Two Journeys, Twice the Learning: 10 takeaways from the Chilean Constitutional Experience

In Chile, in the first days of November 2019, the possibility of opening a constitutional process began to gain significant traction in the context of a complex “social uprising.” At that time, several questions arose: What can be learned from similar experiences? What institutional designs have contributed to the success of other processes worldwide? And one of the most complex questions that emerged was: How to design long-term rules amidst high internal agitation?

During those days, decision-makers, opinion leaders, and academics faced the significant difficulty that there were very few works available to guide, provide guidelines, and direct the Chilean path (to avoid repeating mistakes or imitating the successes of similar cases). Consequently, many central decisions for the process were made with little practical evidence and concrete precedents. Ultimately, the questions that arose were answered based on accumulated experience, intuition, and common sense.

Therefore, the document “Two Journeys, Twice the Learning: 10 takeaways from the Chilean Constitutional Experience”, prepared by lawyer José Antonio Valenzuela and former constituent Hernán Larraín M., aims to offer practical guidance to policymakers embarking on designing a constitutional process.

The work, supported by the think tank Horizontal and Open Society Foundations, seeks to provide advice and suggestions to increase the likelihood of success in this challenge.

The lessons derived from the document are directed at other parts of the world facing similar characteristics to those Chile experienced from 2019 onwards. It is clear that the constitutional trajectory is closed for our country in the short and medium term, and even if it were to reopen, the context in which such a conversation would occur would differ greatly from that of the last decade.

The authors explain that the guidelines and action advice are aimed at generating constitutional evolution rather than breaking completely with the existing institutional framework. Thus, the goal is to guide—in terms of content—a constitutional change process that seeks a balance between the legitimacy of the constitution’s origin and the perceived validity of the result by those who might identify as “losers».