The Cordillera of Shattered Dreams

Chile from the Estallido Social to the Triumph of the Far Right

“If Pinochet were alive, he would vote for me.” This statement alone would suffice to describe the significance of what happened in Chile on Sunday, December 14, 2025, the day of the last presidential election. The statement was made a few years ago by José Antonio Kast, who took office as President of the Republic on March 11.¹

From the very beginning of his term, Kast has implemented a series of measures consistent with the framework of his declared “emergency government,” such as a border control plan that calls for the construction of physical barriers, accompanied by the use of drones and the deployment of the armed forces along the northern border to strengthen efforts to combat immigration². Among the executive branch’s first actions was the suspension of numerous environmental decrees, marking an immediate break with climate policies³. Finally, the President recently confirmed his intention to grant pardons to law enforcement officers convicted for their role in suppressing the 2019 protests⁴.

A far-right leader, Kast comes from a German family that emigrated to Chile after World War II. His father, Michael Kast, was a member of the Nazi Party and served in the Wehrmacht during the war, while one of his brothers, Miguel Kast, served as a minister under the Pinochet regime. However, for the new president, this pedigree is by no means embarrassing. Just as the nearly seventeen years of dictatorship are not an embarrassing legacy for a significant portion of the Chilean population.

However, the absence of a shared memory, 52 years after the coup, is not the only reason that led to the far-right’s victory. Chile, where Kast has established himself, is a country dominated first and foremost by fear, but above all by disappointment. A disappointment that, to be fully understood, requires taking a step back nearly six years.

The 2019 protests

In 2019, thirty years after the return to democracy, Chile continues to grapple with the legacy of the neoliberal model imposed during the Pinochet dictatorship: a weak and fragmented welfare state and a deeply unequal distribution of wealth. The Chilean economy is traditionally considered one of the strongest in Latin America, despite the fact that 1% of the population holds 26.5% of the wealth, while the poorest 50% hold just 2%. Compounding this situation is a precarious public healthcare system and a pension system managed by private insurance companies, with pensions that often do not reach 400 euros per month⁵. Economic inequalities are eroding social cohesion, and the country is a pressure cooker ready to explode.

On October 7, 2019, following the implementation of fare increases for public transportation, Santiago became the epicenter of protests that would later be known as the “social uprising.” Students began refusing to pay fares en masse and occupying subway stations. They took to the streets to protest against inequality, the high cost of living, and corruption. On October 18, the situation worsened; some metro lines were closed due to violent clashes between the carabineros (local police) and protesters. The protests grew increasingly violent; overnight, the capital was engulfed in fires and looting, while riots began to break out across the country. On the morning of the 19th, President Sebastián Piñera suspended the subway fare increase and declared a state of emergency, imposing a curfew throughout the Santiago metropolitan area. But by then it was too late; the Chilean pot had already boiled over.

The state of emergency is extended to nearly all provincial capitals, and the army is deployed to the streets to enforce order and suppress the riots. On October 21, Piñera declares: “We are at war against a powerful and relentless enemy”⁶. That enemy is his own people.

On October 25, more than a million people take to the streets in Santiago, in what will be considered by authorities and the press as “La marcha más grande de Chile”⁷. The exact number of protesters who participated across the country is unknown. L’estallido (the uprising) reached its peak between November and December 2019, subsiding in the early months of 2020 with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, but its effects on Chilean society are destined to endure over time. Alongside cases of violent riots and looting, there are numerous reports of abuses and human rights violations by law enforcement against protesters: torture, shooting at civilians, and physical and verbal abuse⁸. Echoes from a dark past. A past that Chilean society believed it had left behind.

The Boric administration and the constitutional reform process

L’estallido social (the social unrest) also brought with it a series of promises and hopes: a reduction in inequality, a strengthening of the welfare state, social justice, recognition of indigenous peoples, and a new constitution. These hopes led, in 2022, to the election of the Boric government and the launch of an attempt at constitutional reform aimed at replacing the 1980 Constitution, yet another legacy of the Pinochet regime.

On March 11, 2022, Gabriel Boric won 56% of the vote in the runoff, defeating José Antonio Kast and becoming the youngest president in Chile’s recent history. Coming from the student movements and speaking a language radically different from that of traditional politics, Boric won the presidency at the head of a coalition of left-wing parties and movements. His agenda includes replacing the private pension system with a public one, introducing more progressive taxes, raising the minimum wage and reducing the workweek to 40 hours, reforming the police force, and investing in the fight against climate change. In short, a new Chile.

Meanwhile, the constituent assembly drafted a new constitution, which some observers considered one of the most progressive in the world⁹. It was certainly more progressive than most Chileans had expected: extensive rights for indigenous peoples, environmental protection, provisions on gender equality, broader welfare commitments, and significant state intervention in the economy. The right wing took to the barricades, launching a massive media campaign against the constitutional reform.

Compounding the situation was the length and complexity of the new Constitution, effectively one of the most extensive constitutional drafts in the world, with 388 articles and numerous transitional provisions, making it difficult for many citizens to understand how and when the reforms would take effect. Broad in scope and complex in language, the proposal introduces innovative and challenging concepts for the Chilean electorate, such as the plurinational state and parallel justice systems for indigenous populations. These concepts are supported by progressive sectors but perceived as radical by a significant portion of the electorate.

The referendum on September 4, 2022, saw voters reject the proposal by nearly 62% of the vote: a crushing defeat. Less than a year into his term, Boric thus faced his government’s first major setback. It was not merely the failure of a constitutional text, but the collapse of the primary symbolic vehicle of change.

The opposition, reinvigorated, sought to launch a new constitutional process, producing a second, more conservative document. But that too was rejected in the referendum on December 17, 2023. Yet on that day, in Santiago, Chile, there were no jubilant crowds. The constitution enacted by Pinochet remains in force.

Following the first referendum, the Boric administration enters a new phase. The reformist momentum gives way to the need to govern within a hostile institutional context, marked by a fragmented Parliament and a public opinion that has grown more cautious, if not outright distrustful. Boric reshuffles his cabinet, reaches out to more moderate figures within the traditional left, and tones down his agenda. This shift creates a deep rift. The sectors that had seen him as the political representative of the estallido begin to perceive him as having conformed, absorbed by the logic of power he had promised to change. At the same time, moderate sectors continue to view him as inexperienced and indecisive. The result is a government struggling to build a solid and recognizable social majority.

One of the main points of friction concerns the issue of security. The estallido also emerged as a reaction to abuses by law enforcement and state repression. Boric had promised a new approach, one that was more protective of civil liberties and respectful of human rights. However, during his term, the perception of insecurity grows: organized crime, drug trafficking, and urban violence become central themes in public debate. The Chilean right is fueling this perception and gaining ground. Faced with this pressure, the government is forced to strengthen the police and the military, adopting measures that contradict its original narrative.

Another crucial issue, deeply intertwined with the expectations surrounding the estallido, is the Mapuche question¹⁰. During the election campaign, Boric had promised a paradigm shift in the relationship between the state and indigenous peoples: political dialogue, recognition of territorial rights, and an end to the militarization of the Wallmapu, the Mapuche territory that includes the so-called “Macrozona Sur” (Southern Macrozone). A promise that fit perfectly into the narrative of breaking with the past and the vision of a plurinational state. Once in office, however, these expectations clashed with political realities. The executive branch has repeatedly extended the state of emergency, maintaining a military presence in the area. This has generated deep disappointment among indigenous communities and segments of Chilean society that had supported Boric, fueling accusations of continuity with the security policies of previous governments.

On the social and economic front, the government’s achievements appear limited, with reforms promised as groundbreaking but then watered down by parliamentary compromise. As Boric’s term nears its end, pensions, healthcare, education, and the cost of living remain central issues for large segments of the Chilean population. There is an undeniable disconnect between the expectations raised in 2019 and the concrete impact of public policies on daily life. The widespread feeling is that the promised change has not translated into tangible improvements. The estallido had fuelled the idea of a historic turning point, while the Boric government instead appears trapped in the gradualism and limitations of the very system it sought to overcome.

However, the most profound failure of the Boric era cannot be measured in terms of laws or reforms, but lies in the symbolic realm. Gabriel Boric represented a generation calling for a new way of doing politics: one that was closer to grassroots movements, more empathetic, and more transparent. Over time, this promise has clashed with the reality of institutions and power. For many young people and for a segment of society that took to the streets in 2019, the disappointment is not just about a failed agenda, but the feeling that a once-in-a-lifetime historical moment has been squandered. Not so much because Chile hasn’t changed enough, but because the collective energy that seemed capable of transforming it has dissipated without finding a lasting form.

The triumph of the far right

It is against this backdrop of gloom that the campaign for the election of the 37th President of the Republic of Chile gets underway. In the first round, Kast’s main opponents are: Jeannette Jara, the candidate of the United Left, representing the Communist Party of Chile and a former Minister of Labor in the Boric administration; Evelyn Matthei, a representative of the moderate right, though conservative on economic and public order issues; Johannes Kaiser, a figure from the radical right, with positions even more conservative and controversial than Kast’s; and finally, Franco Parisi of the “Partido de la Gente,” a center-right populist with anti-establishment views.

From the very start, the campaign is dominated by the issues of security, crime, and immigration. These are issues that the Chilean right has managed to frame as priorities in the eyes of the electorate, even though statistics paint a picture of Chile as one of the safest countries on the continent.

Initially, the polls seem to show Evelyn Matthei as the frontrunner, but an army of bots begins a campaign aimed at undermining her credibility, even claiming that she has Alzheimer’s disease. Evelyn Matthei denounced the presence of far-right groups close to Kast behind the smear campaign¹¹. The “guerra sucia”(dirty war) was so violent that it prompted Janette Jara to come to her defense, despite their being political opposites.

José Antonio Kast finishes in second place with 23% of the vote, just a few points behind Janette Jara, who receives 26%. Evelyn Matthei finishes fifth and, visibly upset, is forced by her party to publicly endorse Kast and rally her supporters behind him. However, despite official statements, she spends the rest of the campaign posting content on social media featuring red objects, a clear reference to the left-wing candidate.

Janette Jara attempts to navigate an election in the best way possible, one in which she is the underdog from the start. While maintaining the progressive stance of her platform, she seeks to present herself as a moderate, striking the right balance between the youthful enthusiasm of the “estallido” and the pragmatism of an experienced leader ready to govern the country. She presses Kast, who even refuses to participate in the debates. She adopts some of Evelyn Matthei’s proposals, such as covering the entire down payment for the purchase of a first home for young people between the ages of 25 and 40¹². She tries to take a leap of faith, but fails. On December 14, 2025, Kast wins 58% of the vote. The far right wins in every region of the country, from the Atacama Desert to the southern forests, from the Andes to the sea.

The Chile that filled the squares in 2019, demanding dignity, rights, and social justice, is today a different country, one that has changed profoundly. A country that votes for order and security, where fear has become a political agenda. The Andes, which have always watched over Santiago like a silent mother, remain there, motionless. But the dreams that took shape at their feet seem farther away today than ever before.