Political Parties and Social Movements in Post-transition Chile: Between Mistrust and Reconfiguration

Abstract

How has the relationship between social movements and political parties evolved in post-transition Chile? Why and when do some social movements in Chile break their ties with political parties and others do not? On the one hand, this chapter argues that the progressive weakening between social and institutional political actors resulted in a more complex interaction and less dependent forms of articulation of their collective strategies and objectives. In some cases, social movements achieve political autonomy from parties and other formal members of politics. In others, social organizations transform their links with political institutions. These transformations mean that social movements can strategically adjust their repertoires of strategies and decide when and how to engage with polity members. On the other hand, this chapter made an analysis of historical events as a strategy to understand when social movements in Chile become autonomous. The main finding suggests that the probability of a social movement becoming autonomous increases significantly when social protest is systematically reproduced in multiple territorial expressions to shape a broader day of mobilization. These results show that the transformation of the links between organized social actors and institutional politics is more complex than conventional wisdom assumes. In particular, the new cycle of social protests in Chile took place in a more complex scenario where social movements have articulated their strategies autonomously and have found in the streets a new political arena more effective for achieving their collective goals.