¿Chile Despertó? Politics and Anti-Politics in Contemporary Chile
Author(s)
Padoan, Enrico
Date Issued
2024
Type
bookPart
Start Page
37
End Page
59
Abstract
In less than three years, from October 2019 to September
2022, Chile progressed from witnessing the most important social uprising
of its democratic history – a phase of collective mobilisation triggering
the start of a constitution-making process to end with the pinochetista
Constitution – to the democratic demolition of the constitutional
text drafted by the Constituent Assembly. In a similar time-span, from
October 2020 to July 2023, Chilean voters have: opted for having a new
Constitution (October 2020); elected a Constituent Assembly that was
significantly skewed to the left (May 2021); elected the first (leftist) president
outside of the two traditional (centre-left and centre-right) coalitions
dominating Chilean politics since 1990 (November 2021); and then
opposed the promulgation of the Constitution draft (September 2022)
and elected a new Constituent Assembly dominated by the radical right
(May 2023). How was this possible? This chapter starts by offering a
summary of the antecedents and aftermaths of the Chilean estallido social.
The summary highlights the different political, cultural, organizational
legacies of the neoliberal model against which Chileans mobilised
in October 2019. The chapter then proposes an interpretation of the
constituent process. The interpretation emphasises the structural factors
that prevented the process from consolidating its initial progressive di-
rection. The chapter finally advances some concluding remarks, adopting
a comparative perspective as well.