Gabriel Boric: A Breath of Fresh Air? - The Opportunities and Challenges for Chile

Opinion analysis by Pau Luoning Contributor

January 10th, 2022

Last year, people in Chile woke up on December 20th to the announcement of a new president-elect after the 2021 presidential elections. After a long and tedious plebiscite marked by the strong polarisation of the Chilean public, leftist candidate Gabriel Boric was declared the winner after beating his far-right counterpart José Antonio Kast in the second round in what many called the most important election since the country’s return to democracy in 1990 after Pinochet’s dictatorship. Official ballots gave Boric 56% of the votes against Kast, who obtained 44% in what historically would be considered tight elections, with a 55,6% voter turnout.

Half a century after the electoral victory of Salvador Allende, Boric emerges as a representative of a new generation of political actors and embodies a new leadership that the old traditional parties in the country could no longer sustain. Not only is the 35-year-old soon-to-be president going to be the youngest head of the Executive ever elected, but also, he amassed more votes than any other candidate ever in the Chilean democratic history. 

Gabriel Boric’s promises for change and progress are a much-needed breath of fresh air in a country with everlasting social inequalities, increasing economic recession resulting from the pandemic as well as a widespread social discontent and apathy towards traditional political actors. Yet, who exactly is this young man, former leader of the social student movements? And more importantly, why is this victory so important and what does it mean for the country and the region?

First of all, to completely grasp the situation and the development of the latest Chilean state of affairs, it is very important to take into account the historical context of this young democracy. In 1970, Chileans elected Salvador Allende as the world’s first socialist and Marxist elected president in free and democratic elections. After three years of social reform, Allende’s life ended along with his regime after a violent military coup that was orchestrated between General Augusto Pinochet and the CIA in a cooperative attempt to defeat Marxism, restore order and save the economy (Hudson & Library Of Congress. Federal Research Division, 1994). What followed was a 17-year-long authoritarian military dictatorship where human rights abuses, brutality and repression were systemic. It is estimated that over 3,000 people were killed by the regime or went missing then.

Although it might sound very counterintuitive at first for a dictator in power to write a constitution, this was the case for Pinochet. Chile’s current Magna Carta dates back to 1980 after he and his military elites attempted to legitimize their regime by establishing a legal framework, which protected them whilst not subjecting them to the people’s decisions (Hawkins, 2002). The draft was ratified in a rigged referendum with no free media and a predetermined result (Atria, 2013). Furthermore, Pinochet made sure to anchor in the constitution an imbalance of powers between the legislative and the executive in favour of the latter, in order to create a sort of exaggerated presidentialism.

Under the dictator’s rule, important economic reforms were implemented in order to help the Chilean economy quickly recover. Thus, the economic system was constitutionally reorganized under the principle of neoliberalism, according to which the state is only required to set a general frame but should restrain from intervening in the economy, and where a free market tends to self-correct in order to maximize its efficiency. Welfare goods such as healthcare, education, the pension system or social housing, and resources like water and property were regulated by the market as a consequence. At the same time, political interference by the state was strongly limited.

Considered to be the birthplace of neoliberalism, Chile once had one of the most fast-growing and stable economies in the world. The model brought very good macroeconomic performance, especially in terms of per capita income, trade balances and even the country’s international image. However, the system excels in creating rich people, rather than creating wealth per se. Only the rich are getting richer. While neoliberalism in Chile was the cause for the miracle that was a booming economy, it left deepening vast economic inequalities: while the top 1% own 25% of the country’s wealth according to the United Nations, half the population barely lives on a little more than the minimum monthly salary. This is further translated into having one of the highest inequality gaps among OECD countries.

One more problem derived from the neoliberal system set in the constitution is none other than the vast differences in the quality of education resulting from treating this welfare good as a consumer good. By letting the markets regulate a privatized educational system where the state only sets its minimum requirements, the constitution leaves a system where the level of education is directly determined by the depth of the Chilean families’ pockets. In other words, the richer your parents are, the higher your education is. It is no surprise then that many of Chile’s most recent social protests were initiated by student movements, such as the 2011 protests. Thousands of high school and university students filled the streets under the leadership of a younger Gabriel Boric to demand a radical change in the education system. After all, not everyone has rich parents.

Travelling some years ahead, up until the present day, but still keeping in mind Chile’s recent past, we might remember how in 2019, the country witnessed one of its more violent episodes in its democratic history during new massive demonstrations known as estallido social (in English, social outburst). This time, the cause was the increase of the metro tickets in the capital of Santiago. And yet, the increase was of 30 pesos (the equivalent of 8% of the minimum salary in 2019), and it merely served as a trigger for a long-lasting systematic discontent. The last pesos that broke the camel’s back. As protesters chanted, it was not about 30 pesos but about 30 years. Protests rapidly turned violent, the momentum escalated quickly and almost all 16 regions declared it a state of emergency. The state responded with brutal repression. Over 54,000 people were arrested and 8,827 cases of human rights abuse were reported to the Public Prosecutor’s Office. The Chilean National Institute of Human Rights accused the police and armed forces of the murder of 5 people, 52 cases of sexual violence as well as causing up to 405 cases of ocular damage after the impact of rubber bullets (Contreras et al., n.d.).

This context of enduring social inequality, political disappointment, popular fight against the elites and police brutality helps in explaining why the majority of the Chilean electorate chose to trust Boric. Firstly, a much younger candidate (Boric is almost half the age of the ruling president Piñera) is more likely to break from the political establishment that represents the current status quo. Chileans wanted considerable change and voted for a new candidate, for a new era. Second, the young president-elect became popular for being one of the leaders of the student protests back in 2011. He is the representation of a knight in shining armour and the very same spirit of discontent that many individuals share. Third, far-right candidate Kast symbolizes the remaining vestiges of an authoritarian past as he openly defended the legacy of dictator Pinochet. Finally, and simply put, Boric’s political agenda filled with promises full of hope does sound like music to those who desire a fresh start from the past.

Gabriel Boric’s program is based on the respect of human rights, social justice, gender equality, better pensions, social policies of integration for indigenous peoples and LGBTQI communities, with a more inclusive political model and investing in the protection of the environment. After all, what Boric is proposing is nothing far of many European welfare states.

In his first speech as president-elect, the young politician spoke about a peaceful transition and his will to unify the country by working for those who did not vote for him. More controversially, Boric promised to bury neoliberalism and to block a mining project in the world’s biggest copper exporter. Nevertheless, Boric’s most important project probably remains to change and adapt Pinochet’s old constitution to the present day. Many of the estallido social protestors as well as Boric himself see the current constitution as the root of many of the problems the country has long been suffering from. Many social inequalities can be reduced to an undesired effect of a constitutionally established neoliberal economic model. After the protests started in 2021, a Constituent Assembly was established with the sole goal to write and ratify a new text for a new constitution, which Chileans will be able to vote on in a referendum in September of 2022.

Although promising, the implementation of his initiatives is not a small challenge. The 1980 constitution, written during Pinochet’s rule as a legitimizing tool, presents many legal mechanisms that prevent the current text to be modified. Drafters purposefully included them to limit the impact of democratic decisions made by the people. These mechanisms, what scholars name as a protected democracy, was planned to socially and economically protect the ruling military elite, even if the dictatorship had come to an end (Atria, 2013). The rule dictates a two-thirds amending majority to change Chile’s Magna Carta, which is particularly problematic to achieve within the country. Politics in Chile unfold around a

long-standing culture of coalition politics, because in the past, the system made it very costly for the third to win seats. Parties used to join two big ideological coalitions: one for left parties and the other for right parties (Fuentes, 2015). As a result, the original multi-party system performs as a two-party system in which the consensus needed for changes in the constitutions are much difficult to obtain than in an otherwise functional multi-party system.

The soon-to-be 36-year-old will further face significant challenges from the opposition. Kast has already expressed his opposition to a new constitution, as he argues it would ruin the country, descend to communism and turn the country into a failed state just like Venezuela. Moreover, numerous fake news has been recorded as an attempt to delegitimize the chosen Constitutional Assembly. We will probably see how an aggressive anti-communist narrative will accompany Chile’s future president during his rule, as Boric is allied with the Communist Party. Further challenges he will have to face are unsustainable public spending, a very polarised population divided on many sensitive topics (and angry because of the recession resulting of the COVID-19 pandemic) as well as a highly divided national congress apparently not very eager to build consensus during the policy-making process. Finally, he might struggle to present himself to the masses beyond a here-and-now solution, but rather as a long-term solution to Chile’s problems.

In a more regional perspective, Boric is further presented with the invaluable opportunity to legitimize similar leftist progressive movements in Latin America and to re-establish an ideological balance of power in the region in face of far-right populism, especially in the aftermath of Trump’s defeat in the US last year and Bolsonaro’s recent popularity decline in Brazil. After the Chilean plebiscite, Boric will join the group of leftist Heads of Executives such as Xiomara Castro in Honduras and Pedro Castillo in Peru. This trend of leftist movements on the rise in Latin America can further be confirmed with the current increase of Lula’s popularity in Brazil and other socialist candidates in Colombia. These developments probably suggest a regional ideological revival of socialism. Although this might make the blood run cold for many analysts or foreign investors, some scholars argue this might not be the case. Their argument is that voters are generally exhausted and simply fatigued of conventional politics. They tend to radicalize and, in turn, vote for more volatile candidates who are willing to bring some change, without necessarily identifying with the ideology the candidates represent.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

-          Atria, F. (2013). La Constitucion Tramposa. LOM Ed.

-          Contreras, C., Sebastián, L., Rodríguez, D., Frontaura, C., Debbie, R., Maldonado, G., Ljubetic, Y., Branislav, G., Rokov, M., Millaleo, S., Cristián, H., Fariña, P., Romero Méndez, M., Saffirio Suárez, E., & Aguayo, S. (n.d.). INFORME ANUAL SITUACIÓN DE LOS DERECHOS HUMANOS EN CHILE 2019 ©Instituto Nacional de Derechos Humanos Consejo del Instituto Nacional de Derechos Humanos. https://bibliotecadigital.indh.cl/bitstream/handle/123456789/1701/Informe%20Final-2019.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y

-          Fuentes, C. (2015). Shifting the Status Quo: Constitutional Reforms in Chile. Latin American Politics and Society, 57(1), 99–122. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1548-2456.2015.00258.x

-          Hawkins, D. G. (2002). International human rights and authoritarian rule in Chile. University Of Nebraska Press.

-          Hudson, R. A., & Library Of Congress. Federal Research Division. (1994). Chile : a country study. Federal Research Division, Library Of Congress.