CAN CHILE´S CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION DEFUSE PEOPLE´S DISCONTENT? / THE ECONOMIST

Can Chile’s constitutional convention defuse people’s discontent?

The reasons for massive protests in 2019 have not entirely gone away

The presidential election due in November will be like no other in Chile since the restoration of democracy in 1989. 

That is partly because the leading candidates are fairly new faces, and the Concertación, the centre-left alliance that dominated most of that period, is no more. 

But it is mainly because the winner will at first cohabit with a convention which is writing a new constitution and which could decide to curtail the normal four-year presidential term. 

All this is because Chile is still picking up the pieces after an explosion of massive and sometimes violent protests in late 2019 that shook what had been one of Latin America’s most stable and seemingly successful countries.

At the heart of the protests was anger over narrowing opportunities and inadequate and unequal access to health care, pensions and education. 

The convention was offered by a discredited political class in November 2019 to provide a peaceful path out of a dangerous conflict. 

It seems certain to move Chile to the left. 

The question is how far.

The initial answer seemed to be a long way. 

At an election for the convention in May, in which only 43% of the electorate voted, the far left won 55 of the 155 seats (of which 17 were reserved for representatives of indigenous peoples). 

The election was a defeat for both the former Concertación (25 seats) and the right (37). 

Many of the representatives are, nominally at least, independents in an election where to be new, young and untested by politics-as-usual was a winning formula.

Now that the convention has sat for almost three of its allotted maximum of 15 months, and has accomplished little beyond approving its own rules this week, it is starting to moderate. 

One far-left group has imploded, its credibility destroyed when one of its leaders admitted that his claim to be a cancer-sufferer denied proper health care was false. 

Another has split: the Broad Front (fa, for its initials in Spanish) has fallen out with the Communist Party. 

One poll shows approval of the convention falling to 30%.

But its serious work is only just starting. 

“We’re discussing issues that affect deeply rooted interests and power centres,” says Patricia Politzer, a centrist independent representative. 

“It was never going to be easy.” 

She is part of a broad dealmaking nucleus that is starting to emerge. 

They are likely to become increasingly influential as the convention grapples with the big issues. 

First, it is certain to define as constitutional rights a long list of expensive things, such as pensions and housing. 

The issue is whether these will be enforceable in the courts, or left to secondary laws. 

The second question is whether Chile will move to a semi-parliamentary system, as part of an effort to diffuse power. 

Third, the new document seems certain to impose stricter environmental standards. 

Much will depend on whether the final text embodies a sense of fiscal realism and a recognition of the need for a vigorous market economy to generate prosperity and finance better public services.

The presidential election may give a clearer sense of Chile’s change of course. 

The front-runner is Gabriel Boric, a 35-year-old fa leader. 

He defeated a Communist in a primary. 

His economic programme is radical. 

But it seeks to turn Chile into something more like Germany than Venezuela, with European levels of tax and green investment, state companies and industrial policy. 

Whether this could work quickly in Chile is doubtful.

Mr Boric may face Sebastián Sichel of the centre-right in the inevitable run-off, in December. 

But alternatively this might feature José Antonio Kast of the hard right. 

Mr Kast appeals to the large silent minority who were scared by the violence of the protests and fear instability. 

Were he to win he would surely clash with the convention.

The election will show whether the convention represents a snapshot of a moment of rage in 2019 that is starting to fade (partly because of the pandemic), or whether it is part of a continuing demand for radical change. 

There is evidence for both possibilities. 

A recent poll by the Centre for Public Studies, a think-tank, showed an improving view of Chilean democracy and crime displacing pensions as the top public concern. 

Only 39% now say they wholeheartedly supported the protests, compared with 55% in the same poll in December 2019. 

But discontent remains. “People are not on the streets now because they place their hopes in the convention,” says Ms Politzer. 

The presidential contest will thus be a battle between hope and fear.