum — Castro on the far left, Pinochet on the hard right — their regimes similar only in their harshness and in the intense passions they evoked. Now, as the two men exit the world stage, their repressive political models are rightfully repudiated in most of Latin America, giving way to more democratic governments. Yet the legacies of Castro and Pinochet will loom large. They have been tyrants in life, but after their deaths, they will still shape the Latin America they leave behind.

For all their faults, both men tapped into the basic reality of the region and forged responses that will mold Latin America's political and social agenda for generations. Castro recognized the fundamental social inequities that mar the region, the most unequal in the world; Pinochet embraced the market and its power to lift an economy. And the new governments of the region are drawing on both those veins in their quest to better their citizens' political and economic futures.

The human rights records of both men are undeniably dismal. Since the 1959 Cuban revolution, Castro, now 80, has overseen extensive human rights violations, including thousands of executions. Repression and tight government control continue to this day. Castro has long justified the tyranny on grounds that it was essential to creating a communist Cuba that emphasizes universal education and free health care, and to shielding the island from the constant threat of Washington-engineered regime change. Because of his self-styled image as a defender of the downtrodden and as an underdog standing up to the United States, he remains a hero to many throughout Latin America and worldwide.

Pinochet, who died Sunday at 91, by contrast has few fans outside Chile, and even there the number of supporters has substantially dropped off. He upended Chile's democratic tradition with a 1973 military coup and ruled for 17 years before leaving office in 1990. With the abduction, torture and killing of thousands of opponents — in the name of ridding the country of Marxist influence and creating order out of chaos — his regime helped turn the word "disappear" into a transitive verb. Only at the end of his life did Pinochet accept responsibility for what happened during his rule — small consolation for the families of all those victims.

Fortunately, no government in Latin America today practices the sort of politics that will be forever linked to Castro and Pinochet. The closest heir to either is newly re-elected Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, who would like to assume the mantle of leader of Latin America's left when Castro dies. Some Venezuelans fear Chavez will push to implant the Cuba model in their country, but circumstances have changed too dramatically since the 1960s for that to happen.

Castro put his finger on Latin America's fundamental grievance: the social injustice and inequality that prevails there. Recent elections in Bolivia, Brazil, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Mexico, Nicaragua and Peru have highlighted the renewed importance and urgency of the social agenda. Over the next year, incoming governments of varying ideological hues likely will put even more emphasis on social programs that respond to widespread frustration and mounting expectations. New leaders will thus sound many of the same egalitarian notes long sounded by Castro.

Yet in practice, many of these governments will carry out some of the same economic policies espoused by Pinochet, relying primarily on the market in pursuit of their social goals. Even Chavez relies on the oil market to finance his social programs. In the 1970s, the Pinochet regime, influenced by the late economist Milton Friedman, pioneered the embrace of market reforms in Latin America, including privatizing state enterprises and liberalizing trade. The country went through a tough period in the early 1980s, but Pinochet's economic prescriptions eventually set it on a path that has made it Latin America's best economic performer in recent decades.

Despite the meager fruits of market reform elsewhere and the corruption wrought by privatization efforts, polls show that most Latin Americans still favor such changes — albeit carried out honestly, and accompanied by stronger social support programs. Today's ruling coalition government in Chile exemplifies this new current in Latin American politics. Economic performance in the 17 years of democratic rule has been superior to that under Pinochet. And poverty levels have declined from more than 40 percent in 1990 to below 18 percent in 2005.

In Latin America today, the public wants the market-driven growth that draws on the Pinochet experience and the focus on social equality inspired by Castro — but in a democratic context, without the terror and autocratic rule that marked the two regimes.

It wants, in short, the best of both.

Michael Shifter, vice president for policy at the Inter-American Dialogue, teaches Latin American politics at Georgetown University. He wrote this commentary for the Washington Post.