A Chilean story of unity and resilience

Chile despertò
On October 25, 2019, 1.5 million Chileans assembled for the greatest mass demonstration in the country’s history. Chanting “Chile despertò” (Chile Woke Up), what was initially a small crowd of students protesting a rise in metro fares rapidly evolved into a large movement whose membership reached from indigenous communities and feminists to families and retired people. Together, they took to the streets, merging their different demands in a collective call for dignity. To them, dignity meant a demand of political and economic justice from a system still suffering from the legacy of the Pinochet dictatorial regime. Despite the global pandemic, the movement continued for twelve months. It resulted in a historical achievement for Chilean democracy: exactly one year later, on October 25, 2020, Chileans voted to draft a new constitution, replacing the one written by Pinochet in 1980.

The story begins: cazerolazos and student protests
Though the movement’s intensity and perseverance were unexpected, it wasn’t unpredictable given that social mobilization and activism have been gradually growing for the past three decades. Far from being the luck streak of a single-issue protest that the newspapers made it out to be, this success story is a great example of resilience through patient organisation and activist unity. In fact, the first protests against the elected government’s failure to democratise the country’s political and economic system dates back to the earlier cazerolazos in 1990. Cacerolazos are a popular Latin American form of protest that involves groups of people noisily banging pots and pans. In 1990, they were combined with communal cooking initiatives and soup kitchens. Frustrated by the new democratic government that failed to deliver on social and economic welfare, justice and new opportunities for marginalized groups, grassroot and student activism gained momentum and led to the first organized movement in 2001. It involved around 10,000 high school students asking for free public transportation and better public education. However, violent police repression discouraged students and delegitimized their demands. Yet, five years later, it was again students who gave new momentum to the protests: one million high school students marched demanding a comprehensive reform of the educational system. Although the government tried to address the youth’s demands, the response consisted of a superficial set of reforms that continued the exclusion of the student’s needs from in the political agenda.

One million high school students marched
demanding a comprehensive reform of the
educational system.

No al lucro: protests in the 2010th
A few years later, the new democratic government’s failure to meet the needs of the students’ and of other traditionally excluded groups’ led to a cycle protests from different collectives. In 2010, the Mapuche indigenous population mobilized in favour of autonomy and against the government’s failure to reform the legal system that, as a legacy of the dictatorship, condemned them as terrorists and denied their democratic rights. In 2011 and 2012 climate activists took to the streets opposing a hydroelectric power plant project that would have impacted many national parks, reserves, wetland areas, and displaced six indigenous communities. In 2011 the government announced a plan to privatise a good part of the national university. Coinciding with a delay in introducing promised scholarships and discounts for public transportation, this led to new student mobilization. Uniting under the slogan “No al lucro” (No to profit) the student movement protested against the continuation of the Pinochetian education system that privatized universities thus making education less accessible. Again, the government failed to achieve a comprehensive reform and smaller student-led protests continued throughout 2013 and 2015. In 2016 and 2017, two large scale feminist movements (Ni Una Menos and Me Too) took place.

Over the past thirty years, different protest
movements have pushed for democratization.

Unity and resilience
Over the past thirty years, different protest movements have pushed for democratization. This made activists more resilient: while their demands were rejected by successive governments, they also gained popular legitimacy. Indeed, one of the factors that made the recent “Chile despertò” movement so uniquely powerful was its persistence in the face of the violent police repression and the pandemic. Another was its scale: unlike the previous protests, last year all the groups that have previously mobilized individually joined forces to demand dignity with one voice. This unity led to the largest protest in the country’s history with people mobilizing from towns in the northern salt desert to the inhabitants of the cold villages of Patagonia. As a result, there is now at least the prospect of a new and democratic constitution. Although the end of Chile’s democratization journey is still far away, it is important to acknowledge and celebrate this beautiful story as it reminds us of the incredible power that lies in unity and resilience.