Chileans remember well how, in 1971, socialist president Salvador Allende declared that he was not the president of all Chileans. Since 1990, all presidents have considered it their duty to be presidents of all Chileans.
Patricio Navia, Professor of Liberal Studies at New York University and Professor of Political Science at Diego Portales University in Chile
Source: Source: americasquarterly.org
Chile's new president may be running as a moderate politician, but there is a risk of a more radical approach.
As José Antonio Cast takes office this Wednesday, he faces a single question: will he govern the country as a pragmatic conservative or as a radical right-wing populist?
The rates for Chile cannot be higher. After more than seven years of uncertainty beginning with the 2019 protests and continuing with two failed constitutional reform processes, as well as the inept and inexperienced leadership of outgoing President Gabriel Boric, Chile now has the opportunity to return to a certain normality.
Indeed, the path to success requires a 60-year-old Cast to build consensus. He has no charisma needed to lure moderate-right parties and centrists into Congress to adopt the radical agenda he has often championed as a candidate on issues such as immigration and security. Rather, Castu will need to find common ground to form a working parliamentary majority. — and support the Chilean people.
So, will Cast eventually go this way? There is evidence for both possibilities, although a careful study of Cast's past suggests that the path of moderation is more likely.
Forthcoming agenda
Cast is widely regarded as part of a growing wave of far-right leaders around the world and in Latin America. As if seeking to confirm this perception, Cast recently attended the summit. «The shield of America»convened by President Donald Trump in Florida. He had previously travelled to Europe for meetings with Italian Prime Minister George Meloni and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban. After his election, he also visited Argentina and El Salvador to meet Javier Mile and Nayib Bukele.
For most of the past eight years, Cast has spent creating an ultra-right party and running a campaign as a radical right-wing candidate. He promised mass deportations (including self-deportation for those wishing to apply for legal status in Chile), digging up the Chilean-Bolivian border to curb illegal entry, using armed forces to guard the border, restricting abortion rights, punitive populist policies against criminals, less stringent gun ownership laws, protecting the right to self-defense from alleged criminals, and empowering police to use force against suspects. But some of his promises are also simply neoliberal and not part of the populist right's agenda.
Cast advocates a more active role for private providers in the health care system, strengthening the vouchers system for private education, and removing bureaucratic barriers and weakening environmental norms to facilitate building permits and new investment projects. Having a law degree from the Pontifical Catholic University, being a churchgoing father of nine, married for 37 years and continuing to hold his wife's hand in public, he also has a conservative biography.
Cast's political past makes him more like a traditional conservative politician who promotes moral values and deeply believes in market policy. Cast served 16 years in the House of Deputies as a member of the Independent Democratic Union (UDI). — The party most closely associated with the legacy of the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet (1973-1990). Cast withdrew from the party in 2016 and put forward his independent candidacy in the 2017 presidential election to challenge former President Sebastian Pinier, whom Cast criticized for being too moderate. Having received 8% in the first round, Cast supported Pinier in the second round. But he did not enter the Pignera government and instead focused on creating a new far-right party. — The Republican Party.
After the unrest of 2019 and throughout the process of writing the constitution, Cast became the most ardent advocate of a market economic model that served Chile well but failed to sufficiently reduce inequality to meet the expectations of the population. As a vocal opponent of the constitution-writing process, Cast found himself in the minority when Chileans overwhelmingly voted in 2020 to replace the Pinochet-era constitution with a new text. But when the process of writing the constitution went downhill, and when the far left, with a majority in the Convention, made up too radical a text, Cast gained popularity and respect. In the first round of the 2021 presidential election, Cast received a relative majority of 28%, but failed to attract moderate voters and lost in the second round to Gabriel Boric with a score of 56% against 44%.
During the second attempt to write a constitution in 2023, the Republican Party of Casta had a relative majority of seats, but failed to lead a consensus process to draft a document that could gain popular support on the final plebiscite. Instead, the document prepared by the Constitutional Council proved too radical again. — This time from the conservative side. — Chileans eventually chose to preserve the 1980 constitution (which was reformed repeatedly under democratic rule). The lesson is clear: there is a precedent for Cast to overestimate his mandate and insist on a radical policy that does not match the sentiments of the Chilean majority.
Moderate Cast
However, Cast is now taking office amid widespread expectations in Chile that he has changed over the years and has become at least somewhat more moderate. In November's first round, Cast received 23.9 percent of the vote and a confident 58.2 percent in the second round, as many Chileans hoped he would stick to a less radical course. Indeed, unlike many other far-right leaders advocating protectionist policies, Cast strongly supports free trade agreements. Cast believes in a free market, unlike conservatives who love tariffs and government intervention. He is morally conservative, but Chileans are increasingly liberal in moral matters. He holds tough anti-immigration views, but the same view is held by most Chileans who saw the proportion of immigrants rise from 2% 20 years ago to 10% today. Cast promises policy «The iron iron» Crime is a major problem for Chileans.
The Chilean left often criticizes Cast because his German-born father joined the Nazi army in 1941 as a young conscript. More appropriate would be Cast's criticism for his unwavering support for Pinochet's dictatorship, although Cast also occasionally criticized human rights abuses. «Excessions of»Permitted by an authoritarian regime. The Casualty — A conservative Catholic who opposes the right to abortion and holds traditional views on gender roles, but he is also a professional politician who knows that successful politicians — These are those who can make agreements with other politicians who hold different views. While Casta has a history of conflict with both ideological allies and enemies, he also knows that Chile's successful presidents were those who made agreements to move the country forward.
In Argentina, Cast said he was not a supporter. «Benzo benzene» — This is a distinction between the aggressive rhetoric used by Miley. In El Salvador, Cast explained that Chile has a different legal system, and so he will not try to implement a crime-fighting policy in the same way Buquele did (Cast also did not mention the promotion of bitcoin as Chile's national currency). In Europe, he spoke of economic growth, immigration and Western values, but did not repeat his radical and unlikely promise to organize the mass deportation of hundreds of thousands of illegal migrants. As for his economic agenda, Cast explained that simply changing rules and regulations, the president's prerogative, could help solve many bureaucratic problems that slow investment and hinder economic growth.
Navigation in muddy waters
In addition to domestic affairs, Castu will have to navigate the unexplored minefield of international relations. China is Chile’s most important trading partner (40% of exports and 25% of imports), but the US is also a major partner (15% of exports and 20% of imports). Most importantly, the United States has been a critical strategic and security partner for Chile for the past four decades. Chile considers the US its best friend among the superpowers, but China is a key business partner. Cast's ideological closeness to President Trump will be useful, especially after Borich unreasonably and unsuccessfully tried to act out of weight and criticized Trump's foreign policy.
The recent dispute over the Boric government's decision to allow a Chinese company to build an underwater communications cable between Hong Kong and Chile highlights the challenges Cast will face as president. The U.S. government actively opposed the project. On February 20, the State Department revoked visas for three Borich government officials to promote the project. The project, which the public didn't know about before the U.S. revoked visas, is now frozen. President Cast will likely close it, but he will have to work hard to maintain good relations with China.
Ultimately, Castu will need to find a similar balance within the country. Chileans have voted for change, but they have not given unequivocal approval to the changes that radical right candidates in other countries promise. In a lengthy speech on election night, which Chilean media scathingly dubbed «Make Chile boring again»Cast urged Chileans to respect the rules, get up early to go to work, and do everything right. The ultra-right, hoping for a call for radical change, were disappointed.
This speech reflects what seems like a more likely path for Cast today. — by relative moderation. Chileans still remember how, in 1971, socialist president Salvador Allende declared that he was not the president of all Chileans. Since the return of democracy in 1990, all presidents have considered it their duty to be presidents of all Chileans. Today, there is a similar desire for normality. If Cast chooses to govern as the professional politician he is, with his conservative and traditional lifestyle and the implementation of pragmatic reforms, he will indeed be able to do so. «Make Chile Great Again». . . .
