The Constitutional Council () was a 50-member constituent body elected by Chilean voters to draft a new constitution for Chile in 2023, the second attempt to replace the country's 1980 constitution after an earlier draft produced by the Constitutional Convention was rejected in a 2022 referendum. The Council's 50 members were elected on 7 May 2023 and were assisted, but not outvoted, by a 24-member Expert Commission appointed by the National Congress, which had prepared a preliminary draft.

The Council was installed on 7 June 2023 in the former National Congress Building in Santiago, where councillor Beatriz Hevia of the Republican Party was elected president and Aldo Valle, an independent aligned with the Socialist Party of Chile, was elected vice president. The right-wing Republican Party held a majority of seats, and on 30 October 2023 the Council approved a final draft by a vote of 33 to 17, largely along partisan lines. The proposal, criticized by opponents as a conservative shift from the existing charter on matters such as abortion, migration, and state intervention in the economy, was submitted to a mandatory referendum on 17 December 2023 and was rejected by roughly 56 percent of voters. Following the defeat, President Gabriel Boric announced that his government would not pursue a third constitutional process, leaving the 1980 constitution, as amended over the years, in force.

Background

The 2022 Chilean national plebiscite was held on 4 September 2022, to determine whether the public agreed with the text of a new constitution drawn up by the Constitutional Convention. It was commonly called the "exit plebiscite" (plebiscito de salida).

The proposed constitution, which faced criticism that it was too long, too left-wing, and too radical, was rejected by a margin of 62 percent to 38 percent.

President Boric announced a new process for drafting a constitution, and called on the leaders of all political parties to meet on 5 September 2022 to chart a path forward. Because the proposal had been rejected, the incumbent 1980 constitution remained in force. Colombian president Gustavo Petro said the outcome amounted to a revival of the legacy of Augusto Pinochet, while The Economist framed the rejection as a setback for the Boric government.

In the aftermath, internal divisions resurfaced within the Christian Democratic Party over its official support for the "Approve" option, with some members calling for renewed leadership or the expulsion of those who had supported "Reject."

Agreement for Chile In December 2022, Chilean lawmakers reached a bipartisan agreement, known as the Agreement for Chile (Acuerdo por Chile), to begin a second attempt at drafting a constitution, three months after the first proposal was overwhelmingly rejected. The Republican Party and the Party of the People did not take part in the agreement. Senate president Álvaro Elizalde said the agreement opened a path toward a constitution born from democratic deliberation, and negotiators agreed that gender parity among candidates and participation by Indigenous peoples would be built into the new process, although, unlike the Constitutional Convention, no seats would be automatically reserved for Indigenous representatives.

Under the agreement, a 24-member Expert Commission, appointed by Congress in March 2023 to represent both pro-government and opposition blocs, was to produce a preliminary draft between 6 March and 6 June 2023. The elected Constitutional Council would then begin its work thirty days after its election, on 6 June 2023, and was required to deliver a draft constitution within five months, by 6 November 2023, ahead of a mandatory referendum.

Election and installation

The election to fill the Council's 50 seats, held under a system modeled on that of the Senate of Chile, took place on 7 May 2023. An additional seat, reserved for candidates representing Indigenous peoples and allocated proportionally to the vote those candidates received, was also filled, bringing the number of councillors elected to 51. Results were officially proclaimed by Chile's Election Certification Tribunal (Tricel) on 5 June 2023.

The Council was formally installed on 7 June 2023 in a ceremony at the former National Congress Building in Santiago. The inaugural session was chaired by Miguel Littín, the body's oldest member, pending election of the Council's leadership. Councillor Beatriz Hevia of the Republican Party was elected president with 33 votes, and Aldo Valle, an independent aligned with the Socialist Party of Chile, was elected vice president with 17 votes.

Aldo Sanhueza, a councillor-elect for the Republican Party, announced on 26 May 2023 that he would not take his seat after his 2019 detention for offenses against a woman on a bus became public. The Tricel subsequently ruled that a councillor-elect could not resign before taking office, but Sanhueza did not appear at the installation ceremony and was not sworn in, leaving the Council with 50 sitting members.

The 24 members of the Expert Commission were also permitted to attend Council sessions and committee meetings and to speak, though not to vote.

Composition and organization The Council organized itself into caucuses (bancadas), each composed of at least five councillors from the same party, list, or electoral pact; smaller groupings, including councillors elected in Indigenous seats, were permitted to combine to reach the minimum. Each caucus named a lead and an alternate delegate, who held coordinating roles and met periodically with the Council's leadership. At the Council's outset, the caucuses were:

Caucus Leading party/parties Delegate Seats Republican Republican Party Luis Silva 22 Independent Democrat Union Independent Democrat Union Arturo Phillips 6 Socialist Socialist Party of Chile Alejandro Köhler 6 Social Convergence–Communist Social Convergence–Communist Party of Chile María Pardo 6 National Renewal–Evópoli National Renewal–Evópoli Pilar Cuevas 5 Democratic Revolution–Independents Democratic Revolution–Independents Paloma Zúñiga 5

For most business the Council required an absolute majority of its members, but approving, amending, or adding new provisions to the draft submitted by the Expert Commission required a three-fifths supermajority. Plenary sessions, held in the former lower-house chamber of the former National Congress Building, could begin once a third of voting members were present. The Council divided its work among four standing committees, each with a minimum of 12 members: Political System, Constitutional Reform and Form of the State; Judicial Function and Autonomous Bodies; Civil and Political Principles and Rights; and Economic, Social, Cultural and Environmental Rights.

Members of the Council

Drafting process and final vote Councillors filed amendments to the Expert Commission's preliminary draft through 17 July 2023, and the plenary concluded voting on those amendments on 4 October. The Expert Commission completed its own review of the amended text on 13 October, after which the full Council debated and voted on the constitution as a whole.

On 30 October 2023, the Council approved the final text of the proposed constitution by a vote of 33 in favor to 17 against, with no abstentions, reaching the three-fifths threshold required. The Republican Party and the center-right Chile Vamos coalition voted as a bloc in favor, while councillors from the left-wing Unity for Chile coalition voted against, arguing the text represented a step backward from the existing constitution on social rights. Council president Beatriz Hevia said she had pledged not to approve a text simply to end the process, while opposition councillors, including Karen Araya of the Communist Party of Chile, argued the draft failed to address the country's demands for greater social equality. The approved text ran to 216 articles and 62 transitional provisions.

Analysts noted that only about 23 percent of the Expert Commission's original preliminary articles survived unchanged into the Council's final draft, reflecting the extent to which the Republican-led majority reshaped the text. The Council formally delivered the completed draft to President Boric on 7 November 2023, the date on which the Council's mandate ended.

2023 constitutional referendum

The proposed constitution was put to a mandatory, compulsory-voting referendum on 17 December 2023. It was rejected by approximately 55.8 percent of voters, with about 44.2 percent in favor, on turnout of roughly 84–85 percent of the electorate.

Commentators described the rejected text as considerably more conservative than the 1980 constitution it would have replaced, as it would have deepened free-market principles and reduced state economic intervention. Among the most debated provisions was a clause stating that the law protects the life of "the unborn," which critics said could have curtailed the three limited grounds on which abortion is currently permitted in Chile. Other contested provisions would have allowed house arrest for terminally ill prisoners not considered a danger to society, which opponents warned could benefit individuals convicted of human-rights crimes during the Pinochet dictatorship; eliminated a property tax on primary residences; and directed the expulsion of irregular migrants "as soon as possible."

Following the result, President Boric said his government would not pursue a third constitutional process during his term, and Chile's 1980 constitution, as amended since the return to democracy, remained in force.

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