Chile's constituent process concludes with important contributions from GI-ESCR

In November 2019, Chile began a constitutional process that gave an institutional channel to the so-called "social outbreak" that had begun during the previous month. From the initial discussions, this process showed progressive features, being the first in the world to be drafted with parity, seats reserved for indigenous peoples and the participation of lists of independents.

Preparation of the constituent process

In preparation for the process, GI-ESCR developed a series of activities aimed at promoting international standards of economic, social, cultural and environmental rights, including:

Cycle of talks "Social law and constituent process: (re)imagining the Chile of the 21st century" (August 6 - September 24, 2020)

Launch of GI-ESCR’s publication “TOPIC 11 | PUBLIC FINANCING OF PUBLIC SERVICES” (November 2020)

Launch of the publication “Living in dignity. Towards the right to housing in the New Constitution” (November 2020)

Launch of publication "Let's set up another Education... A better society is possible" (December 2020)

Launch of the campaign “Commitment to Dwell in Dignity. Guidelines for the debate on the right to adequate housing” (June 2021)

Launch of the platform "The Constitution is Ours" whose objective was to connect the Constitutional Convention with the citizens (August 16, 2021)

Incidence in the Constitutional Convention

Formally installed on 4 July 2021, the Constitutional Convention had a series of mechanisms for citizen participation that were used by GIESCR local team, along with other collective advocacy mechanisms, to promote the incorporation of both economic, social, cultural and environmental rights, as well as their guarantee mechanisms and the gender approach, within the constitutional text that was drafted. Among these activities are:

GI-ESCR public hearing in the transitory human rights commission (August 18, 2021)

Launch of publication "For a feminist regulation" (July 4, 2021)

Launch of the book "Social rights and the constituent moment of Chile: Global and local perspectives for the constitutional debate" (September 2021)

Webinar “Women and ESC rights. Perspectives from intersectionality” (September 9, 2021)

Launch of the publication “Living in Dignity. Constitutional Proposals” (September 23, 2021)

Launch of the Global Manifesto for Public Services (October 25, 2021)

Cycle of dialogues “There are no rights without resources” (October 7 - November 18, 2021)

Creation of the Citizen Network for Fiscal and Tax Justice in Chile (November 2021)

Cabildo "Fiscal Policy and Human Rights" (December 1, 2021)

Launch of the report "Proposals for tax and fiscal justice in the new Constitution of Chile" (December 3, 2021)

Open Cabildo "Public Services" (December 17, 2021)

Launch of publication “More than Juanitas. Guaranteeing economic, social, cultural and environmental rights with a gender approach” (December 17, 2021)

Seminar on the creation and review of the proposed articles and merger in the Popular Initiative for a Joint Standard between fiscal policy and public services (December 22, 2021)

Presentation of the Popular Initiative proposal for Standard No. 18,202 "Universal and quality public services and universal and fair fiscal policy to guarantee social rights" (December 24, 2021)

Campaign to collect signatures for the Popular Initiative for Standard 18.202 (February 2022)

Presentation before the Commission on the Environment and Economic Model of the Constitutional Convention (March 7, 2022)

Presentation before the State Form Commission of the Constitutional Convention (March 14, 2022)

International seminar "Universal and quality public services for the new Chile" (April 26 and 27, 2022)

It is important to note that the Popular Initiative for Standards mechanism allowed GI-ESCR Chile –together with Public Services International and other partners– for the first time to build precise regulatory content based on the Global Manifesto for Public Services and the Principles of Human Rights in Fiscal Policy, and will take it to a decision-making space of constitutional rank for the first time worldwide. This required a strong campaign and public advocacy work to achieve the minimum popular support of 15,000 signatures required by the regulations of the Constitutional Convention. On February 1, 2022, GI-ESCR Chile and its local partners obtained 16,388 signatures of support, allowing the article proposal to enter the discussion of the Environment and Form of State commissions of the Constitutional Convention. Subsequently, the text proposed by the coalition made up of GI-ESCR Chile was expressly accepted, particularly in articles 176 and 185 of the constitutional proposal subsequently presented to the Chilean community.

The text of the constitutional proposal

The constitutional proposal, which has been internationally described as one of the most progressive of the time, appropriately enshrined a general framework of social rights by: (i) incorporating the Social Rule of Law; (ii) introduce provisions on the interdependence of all human rights, the progressivity and non-regressivity of social rights, the principles of substantive equality and non-discrimination, and the generation of affirmative measures; (iii) expand the catalog of social rights, including rights not previously considered (housing, water, energy and care, among others) and adjusting the treatment of those already considered to international human rights standards; (iv) introduce mechanisms to guarantee social rights, such as a fair fiscal policy, universal and quality public services, and the justiciability of these rights; and (v) the recognition and regulation of traditionally excluded groups such as women; children and adolescents, people with disabilities, older adults and indigenous peoples, among others. All of these points are at the heart of the GI-ESCR programmatic agenda.

Precisely because of the significant advances that the proposal represented in terms of social rights, GI-ESCR Chile joined forces with three other civil society organizations (Amnesty International Chile, Citizenship Intelligent and Fundaci?n Avina) to launch a new stage of the project "The Constitution It is Ours” , whose objective was to promote the informed vote of people in Chile, based on the construction of a methodology for the evaluation of the articles of the constitutional proposal by civil society organisations and national and international academia, under a thematic agenda of human rights and nature and democratic strengthening.

The content produced was disseminated through different channels in Chilean society, reaching the digital platform, social networks (Youtube, Instagram and Facebook) and territorial activities with direct contact with groups of people in all regions of the country.

Some of the results of the scope of this project were:

1. More than 40 civil society organizations participated in the application of the evaluation methodology, giving their opinion on the final text;

2. 17 international experts were summoned to evaluate norms of the Chilean constitutional proposal;

3. More than 33,000 constitutions were printed and distributed throughout the country;

4. More than 41,600 booklets were printed and delivered to the public, which included the evaluations of the 16 most important articles according to the programmatic agenda of the project;

5. The website received more than 34 thousand unique visits to the content of the evaluations;

6. The spokespersons for the project had more than 24 appearances in national and regional media;

7. The informative video of the GI-ESCR’s Director in Chile on the vote in the plebiscite had more than 1,410,276 views;

The team was deployed territorially on more than 16 occasions to facilitate thematic workshops with people belonging to traditionally excluded communities, such as older adults, people in drug and alcohol rehabilitation, people from communities living in poverty and people with mental disabilities, among others. ;

Finally, in alliance with another project called "Once Constituyente", material from the normative evaluations was distributed in workshops developed from Arica to Punta Arenas.

The exit plebiscite

On Sunday 4 September 2022, Chile faced a plebiscite, where citizens had to vote to approve or reject the constitutional proposal prepared by the Constitutional Convention. On the occasion, and in the midst of a complex context of inflation and increased criminal activity in the country, the proposed text was rejected by 61.86% of the votes, being approved only by 38.14% of the electoral roll, which for the first time in Chile's history included automatic registration and compulsory voting.

Without prejudice to the electoral result, GI-ESCR highlights the great success that the work carried out by our team in Chile had in the incidence of international human rights standards, particularly in relation to economic, social, cultural and environmental rights during the constituent process in Chile.

Although there is not yet a clear procedure for continuing the process of building a new constitution for Chile, we ratify the institutional commitment to promote economic, social, cultural and environmental rights in Chile’s future constitution, thus consolidating our mission to transform economic, social and gender inequalities from a human rights lens in the institutional frameworks of the Chilean territory.