More than 15 million Chileans will go to the polls this Sunday to approve or reject a new constitution that will replace the one drafted during the dictatorship. Augusto Pinochet (1973-1990) and successive reforms followed the democratic restoration. The text was prepared on the 50th anniversary of the overthrow of Salvador Allende by a constituent council under the hegemony of the far right and with the support of other conservative forces. Recent polls predict the proposal will be rejected at the ballot box. But, Anything can happen on December 17Among other reasons, supporters of Magna Carta see consultation as a way to express rejection of left-wing government. Gabriel Boric, People whose positive image is below 40%.
“Boric voted against, Chile voted for!“They insist on the slogan. The far-right wave that started on the other side of the Andes As Javier Milei hypothesizes, It was felt in the Chilean referendum. Supporters of the “against” vote, left and centre-left, hold banners like those of former presidents Ricardo Lagos and Michelle Bachelet, From their perspective, they claim that this Constitution, consisting of 17 chapters and 216 articles, is much more reactionary than the constitution prepared in 1980.
Recent polls show up to a 12-point gap in rejection. However, in recent days the growth of the advantageous option has been confirmed. For this reason, some analysts talk about an ending that is open to surprises. “Gaining a favorable position would be a cosmic cultural and political defeat for the left and progressivism.“said writer and former voter Patricio Fernández. If this eventually happens, the Government and the National Congress must ensure the implementation of the Constitution.
Four dazzling years
Everything has happened in Chile in the last four years. A. social epidemic It is against neoliberal policies channeled through the call for a constitutional convention in which the left is dominant and its opponents do not have veto power. Then Boric’s election victory. From that moment on, the left and other progressive views began to retreat from their positions. Magna Carta, which had a strong, progressive and egalitarian structure, was defeated in the consultations in September 2022, and the new body responsible for drafting a superior text had the opposite ideological signature. They started talking about ‘castitu’, referring to the superiority of the Republican Party. José Antonio Kast. His status as a former presidential candidate defeated by his family and Boric did not prevent him from becoming one of Chile’s current figures.
Caste: son of a former Wehrmacht officer and Nazi Party activist. His brother Miguel served as Pinochet’s minister and became head of the Central Bank. Some of their political capital is put at risk during consultation. “We hope that the new proposal will satisfy the majority of Chileans“It’s not for the majority of the Republican Party,” Kast said months ago. However, the far right had other wishes. “The aim was never to present a Constitution based on broad consensus“I admire Cristián Valenzuela, director general of Ideas Republicas, a programmatic powerhouse of this entity.
Text features
Former president Sebastián Piñera is mulling over the new Magna Carta. “First, because it strengthens the freedom, security and property of citizens. Second, it strengthens the State because it strengthens its role in protecting public order, securing social rights and maintaining macroeconomic balances.” The text manages to add some voices from the center in these consultative situations, among them former president Eduardo Frei, is doing nothing more than taking back the fundamental rights of its rivals. “It does not unite us as a country” Bachelet said, emphasizing how harmful this is for gender issues and the risks of recriminalizing abortion on accepted grounds. Other experts say this further exacerbates the problems of the current Constitution by introducing problematic elements that were not even included in Pinochet’s Magna Carta guesses..
The proposal according to sociologist Felipe Ruiz Bruzzone hinders future debate on the right to public education By strengthening the private system, it restricts the State’s ability to design a progressive tax policy and threatens democratic gains that refer to women’s freedom to decide about their own bodies. In terms of environment, it falls behind contemporary international standards. The text “assumes a positive position regarding business organizations as organizing entities of collective life” and It weakens unions by restricting the right to strike.
Scenarios
for portal Counter“Whether he opposed or won, the establishment process ended in failure because a constitutional text that broad political and social majorities agreed upon and supported could not be achieved.” A historic opportunity was wasted. “In the current situation, everything shows that the most reasonable thing is to vote against,” he said in his editorial titled. Chili pepper with intestinal obstruction (constitutional)“. Piñera’s former Minister for Women, Isabel Plá, of the right-wing Independent Democratic Union (UDI), thought that if citizens turned to rejection, “it would be a defeat for the whole policy.”
The four years that have passed between the mass protests against Piñera and these consultations show a citizenry dominated by exhaustion and apathy. One survey shows that 47% of people who can afford to pay have little or no interest in what is at stake. Another agenda dominates the collective concerns: the education crisis, the difficulties of the private healthcare system (ISAPRES), as well as immigration and crime problems. Citizens are so tired that if the Con prevails, a third constitutional test will in principle disappear in the short to medium term.