Understanding the Constitutional Elections in Chile

Chile is celebrating elections this Sunday for a new constitutional councilthe second in barely a year and amid exhaustion and controversy surrounding the process that began with great enthusiasm after the 2019 protests, known as the “social outburst”.

These are the keys to understanding the complex board election that You will have barely six months to complete your work and that, unlike the previous one, it must work within the framework of a dozen principles established by political parties and on the draft drawn up by the Council of Experts.

.- Constitutional Council will have 50 members, of which 25 are men and 25 are women. Each voter can only vote for one candidate. It could rise to 51 or 52 voters if one of the representatives of the original nations is elected.

.- 353 candidates agreed distributed throughout the country, which has an electoral census of 15 million inhabitants with the right to vote.

.- Most of the candidates are connected to political parties: The Republican Party – extreme right – and the People’s Party – conservative populists. Or electoral coalitions: Todo por Chile -center left-, Chile Seguro -right- Unity for Chile -close to President Gabriel Boric.

.- Except there will be three independent candidatesfrom three regions. Jorge Sepúlveda (La Araucanía), Liset Quilodrán (Aysén) and Claudio Barrientos (Magallanes).

.- In the Appendix two candidates are from the native nations, who could be elected by special ballot if they win 1.5 percent of the votes at the national level. The applicants are Mapuches Alihuen Antileo Navarrete and Julio Nelson Marileo.

.- Voting is, once again, mandatory throughout the countryand those who cannot justify the absence will be fined.

.- On the preliminary results the principle of parity will be applied, which in principle does not particularly favor either gender. In the event that more women than men are elected, a part will have to be subtracted and a part added, and vice versa, until there are 25 and 25 of each gender.

.- Probably, considering the number of candidates, corrections could favor men more than women.

.- Three independent candidates are taken into account for the calculation. However, in the event that they are elected, they will not be subject to change, since all changes resulting from parity adjustments are made exclusively within the list, either party or electoral pact.

.- If there is no parity in the result, i.e. there are more or less than 25 elected representatives of both sexes, it is necessary to sort the lists according to the total number of votes they received at the national level, in order to make a change in one of the electoral units. Specifically, the elected candidate of the majority gender with the fewest votes would be replaced by the candidate of the opposite gender of the same party with the most votes.

.-It is important to note that changes are never made between lists. So, for example, in case it was necessary to make an adjustment on the Chile Vamos list, it could not be done through the candidate of the Republican list, or any other.

.-If it is not possible to make the change, the next constituency with the fewest votes on the list is reviewed until a change is made or until all constituencies are reviewed. If even so, parity is not achieved, it continues with the next list with the fewest votes.

.- The most populated regions elect more representatives: Valparaíso, Metropolitan, Maule and La Araucanía They will elect five representatives. Regions Antofagasta, Coquimbo, O’Higgins, Biobío, Los Ríos and Los Lagos will choose three people, while Arica and Parinacota, Tarapacá, Atacama, Ñuble, Aysén and Magallanes They will choose two.