After the social outbreak of 2019, the popular demand arose in Chile to replace the 1980 Constitution, promulgated during the dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet (1973 – 1990). In 2020, the citizen demand translated into 78% support at the polls to replace the Magna Carta, which led to the formation of a Constitutional Convention.
That body was made up mostly of citizens who did not belong to any traditional political party and showed great support from the traditional Chilean left. However, his proposal failed miserably. During the plebiscite on September 4, 61.89% of Chileans voted to reject the proposal presented by the Convention.
After the failure of the first project, political forces called for a second constituent process. This time a Constitutional Council was created made up of 50 members who were elected by popular vote. This new body was represented mainly by the Chilean right and extreme right, which caused it to be rejected by a significant part of the population from its origins.
“There is a spirit very similar to that which the citizens had in the previous process. It is one of distance or separation from the process itself. And that led to the rejection result on September 4. Something similar is happening now, there is a situation of boredom and criticism about the performance of these representative bodies, they are seen as something very distant by the citizens.“, he comments to Trade the political scientist and academic from the University of Chile, Octavio Avendaño.
:quality(75)/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/elcomercio/IKOYF35Y6ZFJ5B4HBKFZR4B2EE.jpg "Chile begins its path to a new plebiscite with little probability of having a new Constitution: the possible consequences of the consultation 1")
The President of Chile, Gabriel Boric, together with the Minister Secretary General of the Government, Carolina Toha, and the Secretary General of the Presidency, Álvaro Elizalde, display the signed decree that calls for a plebiscite on December 17, 2023. (Photo by Pablo VERA/AFP).
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The result of this second process is a proposal of 216 articles that essentially maintains the economic model established by the Pinochet regime and which the ruling party itself, which had widely supported the change of Magna Carta at first, criticized for its tone. conservative and controversial on issues such as abortion or migration.
Even the centrist Christian Democrats considers that it is a text “ideologized” by the radical right.
“They promised the people that the new Constitution was going to solve Chile’s problems, that it was going to be a constitution of unity and it turned out that the first case was very left-wing, divisive; while in the second case it is more right-wing and people feel that it deepens divisions even further. So there is a lot of dissatisfaction, discontent and disappointment with the process”, comments Chilean political analyst Patricio Navia.
These criticisms have also been reflected in popular sentiment. The most recent survey, published by Pulso Ciudadano on August 29, showed that 69.7% of Chileans would vote “against” the proposed new Constitution, while 30.3% would be “in favor” of the same.
“Polls show that rejection wins but with substantial differences. The one you quote marks 70%, others indicate that it is 50%. I think it will be a little tighter than last time, I consider that any option can win but not by more than 8% or 10%. If you ask me, now, I think the rejection will win, but there are still a few weeks to close the process”says Navia.
“In the previous process, the polls were quite effective in recognizing very early on that there was no chance of the text being approved. The same thing happens now, but the reasons are different”Adds Avendaño.
The most worrying thing, however, would be that 67.7% of the population confessed to having no confidence or little confidence in the constitutional process.
“There is more confusion now around the contents of the text on the part of citizens. There was not enough dissemination, partly because the project was only officially presented on Monday. What there were were partial versions that circulated through the press. Only now will the dissemination process begin”, Avendaño comments on this.
For the expert from the University of Chile, the underlying problem lies in the fact that the debate on a new Constitution ended up being a reinterpretation by politicians of the needs of the people. “The conclusion we reached is that changing the Constitution was not the main demand of the citizens but the main proposal of the political class. And they have insisted on this process, they have defined the conditions of both processes and even insisted on maintaining the process after the rejection of September 4”, he assures.
For Navia, the explanation would rather come from unsupported promises. “In 2019 it was said that a new Constitution was a magic pill that would solve the country’s problems. That didn’t happen because it couldn’t happen and now people are very disappointed. The new constitutions are about the political system not about public policies such as pensions or the lack of growth. “I get the impression that people were sold a magic pill that ultimately didn’t work,” points out.
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In 2019, the Chilean streets lit up in the so-called social outbreak, a demonstration of citizens’ disagreement with the political, social and economic model that has governed the southern country since 1980.
– Consequences of a new rejection –
Although trends may vary in 38 days, there is a high probability that this new constitutional proposal will be rejected by the Chilean population. Given this scenario, Gabriel Boric’s administration has already anticipated that they will not insist on a third process despite certain pressures that would come from within the government coalition itself.
Regardless of the result, the two analysts consulted by Trade They agree that December 17 will represent a hard blow for the left and, probably, a springboard in the right’s aspirations to achieve power.
“It is a great defeat for the left. In this, the right loses nothing, whether it is rejected or approved. The left, on the other hand, faces an almost absurd dilemma: whether to accept the right’s proposal or validate Pinochet’s Constitution.”says Avendaño.
“This is a significant and crushing defeat for the entire left that had promoted the replacement of Pinochet’s Constitution and now appears campaigning for Pinochet’s Constitution to prevent that of the current right from being imposed. Pinochet at least is dead, but José Antonio Kast is alive, he will be a presidential candidate and will probably be the next president of Chile”, adds Navia.
Another factor that must be monitored will also be the reaction of citizens to the results of December 17. For Avendaño, who believes that political representatives failed in the challenge of adequately interpreting social demands, the unrest is already established and will hardly change with any of the results.
“It is difficult for this to cause greater discomfort because it is already installed regardless of the result. One of the most feasible scenarios is that changes to the current Constitution are carried out through agreements that can be reached through the National Congress. It must be taken into account that the current government and those in favor of constitutional change do not have a majority in Congress, so it is possible to think about some specific changes but not more substantive aspects.”, he assures.
Navia adds for his part that the feeling among the population is one of disconnection with the political class, since they see it as part of an elite that puts its interests before those of the citizens. “In general, people distrust elites, including politicians. They feel like they are protecting each other and don’t take people’s needs into account. That is why in the first process many independents were elected, but it turns out that they did not care about the people either, but rather about their own agendas,” it states.
