The Two Sides of Chile

The Political Division inside of Chile

In the United States we often fret about Democratic policies if we’re Republican, or ponder why Republicans think the way they do if we’re Democratic. However, most of the time, you can sit a Democrat next to a Republican, and even have them debate about politics, without them going at each other’s throats. In Chile, I have found a different political environment, one where many people actually despise the other side just because they belong to the other side.

First of all, people refer themselves to either la izquierda (the left) or la derecha (the right). La izquierda’s party in power was la concertacion and it held office for the years following Pinochet’s right-wing regime until this year’s elections. In these elections, Sebastian Piñera, a right-wing candidate, came out victorious and those belonging to la izquierda were left disappointed, confused, and even with a sense of scorn. La izquierda was disappointed at the fact that they had lost after 20 years of power. However, after talking to those from la derecha, they affirm that la izquierda had it coming. The legistlative branch already had a right-wing majority and the presidential elections had gone to a run-off for the last couple of elections.

La izquierda was also confused at the fact that they had lost the election. For years, it was believed that la izquierda was the majority, and that it was going to be hard for them to lose since it was too soon after Pinochet. However, people were growing weary of la concertacion because they weren’t living up to what the people expected from them and the economy of Chile was in gloom due to the World Economic Crisis. Piñera offered CHANGE to Chile and that made him an attractive candidate.

Christine describes it as “chile is definitely more of a ying yang in terms of political opinion than a marble pattern...very extreme.” However, this ying doesn’t complement the yang so it leads to much political turmoil in the country.

I met a girl over the weekend that goes to school in UC Santa Cruz and is doing a home stay for the first month of her stay. She told me that her mom is very conservative and that she would get her out of jail for anything except if she took part in student protests or political demonstrations. To them, being involved in protests is what la izquierda does and they deeply shun that.

I can say that at the moment, la izquierda is definitely more angry than la derecha. They feel that the people who voted for Piñera were looking for an easy way out and that they are going to pay for that. They feel that Piñera is going to implement government policies similar to Pinochet and his humanitarian policies were actually brought into question before the election. Not because he has a bad history, but more because for many people it’s still too soon.

Nonetheless, the majority of Chileans wanted change. Piñera has been in power for 100 days and nothing significant has happened yet to cause a huge uproar. Some say the earthquake gave him a sense a freedom in his policies and that’s good to some and bad for others. Also, Chile’s frenzy in the World Cup gave him a sense of transparency because the country was too intertwined with the Cup to care of much else.