This article was first published in Brecha and Correspondencia de Prensa on May 21st. It was translated into English by the ISP.
As morning broke on Monday, May 17, marraqueta –the most common type of bread on the tables of the Chilean people–tasted “crunchier and the tea sweeter”, as an old popular saying goes. The saying, attributed to soccer coach Luis Álamos, refers to the pleasant feeling after a victory for the most popular club in the country: Colo Colo. It was much the same among ordinary people the day after the results of the historic mega-election of mayors, city councils, governors and delegates to the constituent assembly that will rewrite the Chilean constitution. The election to the constituent assembly, in particular, focused mass interest, because it was the political solution the political elite proposed to channel popular discontent expressed in the revolt that began on October 18, 2019.
Although only 43.35 percent of the electorate voted (in the plebiscite of October 25, 2020 it had been 50.9 percent), the May 15-16 vote tipped the balance in favor of transformative forces that will assemble at a convention to draft the new constitution. Groups not affiliated with the traditional political parties, with 48 representatives, will be the largest political force within the constituent body. This does not take into account 40 independentswho appeared on multiple political party lists, nor the 17 seats reserved for Indigenous peoples. Similarly, the AprueboDignidadlist—which brings together the Broad Front (Frente Amplio), the Communist Party and other groups outside of the political duopoly that has dominated the scene since the end of the Pinochet dictatorship—also won 28 seats.
Conversely, the right-wing Vamos por Chile list, aligned with President Sebastián Piñera, did not get the third of representatives it needed to block the reforms if it desired. According to law 21.200, which enabled the constituent process, “the Convention must approve the rules and voting regulations for them by a quorum of two-thirds of its members in office” and Vamos por Chile obtained only 37 of the 52 necessary seats. The center-left parties of the ex-Concertación, grouped on the Lista del Apruebo, did not receive good news either. They barely won 25 seats to the convention. That was interpreted as a resounding defeat.
With the sum of these factors, Claudia Heiss, chair of the political science program at the University of Chile, told Brecha: “The convention was configured to reflect the demands of the citizens from the uprising. It is very important that it does not look much like Congress, even though it was elected with the same basic rules as the Congress. The convention has gender parity (something unprecedented in the world), has 17 seats reserved for Indigenous peoples and chose about one-third of the body to be independent of the political parties. It does not have the same level elite social origins as Congress has. There is also a great diversity of socio-economic origins: a third were educated in municipal schools, another third in private subsidized schools and the other third in non-elite private schools.”
From a chess champion to a scientist
The vast spectrum of profiles among the 155 delegates was also reflected in the plurality of activities or occupations. However, lawyers prevail (61). But the rest range from engineers to a housewife. There are journalists, midwives, teachers, actors, a preschool assistant, a machi (a traditional healer in the Mapuche culture of Chile), an auto mechanic, and a geographer, among others. There is also the four-time Chilean chess champion, Damaris Abarca, who got a place as an independent on the Approve Dignity list. She is one of 77 women who will be at the convention.
“The array of delegates has been very positive, and no one group—even the conservative forces who don’t want any change—has the one-third veto power. I am interested in working from a feminist perspective for women’s rights, the rights of children, and also sports and science as a social right,”says Abarca, representative of District 15, which includes communities in the O’Higgins region, in the central area of the country.
Also featured in the convention is Cristina Dorador, a biologist and researcher at the University of Antofagasta, her hometown, who advocates for an ecological constitution that guarantees the human right to water in a country with privatized water resources that contributes to seven of the nine conditions of climate vulnerability, according to data from the United Nations. “I believe that we are going to achieve change, because there are many candidates that have come from the land for a long time. The incorporation of native peoples will allow a high-level discussion, due to their relationship with nature. We do not have to be as concerned with how certain powerful groups, which are in the minority here, are going to act. We have to reach a consensus, but we can also push the envelope”, says Dorador, who obtained the first majority in District 3 running on Movimiento Independiente del Norte list.
An independent like her, although a member of the Lista del Pueblo (People’s List), a bloc that formed to assure representation of the social movements in the convention, is Constanza San Juan, a history graduate and spokesperson for the Movement for Water in Guasco Alto. The movement played a central role in the struggle to close the Pascua Lama mining project, in the high mountain range of the Atacama region. “We are committed to a collective and popular mandate from the territorial assemblies of Atacama. Our main topics are moving to an anti-neoliberal society, a direct democracy and a state of solidarity. Our positions have changed the terms of debate for the political parties”, says the representative from District 4, who is pressing to hold convention sessions in different regions and to broadcast them live to assure transparency, and “to have methods of direct communication with the populations of different regions.”
Until now, the only space set aside for the operation of the convention has been the headquarters of the former National Congress in Santiago. The assembly’s work will last for nine months from its installation in June or July of this year. It can be extended for up to 12 months. If the final text is approved in the final plebiscite (which will be mandatory, unlike the voluntary plebiscite that started the process), the constitution that will succeed Pinochet’s will take effect in the first half of 2022, with a new President of the Republic in office.
For the political scientist Heiss, the diversity in the composition of the constituent assembly not only adds legitimacy to the process, but also “leads to better decisions”, because “having different points of view will allow there to be less bias in deliberation.” In this sense, despite the leftist orientation of most of the members of the assembly, this will not necessarily be expressed in the new constitution. “The independents are not a homogeneous force. The list of Non-Neutral Independents will have more moderate positions. One can say that the majority is on the left, but the developmentalist left is not the same as the environmentalist left. They have different visions. This convention will not be steamrolled, as some sectors of the right believe. I believe that there is no right/left divide here, but rather an elite/citizendivide,” adds Heiss, who has studied Chile’s 1980 Constitution in depth.
Heiss believes that the new constitution will enshrine water as a human right. Regarding social rights, however, she grants that there will be some margin of uncertainty. “Surely the right to health, and to housing will be much more robust, but it is not enough to establish them in the Constitution. Then you need public policies, tax reform and laws. The Constitution will not create these social rights by itself, but it will guide the political system towards a more community-driven approach.”
