Chile’s next president will be an extremist, but he won’t be able to do anything crazy

The conventional wisdom is that Chile, Latin America’s most successful country in recent decades, has committed political suicide following the victory of two extremists — far right candidate Jose Antonio Kast and far-left candidate Gabriel Boric — in the Nov. 21 first-round elections. But the conventional wisdom may be wrong.

There are several reasons why both candidates will have to make a sharp turn to the center to be elected. In fact, the Dec. 19 secondround vote will probably be won by the candidate who leaves behind his most outlandish ideas and moderates his platform the most.

It’s no coincidence that Chile’s stock market soared by 10% the day after the election. Only a few weeks ago, Chile seemed headed toward political instability and economic collapse.

Chile’s three-decade experiment with pro-market democracy seemed to be irreversibly shattered by the massive 2019 street protests to demand better distribution of the country’s income. The riots, which left 29 dead and nearly 2,500 wounded, led to the election of a leftist-dominated Constitutional Assembly that is drafting a new Constitution.

But following the Nov. 21 vote, the chances that Chile will scrap its free-market economic system have diminished. While far from perfect, Chile’s economic policies have helped reduce poverty from nearly 40% of the population three decades ago to 10.8% last year, according to the World Bank.

The main reason to be optimistic about the Nov. 21 vote is that the far-right and far-left candidates together obtained only 54% of the vote, which means that both will need centrist votes to be elected. Not only did 46% of voters pick other candidates, but many others abstained from voting altogether.

Kast, 55, a fervent Catholic and father of nine, will be under pressure to move away from his ultra-conservative views on abortion and same-sex marriage, and to make a categorical rejection of the Pinochet dictatorship.

And Boric, 35, a former student leader who often still sounds like one, will be under pressure to distance himself from his vows to pardon jailed leftist protesters who burned subway stations in the 2019 riots, which make him look soft on crime.

Boric will also be under pressure to distance himself from the Communist Party, a key member of his coalition, and to denounce without ambiguities the Cuban, Venezuelan and Nicaraguan dictatorships.

More importantly, regardless of who wins, the next president won’t have a majority in Congress, and will be forced to negotiate with opposition parties. The newly-elected 50-seat

Senate will be evenly divided between the right and the left.

“This election has created a new equilibrium,” Chile’s former centrist president, Eduardo Frei, told me in an interview.

Noting that before Nov. 21 it looked like the country was moving to the extreme left, Frei added that “we now have a balanced Congress, which means that whoever takes office won’t be able to do anything crazy.”

There is another, less noticed reason for hope, which is that Chile’s Constitutional Assembly is losing public support, which reduces the chances of it passing an off-the-wall Constitution. Under existing laws, a new draft Constitution would have to be approved by a plebiscite.

In part because of scandals that tainted some of its leaders, the Constitutional Assembly’s popular support has plummeted from 80% last year to 44% this month, according to a survey by the Cadem polling firm.

Asked which candidate is likely to win, New York University political scientist Patricio Navia told me the rise in political violence and street crime may benefit Kast’s law-andorder message.

“If the choice is between living in fear of rioters under Boric or living in a kind of Catholic monastery under Kast, most Chileans will prefer the law-andorder candidate,” Navia said.

Indeed, if insecurity continues to be the top issue in voters’ minds by the Dec. 19 runoff election, Kast will win. But the good news is that regardless of who wins, Chile’s next president will face strong opposition in the Senate. As Frei said, the new president won’t be able to do anything crazy.