Tribune. Like a current that thwarts one after another the dikes set to contain its passage, the Chilean constituent process has just taken another decisive step during the election of the Constituent Assembly on May 15 and 16.
After the referendum of October 25, 2020, which had ruled out by a very large majority the most restrictive constitutional revision procedure, the hope of the conservative sectors of having a blocking minority seems definitively ruled out. One of the most restrictive rules of the constitutional pact concluded by the parliamentary forces, in November 2019, requires a two-thirds majority to modify the standards of the current Constitution, designed by the dictatorship of General Pinochet (1973-1990). The demand for a new Constitution was born in the streets, during the popular rebellion in October 2019.
The Chilean right had bet on the unity of its camp, going so far as to integrate its extreme wing, but it receives only 37 seats. This election also begins the decline of the center-left forces which had piloted the democratic transition, while leaving untouched the neoliberal economic model questioned by the demonstrators two years ago. Their old alliance is preceded by the left, united around the Communist Party and the left forces of the Frente Amplio, which obtains 28 seats.
Irruption of independent candidates
But the most striking element is the emergence of independent candidates (48 at least, plus those integrated as such by partisan alliances), whose most structured force, the “people’s list”, came directly from the movement of 2019. If we add to this fact the separate election of the 17 representatives of indigenous peoples and the importance of elected feminists, supported by the rule of absolute parity between women and men, the convention which will have to draft a new Constitution presents a new face, full of promises of renewal, not only in relation to Chilean history (it will be the first Constitution drawn up by an elected body), but perhaps also to constitutionalism itself.
We cannot predict anything about the final product of this assembly which will meet from June, for a maximum of one year. Constituent conventions have their own dynamics, including the capacity for creation, the echo of proposals on public opinion, the appearance of unforeseen agreements which can multiply, even more in a configuration like the one we have just seen. (it is estimated that two thirds of elected officials have no prior partisan experience).
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