0 comments
With large swathes of the world currently backsliding into conservative autocracy, Chile just showed us what democracy could look like in 2020.
Chile’s president has hailed the result of this weekend’s nation-wide referendum a ‘triumph of democracy’, as Chileans voted overwhelmingly in favour of changing their outdated constitution.
‘This… should fill us with joy and hope’ said President Sebastien Piñera as early results Sunday indicated a 78% majority supporting radical new measures to democratise the country. ‘From now onward, we should all collaborate so that the new constitution is a great mark of unity, of stability, and the future.’
Until this weekend, Chile’s constitution had been marred with the stain of the dictatorial regime that penned it. Four decades ago, the military autocracy headed by General Augusto Pinochet enshrined the neoliberal principles of the Chicago Boys, a group of Chilean conservatives mentored by US economist Milton Friedman, into the document.
This hyper-capitalist memorandum advocated minimal state intervention, allowing private sectors to control public services. This has led to vast wealth inequality in the modern era – the OECD reported in 2018 that the income inequality gap in the country was more than 65% wider than the global average.
Protests against the constitution were sparked last November by a hike in metro fares, which flared into a movement against the high cost of living. Clashes with police left more than 30 civilians killed and thousands injured in an eery echo of the violent autocracy typical of the Pinochet regime, under which torture, exile, and corruption were rife.
The unrest drew a clear line through history between the legacy of military dictatorship in Chile to its current lack of plebiscite.
https://twitter.com/AmayaFV/status/1320365050314575872
Continued protests forced Piñera’s hand, but the referendum he was initially reluctant to grant may end up as his regime’s most positive legacy.
‘We got to this stage as the country is in a crisis. It’s not only that the constitution is illegitimate, but it’s not suitable for the reality we live in – it’s time to change it,’ Maria Cristina Escudero, a political scientist at University of Chile, told The Guardian. ‘It is a great virtue to have found an institutional way to solve this problem.’
A special convention made up of 155 members elected in April next year will begin drafting a new constitution to be submitted to voters in mid-2022.
As so much of the world responds to 2020’s turmoil with encroaching narratives of nationalism and conservatism, it’s gratifying to see Chile loosen the grip of a regressive past to legislate a freer future. The world is desperately in need of a recent model of constitutional reform and it seems the people of Chile have given us one, if Piñera’s government can remain stable until 2022.
