Chile's New Constitution

Full Transcript:

Introduction: 

Hello and welcome the Rules of the Game podcast, where I discuss and analyze democratic institutions. 

The draft of the new constitution of Chile is now published. The constitutional convention met for the first time on 4 July 2021 and has now completed a draft constitution that the people of Chile will vote on in September. It has been a process of inspiration and hope, but also of controversies, and especially of hard constitutional work. 

With Gabriel Negretto I discuss the main political institutions of the new constitution. He describes the ups and downs, and the milestones that were reached by the convention. He has followed the process up close. 

Almost exactly a year ago, I talked to Claudia Heiss in Episode 8 about the incredible journey that Chile has taken from the overwhelming street protests that caused the popular votes on a constitutional convention to drafting a brand new constitution. Gabriel Negretto now comments on the continuation of this extraordinary journey. 

Gabriel Negretto is a Full Professor of Political Science at the Institute of Political Science of the Catholic University of Santiago de Chile. His research focuses on comparative constitutional politics, electoral and constitutional change, and democratization, and he has also been a consultant to international organizations, such as the United Nations, and the Inter-American Development Bank, among others.  His most recent book is titled Redrafting Constitutions in Democratic Regimes: Theoretical and Comparative Perspectives (Cambridge University Press, 2020), and he also published countless articles in top academic journals including the American Political Science Review.

I link to his website and his Twitter account in the show notes.

I am your host, Stephan Kyburz, and this is the twenty-second episode of The Rules of the Game podcast. I am a political economist with a PhD in Economics from the University of Bern in Switzerland. And I previously held positions at the London School of Economics and Political Science and the Center for Global Development.

You find a full transcript of this episode on my website rulesofthegame.blog. I am always curious to hear your opinion, so just send me an email to stephan.kyburz@gmail.com, and please leave a review and share this episode with friends and colleagues.

Please enjoy this wide ranging conversation with Gabriel Negretto.

Interview:

Stephan Kyburz: Gabriel Negretto, welcome to the Rules of the Game Podcast. I’m very happy to have you on the show.

Gabriel Negretto: Thank you for the invitation, Stephan. Nice to be here.

Stephan Kyburz: So as always I ask the first question and that is what is your first memory of democracy or of politics in general?

Gabriel Negretto: Well, I have several memories but one that really has sticked into my mind it’s the image of massive crowds in 1983, in Argentina, right at the time of the election of Raúl Alfonsín as the new president of the integration of democracy after the military dictatorship. That’s an image that has impressed me and I think… It’s a salient memory for me, yes.

Stephan Kyburz: Did that kind of influence your career also in the end or is this more a childhood memory?

Gabriel Negretto: I’m not sure. Perhaps in some way it did, it did influence my career. yes I got excited about politics, at the time I was not really exposed to politics particularly because I was living before in a dictatorship. I was young. So it was my first exposure to politics and I was pretty excited about it. So probably it did have some effect on my future career. And now with the benefit of inside, I can say that I didn’t know it at the time. But yes, probably.

Intermezzo

Stephan Kyburz: So today we want to talk about the constitutional convention of Chile that is in the process as we speak of drafting a new constitution and that process started pretty much with, well, in the first place huge protests in the streets of Chile, of Santiago and other cities and that caused the government to propose two popular votes. One was to replace the old constitutions. That is based in the era of Pinochet, still, and the other popular vote was on whether to elect a separate constitutional convention and that was in October 2020 and the people approved to have that process started. And the Constitutional Convention was then elected and first met 4th July last year and since then the process has been going on to draft this new Constitution. So from your perspective what were the experiences, so far? What were the main events? And what are your takeaways, so far?

Gabriel Negretto: Well, many things have happened since the election of the convention in May 2021. I would say that there were really high expectations and high optimism at the time when the convention was elected. The election was postponed for a year due to the pandemic. At the time , everybody celebrated, myself included of course the way in which the convention was elected, the kind of representation that it achieved. Just for the audience to know the rules… The regular rules for the election of the ordinary legislature were applied at the time, a proportional electoral system with 28 electoral districts with a medi type of magnitude. But several new rules were added for this special election. First gender parity is that half of the assembly will be made up of women and the other half of men, second reserve seats for indigenous peoples. Actually 17 out of 155 seats were reserved for this type of representation and then the representation of independence but in a different form from the past, that is not just as individual candidates or candidates that could get associated with a party list but the law enabled them to present their own list competing side by side with party lists. Now the outcome at the time was in a way unexpected in the sense that the right really didn’t achieve the type of representation that everybody expected. It didn’t get the third of the seats that was needed to block decisions and force consensus because the convention will make decisions by two-thirds, , in order to adopt a new constitution. Actually the right was pretty much in disarray at the time. They were always against the idea of a new constitution. They only accepted it because they thought it would be a way to placate citizen dissatisfaction with the status quo. They didn’t really have many proposals for the new constitution. So they got the right, , I wouldn’t say by surprise but they really didn’t manage to mobilize their constituents, the voters. But in general it was a big blow to traditional parties. Political groups associated with a new left gain more representation than political groups associated with the old and more traditional left, the one that was in charge of the transition. And in the early years after the inauguration of democracy in Chile so a new left reached more votes and more representation. Second independence accounted for much more than the representatives of traditional parties and any type of political group. That was another important feature of that election. And then as I said, , gender parity and reserved seats for indigenous people gave this convention a sense of renewal, of differentiation with everything that Chileans knew before in terms of political institutions. Very different from the ordinary legislature that was working at the time. So people in spite of the fact that it was a big blow to traditional political parties in general and to the right in particular, I would say that on average the sense was one of optimism because that’s why a constitutional convention was elected, precisely to renew politics, to create a new sense of a new beginning in the country and certainly that type of representation that came out of the election of May 2021 confirmed that goal, that idea.

Stephan Kyburz: So quickly I remember, because I had Claudia Heis on the podcast as well, pretty much one year ago and we were talking about the whole history up to the convention, so she also, I think, she felt that sense of optimism and euphoria and renewal which was really, really interesting and I think one element that was, in the history up to the convention was also the electoral reform of 2015, that’s what she was also mentioning, that this introduction of proportional representation and a list system that was crucial for bringing about a different representation or a more… Probably a more legitimate representation also of the population at large.

Gabriel Negretto: yes, definitely definitely. That’s exactly what happened in the country. And over time what happened is that people started to see how the convention worked. There were some…  I wouldn’t say scandals but some problems within the convention like one delegate from a political group that was associated with the social movements lied about a medical condition. Then important discussions and some sort of polarization about early decisions on the rules of procedure. Then that is stabilized and I will say that until the end of the year that optimism on average was maintained. I think things started to change after the presidential and congressional election and would show a very different landscape. Traditional parties regain popular support. The new rules that were applied for the election of the convention were not applied for the election of congress but in general what we saw there was a country much more divided than what we saw in the election of the convention. I mean divided, in a very traditional way, divided between left and right, like 40% on each camp in the legislature compared to what happened in the election of the convention where the left really won many more seats than the center, center right and right. So it was a sort of a return to an old distribution of preferences in the country and that kind of gave a different perspective of the whole process then.

Stephan Kyburz: Sorry to interrupt. Do you think that was also a reaction to what people observed in the convention? Was it like kind of a balancing act? So the people thought that the convention is more kind of tilted to the left a bit or to more progressive circles and then they kind of want to rebalance it? 

Gabriel Negretto: yes I think it was but the extent to which it was a balancing act we cannot really disentangle the whole causality of the process because the rules were different. We can’t keep the rules constant, that’s a problem because the rules by which the convention was elected changed by the time that the new congress was elected. But certainly there was higher participation among older people, people that were either against the constitution making process or were agnostic about it. So people that didn’t vote at the time. That’s another thing. So because at the time of the election of the convention the percentage of participation of young people that is below 40 was much higher than in previous legislative elections and in the election of 2021, the legislature in November 2021. So even that changed. So we can’t keep many variables constant to determine how the elector reacted. But I think it was and that’s a way in which it has been interpreted and so people tend to perceive it that way. There was a kind of correction to an imbalance that occurred at the time of the election of the convention. Then what we have by February is the reports of the commissions that worked on particular topics like the political system, citizen rights, judicial system, all these topics. So reports started to come first in the general approval, then in particular approval of the provisions in these commissions and several debates emerged, public debates emerged about the reports and the proposals.

Stephan Kyburz: So it was really a publication of the proposals and this kicked off a public debate. Is that correct?

Gabriel Negretto: It kicked off a public debate, particularly it became clear that the convention did not just want to introduce social rights, strengthen civil rights and introduce a few mechanisms of direct popular participation. They really wanted to do much more than that. I’m saying that because the expectation at the time of the social mobilizations of October to December 2019 or by the time that the decision to get to approve a new constitution was made, really the social demands were related to substantive public policies. Generally the expansion of social rights, better access to education, wider and better access to education, public health, social security and there were not many more demands in terms of  the political system, the judicial system. But it became clear when this committee started to work that  they wanted to go much further. They wanted, really, to reshape the political landscape of the country.

Stephan Kyburz: And leave less room to the legislatures, right? Like to already determine a lot of basic laws.

Gabriel Negretto: Exactly! Well to determine many details for the future legislature, but also to change traditional features of the political system. Like for instance one debate and that was important between February and March was the elimination of the senate, right? Not that the public will pay lots of attention to this, but it really caught the public’s eyes in the sense that it became clear that the convention wanted to do much more, go much further in terms of transformation then just simply expand rights, which was the expectation. And many of these changes were controversial, were very controversial. The same I could say about the idea of creating parallel legal systems, one for ordinary Chileans and nationals and the other for indigenous peoples even though the details of this juridical pluralism as it was called are not clear for the ordinary citizen, what it became clear is that this was going much further than what was expected in terms of getting better education, more intervention of the state in the provision of basic public goods. So at the time between February and March is when we start to see an increase in the criticisms to the convention and a decrease in the levels of trust. So it kind of coincides with the time in which the concrete substantive proposals came out. Again, not because citizens were paying attention to the details or were fully aware of the details but because it caught by surprise, many voters or many citizens. The fact that this convention was  doing well. More controversial things than they were supposedly called for at the time of the election in 2021. So that’s one interpretation and I have this interpretation. On the other hand, many things were going on in the country. The process has been long. Chile spent between October 2019 up to now we’re talking about it’s going to be 3 years almost of constitutional debate, so to speak, and the country is experiencing other problems like levels of inflation for instance that has never been experienced. A dramatic decline in the approval of the previous government due to the handling of the social mobilizations, social conflict but also the handling of the financial situation during the pandemic, many things so I would say that in general the  mood of the country is gloomier than it was in 2018 or even early 2019. The constitutional convention is working in a context in which the perception about the future of the country is not so certain as it was in the past, as it was before the social mobilizations of October 2018. So that is affecting in many ways the process as well.

Stephan Kyburz: So people are more like trying to find more stability again, right? And obviously the – also the old constitution in a sense provides some stability because they know what they have in it, in a sense, and I guess like 3 years of discussions about these really fundamental issues is also exhausting, in a way, even political scientists must be like… so intense that whole process.

Gabriel Negretto: Oh yes, yes.

Intermezzo

Stephan Kyburz: I kind of want to discuss the different institutions where we see changes and obviously some things you have mentioned like this parallel legal system that sounds super interesting also but very fundamental in legal terms. But let me go back to the senate. I think that’s probably a good starting point because that created so much public debate also. So the  convention decided to abolish the senate and replace it with a chamber of regions. Can you explain how far is this a definite decision? And how far it got? And what are kind of the characteristics of that chamber of regions?

Gabriel Negretto: The first provisions that were approved in general, in the commission of the political system in February were the full elimination of the senate and the adoption of a unicameral system that triggered a huge debate among conventionals, the approval of the unicameral proposal was supported by a fair majority in the commission of the political system. Then in the newspapers, among scholars that revealed this radical goal of the… of at least an important number of delegates in the convention because eliminating the senate and adopting a unicameral system was not just a reaction to the immediate past,  whatever defects could be attached to the senate as it worked  since 1990 and the legacy of the constitution designed by Pinochet which of course has been deeply transformed during the democratic period but it was going against the Chilean constitutional tradition because the senate has been in place for a much longer time than the dictatorship of Pinochet and the design of the 1980 constitution. It existed… before it existed in the 1925 constitution, it existed in the 1833 constitution. That is that this convention was really willing to transform and that really triggered an important debate that I think led to some corrections. Many people argued that it was contradictory to eliminate the senate and adopt that unicameral system when on the other hand it was being declared that Chile will become a regional state, more or less following the model of the regional autonomies of the Spanish state, but certainly, having a regional state in which decentralization will be deepened, where local institutions will be strengthened, was at odds with the idea of abolishing a second chamber that could be designed to represent regional interest, right? I think that was a very strong argument and led many delegates to backtrack on their positions and that led to  subsequent negotiations in which a decision was made to adopt a chamber of the regions. Now this chamber of the regions at the very beginning was a very symbolic chamber, a sort of I would say, a formal second Chamber with no powers whatsoever. Over time because this also led to criticisms and it was said, not without reason, that the second chamber was hiding a de facto unicameral system, so it also led to new negotiations in order to strengthen this second Chamber and as it stands now in which the chamber of the region has been incorporated to the draft constitution, with a list of powers that has been strengthened much more than in previous reports. What we have now is a constitution that would establish an asymmetric type of bicameralism but one that is much more moderate and I would say, in a certain way, less radical a change compared to the past than it was in previous iterations. So we will have a second Chamber with significant participation in every type of law. That implies that it affects regional and territorial interests and there will be asymmetries in the enactment of ordinary laws but in these areas, where laws will affect dangers of the regions this second Chamber would have an important influence. That is where the draft of the constitution stands now.

Stephan Kyburz: Okay, is that a reasonable solution for you? Do you think that kind of asymmetric solution for the chambers makes sense?

Gabriel Negretto: I think it is a reasonable solution. I think that the approach could have been more minimalistic from the very beginning, in the sense that it could have taken the old senate, changed the name, changed the way in which regions were represented, strengthened decentralization and deprived the second chamber of an equal power in terms of ordinary legislation, actually of any type of legislation like, for instance, overcoming this agreement by a joint session of both chambers deciding, say, by absolute majority that will give automatically an advantage to the first chamber and I think that would have been an approach to an asymmetric type of bicameralism that would have been very reasonable but that was not the approach of the convention. The convention started by eliminating the senate. So given that approach that the convention took, that I think was mistaken, I think that the outcome is reasonable.  I think it is reasonable.

Stephan Kyburz: It’s just… it was kind of going the other way around. It’s first abolishing and then reestablishing instead of taking what we have and then changing slowly what we think is not working.

Gabriel Negretto: Exactly yes, it started with a very extreme position and it ended up with a much more moderate, acceptable position that really, I mean, that it does change the constitutional tradition in Chile but not so radically, not so dramatically as it would have been.

Stephan Kyburz: And the first chamber, the chamber of deputies, were there any changes proposed? Or will that really pretty much stay as it is, including the electoral law?

Gabriel Negretto: Well no, there were changes also in terms of the chamber of deputies. Well first of all in terms of powers, the most important change perhaps is that this will be a chamber that will predominate in most areas of legislation. Also that it will decide by simple majority except in some specific pieces of legislation as you probably know, the Chilean constitution had qualified majorities for a wide range of matters and types of laws. That was eliminated. And again the same story as in the case of the senate. It started by adopting a unicameral type of legislature, deciding by simple majority and then it restored a second chamber but also it accepted the idea that some laws should be approved by a qualified majority. So that was also adopted in this draft constitution for instance, electoral laws are going to be approved by qualified majority, not by simple majority. So that was another area in which the most radical delegates backtracked from their previous positions.

Stephan Kyburz: Kind of safeguarding a few… certain legislations.

Gabriel Negretto: Exactly. In terms of representation and elections of electoral rules the most important change is in terms of pluralism in representation. The party rule was adopted across the board, that is, any collective body that is selected will have to adopt – and also unelected bodies, actually. So the gender party rule has been adopted across the board for any collective body. That was expected but it has been established. Then the same with reserve seats for indigenous peoples. It has also been adopted for every type of collective body including the chamber of deputies. 

Stephan Kyburz: So to clarify, this rather resembles the electoral rules used for the constitutional convention, right?

Gabriel Negretto: Exactly, and that confirms a proposal made a long time ago by political scientist Jon Elster that constitutions tend to follow the image of the convention that produced them. So unicameral conventions tend to adopt or try to adopt unicameral legislatures. The rules of elections tend to be reproduced in the new constitution and so forth. So to some extent that has been true, except in one area, the election of independents. The experience with independents, particularly the election of a list of Independents as it was allowed by the time of the election of the convention has been very negative. I think that many people at this point believe that was even a mistake, right? Because that was…

Stephan Kyburz: People think that there are too many independents in the convention?

Gabriel Negretto: Too many independents and the results of having a convention, a collective body really, working through a collection of individuals without the capacity of preference aggregation, forging agreements among a large number of delegates and sustaining those agreements has been seen in a negative light and I think also not without reason because this is exactly what the convention shows. Very difficult to forge agreements, to sustain those agreements across issues and areas of design and that’s because of the absence of parties. 

Stephan Kyburz: yes, so it’s a lot of fragmentation, right? 

Gabriel Negretto: Oh yes, it’s more than party fragmentation. This is a fragmentation period. Fragmentation in terms of Individualities. So even political groups that were not very cohesive divided themselves. So yes, as many people have said that this is proof that it’s not good to have a collective body without parties: it’s the convention, right? So that rule was not adopted. But the reason that there has been a huge debate about the role of independence and the role of social movements in the end as the draft stands now, there is no rule adopted in general for the presence of independents, or for the radical separation between social movements and political parties. So that’s another area in which the convention – or let’s say more precisely – majorities in the convention have moderated themselves. Because without  the criticism that follows some attempts at the beginning to include independents to create particular rules for social movements separate from parties. Without that criticism probably we will see today a more exact reproduction of the rules by which the convention was elected.

Stephan Kyburz: Yeah, I think that’s probably also that kind of overreaction, right, that people have really bad memories of certain parties or they have bad experiences with big parties, traditional parties and then they kind of go over the top and ask for independents, but they disregard the fact that independents have much harder time to find agreements, right? So the parties are still really important in the end for political work.

Gabriel Negretto: Of course, of course, and I think that even ordinary citizens now realize about that, also because parties, of course, they work through platforms, programs, right? Where they have to reconcile positions on several areas on several dimensions. Whereas independents, I mean they just take single issues and this is what happened with the convention. So you have many delegates that really care about one single provision or perhaps one chapter of the constitution – if at all.  And so it’s very difficult to negotiate and make changes and really produce collective, consistent and coherent collective decisions with that type of agenda.

Stephan Kyburz: Yes, of course and also it’s hard for the people to recognize what people really stand for, right? So that makes it hard on both sides – both in parliament but also in the convention and for the people to make choices.

Gabriel Negretto: One more thing about the electoral rules is that there was even an attempt to reduce party fragmentation for the future. There were several drafts of the report before – they were sent to the plenary – that included provisions such as an electoral threshold of 4% in order to have access to representation. Also an important rule that was pretty much debated and it seemed at one point that it had some support, that was the provision according to which the chamber of deputies will be elected simultaneously with the run-off presidential election in a way  so that the legislative election, so the results of the presidential election would spill-over to the legislative election. But that was not adopted, finally. And it was eliminated also the threshold, which makes a lot of sense because from the point of view of partisan self-interest because for many delegates and for many political groups which are all minoritarian here, adopting this type of provisions would have been suicidal, right, in many ways. 

Stephan Kyburz: Yes, excluding themselves.

Gabriel Negretto: So excluding themselves for the future. Not good for the system but good for themselves. So I’m not surprised that that initial seeming consensus about these rules to moderate fragmentation vanished, because that’s what you would expect out of partisan answers.

Stephan Kyburz: So in terms of executive power – on my podcast I talk a lot about presidentialism, parliamentarism, hybrid forms, etc., what was the discussion in the convention about that topic? Like Chile, obviously with the presidency – as far as I know that is not questioned fundamentally so as far as I have seen the presidency will stand.

Gabriel Negretto: Yes, definitely. The new constitution will maintain the presidential system, the basic structure of a presidential regime. There was a debate at the very beginning when the commission on the political system started to work. There were proposals all over the place. There were parliamentary proposals, there were semi-presidential or mixed regime proposals, and presidential proposals. In the end, the alternative that won the day was the idea of keeping the presidential system but reducing at the same time some important powers of the executive particularly in the legality arena. The Chilean president stands out as one of the strongest executives in the region in terms of legislative powers, and particularly in agenda setting powers. Strong powers for the exclusive initiation of legislation in financial areas, and that’s really what the convention and the commission on the political system in particular focus on. So the exclusive initiative was transformed and it wasn’t eliminated, but it’s not exclusive anymore. So Congress, actually the Chamber of Deputies, can also make proposals in financial areas for the creation of taxes, for instance, or the abolition of pre-existing taxes, along with the president. But something like an exclusive initiative or the necessary support of the president was included and in that sense the powers were reduced compared to the past. But not dramatically in the sense that the president has to support this process, this project when they are initiated by the legislature without that support, the project, the bills cannot be enacted, right. Then the veto powers of the executive have been weakened. Well, first of all because now you have one chamber that predominates over the other but also because the override, the threshold for the veto override has been diminished from two thirds to four seventh. Actually let me correct that, I think in the last version approved, It’s from two thirds to three fifths, that is from 66% to 60%, but with an important distinction between partial and total veto. Because partial vetoes, partial observations can be overridden by a simple majority. That’s another area in which the powers of the executive have also been weakened.

Stephan Kyburz: Okay, that’s interesting. Because I always think the only way a presidential system can work is if the president is not too powerful. So if the president has really to consider  the opinions and the processes in Congress. That’s the only way I think a presidential system can work, and…  – the whole discussion on president’s becoming too powerful, which is a danger to democracy itself.

Gabriel Negretto: Well yes, but you see the functioning of a presidential system is supported by a very delicate balancing act. Because the president should not be too powerful in order to overcome any, or pass over any objection controlled by the legislature. But on the other hand, it can’t be too weak either. Because if you have a too weak president that on the other hand is elected, directly elected by the people you do have a problem and presidential systems can be very dysfunctional if you have too weak a president. So the balancing act is that you need a president that is neither too powerful nor too weak and that also has been part of the debate, because in the first draft – again same story as in the case of the senate – the weakening of the presidential powers was very extreme in the first versions of the report of the commission of the political system. Not only the congress will be unicameral and will enact laws by simple majority, but the veto override will be always by simple majority, in a single chamber. So basically, and then with the transformation/elimination of the old exclusive legislative initiative in important financial matters. That led to a very diminished role for the executive in the early versions of the proposals. Now in the final version, the one that stands now in the draft of the new constitution, I would say that, yes, the legislative powers have been weakened, but in a much more moderate way.

Stephan Kyburz: So I still have so many questions and we could go in so many directions. But one topic I still like to talk briefly about is direct democracy or direct participation of the voters. Have there been any more substantial rights in terms of maybe initiatives or referendums?

Gabriel Negretto: Oh yes, all kinds of mechanisms of direct participation or direct democracy have been included. The final shape is not completely finished because there has been some rejection of those norms in the plenary, so they are being decided as we speak, so very soon. But yes, this is going to be a constitution with almost every type of mechanism of direct citizen participation that you could think of, from popular initiative for ordinary laws, popular initiative for constitutional reforms, popular initiative for the replacement of the constitution, that is a specific type of popular initiative in which citizens can collect signatures to activate a constitution making process that is to replace the constitution.

Stephan Kyburz: Yes, that was actually the very first type of initiative that Switzerland had. The first constitution knew that rule that the citizens could initiate a complete overhaul of the constitution. And only later there was the element added that there can be a partial amendment of the constitution.

Gabriel Negretto: Yes, there’s going to be different types of referendums for the approval of constitutional reforms, for the approval of particular norms. Then recall: not just for local but also for national authorities. I haven’t seen the last provisions, I mean the final shape of the recall mechanisms for deputies, and there were proposals also for the recall of the president. I’m not sure I haven’t seen the last version now but it could be the case, it will be the case that we will have a recall for national authorities at least for the legislature and it might be the case that the president is also included.

Stephan Kyburz: Okay, wow that would be quite a strong instrument.

Gabriel Negretto: Yes, that will be quite strong, yes, definitely. This was very clear from the break from the beginning that this will be a participatory type of constitution, which is also a strong reaction to the past. Chile is actually, I would say the single constitution in Latin America right now, the 1980 constitution, even after several amendments over time, that doesn’t have any single mechanism of direct citizen participation in national issues except for the possibility of participating in constitutional reforms when the president disagrees with the legislature. But that was a provision that in fact enhances the power of the president, not that expands the ability of citizens to participate in national affairs. So basically it’s a traditional representative type of constitution with no instruments whatsoever of direct citizen participation. And the new constitution is going to be quite the opposite.

Stephan Kyburz: That’s very interesting that the people now really think like okay they want to keep the power also with the people, right? Not give it back to the presidency or to the legislature.

Gabriel Negretto: Exactly yes.

Stephan Kyburz: On the way forward how that’s going to  play out. For example, the recall I think is also quite a strong instrument, which I don’t know much about it actually, because for example in Switzerland, we don’t have it and I haven’t read so much about it. But yes, that’s kind of the full version of direct democratic rights. 

Gabriel Negretto: yes, exactly? yes.

Stephan Kyburz: So for people who want to read up on these topics, where can people maybe find like a summary of developments or maybe can you recommend something in English that has been written?

Gabriel Negretto: There have been several works published while the process is ongoing but of course those works are by necessity partial and just capturing parts of the event. There is – well this sounds like self-promotion – but it’s inevitable because it was a full issue in December of  2021 by the Hague Journal on the Rule of Law dedicated to the Chilean constitution making process. I’m saying self promotion because I’m the author of one of the articles. But there are several authors as well taking different perspectives on the Chilean constitution making process. And that’s in English, of course. I don’t have now the exact volume of the issue, but it was published in December.

Stephan Kyburz: Now I will link to it in the show notes for sure.

Gabriel Negretto: And I am not aware of any other recent work in English, there are several in Spanish.

Stephan Kyburz: I will link to those as well because  a lot of people speaks Spanish.

Gabriel Negretto: Most of the articles or notes that I have read are in the news, so like extended notes or critical reflections.

Stephan Kyburz: Yes, that’s fine, I will link to those. Also like newspaper articles, they are very interesting for a broader audience and just to have like a summary of what’s going on. Gabriel Negretto, thanks a lot for taking the time. It was super interesting with many insights for me, and yes, I hope the process will find a positive end and hopefully, yes, the election [vote] will be in September is that right?

Gabriel Negretto: The final referendum ratification will be in September, we can’t really make a prediction or certain but no prediction can be certain at least not in political science, I mean the social sciences in general. If I were to make a prediction I would say that the new constitution will pass. Well just because in spite of the many controversies that have emerged and criticisms of the convention, I think that in the end people are going to have a choice between having a constitution without social rights, without mechanisms of citizen participation, and one with them. So I think that in the end that it’s gonna tilt the boat towards approval. Now it could be a close win. It could be a 55–45 which is probably not so good. Or it could be a greater win like 60–40, 65–35 and so where we don’t know at. But is it possible that the constitution could be rejected? Well yes, we can’t rule that out completely. Although it’s the percentage of people that are declaring that they will vote against the constitution has been increasing, and now for instance, the last poll that came out two weeks ago says that 48% of the people will vote against, whereas only 35% will vote for the constitution. I’m not sure how much we can rely on those polls, but certainly the margin of rejection is increasing lately. So we can’t discard the possibility of rejection. I think that in the end the constitution will pass, but certainly it’s probable that the referendum is going to be polarized in many ways.

Stephan Kyburz: Yes, but there is also still a few months, so let’s see how the discussions develop.

Gabriel Negretto: Yes, we need to see how it develops definitely.

Stephan Kyburz: Thanks a lot, Gabriel for the conversation and wish you all the best and Chile for the constitutional process and hopefully with a happy end.

Gabriel Negretto: Thank you so much Stephan. Let’s hope for that.