Freedom in the World 2004 - Chile

Political Rights: 1
Civil Liberties: 1
Status: Free
Population: 15,800,000
GNI/Capita: $4,590
Life Expectancy: 76
Religious Groups: Roman Catholic (89 percent), Protestant (11 percent)
Ethnic Groups: White and mestizo (95 percent), Amerindian (3 percent), other (2 percent)
Capital: Santiago

Ratings Change
Chile's political rights rating improved from 2 to 1 due to the diminished vestiges of the country's authoritarian past, including greater civilian control over the military.

Overview

In 2003, President Ricardo Lagos responded to high-profile corruption scandals by pledging significant reforms to eliminate what he said were their causes. Lagos won high marks for moving Chile's economy away from recession and for the deft handling of the country's thorny civil-military divide.

The Republic of Chile was founded after independence from Spain in 1818. Democratic rule predominated in the twentieth century until the 1973 overthrow of Salvador Allende by the military under Capt. Gen. Augusto Pinochet. An estimated 3,000 people were killed or "disappeared" during his regime. The 1980 constitution provided for a plebiscite in which voters could reject another presidential term for Pinochet. In the 1988 vote, 55 percent of voters said no to eight more years of military rule, and competitive presidential and legislative elections were scheduled for 1989.

In 1989, Christian Democrat Patricio Aylwin, the candidate of the center-left Concertacion for Democracy, was elected president and the Concertacion won a majority in the Chamber of Deputies. However, with eight senators appointed by the outgoing military government, the coalition fell short of a Senate majority. Aylwin's government was unsuccessful in its efforts to reform the constitution and was stymied by a right-wing Senate bloc in its efforts to prevent Pinochet and other military chiefs from remaining at their posts until 1997.

Eduardo Frei, a businessman and the son of a former president, carried his Concertacion candidacy to an easy victory in the December 1993 elections, defeating right-wing candidate Arturo Alessandri. Frei promised to establish full civilian control over the military, but he found he lacked the votes in Congress, as the 48-seat Senate included a senator-for-life position for Pinochet and 9 designated senators mandated by the 1980 constitution. Frei was also forced to retreat on his call for full accountability for rights violations that had occurred under military rule.

The October 1998 detention of Pinochet in London as the result of an extradition order from Spain, where he was wanted for alleged rights crimes against Spanish citizens living in Chile, at first produced a strong political polarization in Chile. His continued imprisonment, however, was viewed as a reaffirmation of the rule of law, even though it was due to foreign intervention.

On December 12, 1999, Ricardo Lagos, a moderate Concertacion socialist, faced right-wing Alliance for Chile candidate Joaquin Lavin, the mayor of a Santiago suburb and a former advisor to Pinochet, winning 47.96 percent to Lavin's 47.52 percent. Lagos won the January 16, 2000, runoff election, taking a 2.6 percent lead over Lavin. Although the Concertacion coalition had 70 seats to the opposition's 50 in the lower house, it held just 20 seats in the Senate to 18 held by the opposition. A bloc of 11 others were either senators-for-life or had been designated under Pinochet's rules. Lagos's strong early performance appeared, by late 2000, to be threatened by soaring unemployment, price increases, and charges of government corruption. In the October 2000 municipal elections, Lavin won 61 percent of the votes in the contest for the Santiago mayoralty.

In December 2000, a judge indicted Pinochet on homicide and kidnapping charges, in a year that saw the judiciary rule that allegations of crimes against humanity, including torture, kidnapping, and genocide, fell within its purview and were not subject to amnesty decrees. In July 2001, an appeals court in Santiago dropped the charges against Pinochet after it found that he suffered from dementia. On July 1, 2003, the Supreme Court ruled that Pinochet was unfit to undergo trial in the infamous "Caravan of Death" case involving the murder of 57 political prisoners following the 1973 coup. A week later, the 87-year-old retired general resigned his honorary lifetime seat in the Senate.

On December 16, 2001, Chileans voted for a completely new lower house and half of the 38 Senate seats were decided by popular vote. Pinochet supporters made big gains in the legislative elections, although they failed to win control of Congress from the governing center-left coalition.

Political corruption scandals dominated the headlines in 2003 in Chile, a country long viewed as a regional leader in clean government and transparency. Incidents of influence peddling, insider trading, and kickbacks resulted in the head of the central bank and two cabinet members – one a presidential confidant – leaving their jobs. Dozens of lower-ranking officials and several congressmen from the ruling coalition were indicted. In response to the corruption scandals, Lagos forged a working alliance with the opposition's strongest party, the Union Democrata Independiente, to push for reforms.

On August 12, Lagos announced a series of measures relating to the criminal prosecution of former members of the military – including transfer of human rights cases currently under review in military tribunals to the jurisdiction of the civilian court system – and to reparations for victims of past rights crimes and their relatives. In September, the IMF issued a glowing report on the government's economic management.

In a civil suit in October 2003, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida awarded $4 million in damages against a Chilean former army officer for the killing in Chile of an economist after the 1973 coup – the first verdict handed down by a U.S. jury for crimes against humanity.

Political Rights and Civil Liberties

Citizens can change their government democratically. The 1999, 2000, and 2001 elections were considered free and fair, although low registration rates among young voters are a cause for concern.

In 2003, in response to public outcry over the political corruption scandals, Congress passed laws to prevent political patronage in high-level civil service jobs, increase government workers' salaries to reduce their susceptibility to bribes, create public funding for political campaigns, and require private campaign contributors names to be listed publicly.

The Chilean media generally operate without constraint, although some Pinochetera laws remain in effect and some self-censorship continues. Chile has no law guaranteeing access to public information.

The constitution provides for freedom of religion, and the government generally respected this right in practice. The government did not restrict academic freedom.

The right to assemble peacefully is largely respected, although police occasionally use force against demonstrators. The constitution guarantees the right of association, which the government has also generally respected. Workers may form unions without prior authorization as well as join existing unions. Approximately 12 percent of Chile's 5.7 million workers belong to unions.

The constitution provides for an independent judiciary, and the government generally respected this provision in practice. Most sitting judges come from the career judiciary and all judges are appointed for life. The constitution provides for the right to legal counsel, but indigent defendants, who account for the majority of the cases in the Santiago region, have not always received effective legal representation.

Chile has two national police forces – a uniformed force, the Carabineros, one of Latin America's best law enforcement institutions with a history of popular support and respect, and a smaller, plainclothes investigations force. In recent years, the Carabineros have been the subject of complaints about the inadequate number of uniformed police patrolling the streets and allegations of increasing narcoticsrelated corruption. Police use of excessive force against demonstrators, brutality, and the lack of due process rights for detainees are also alleged. In 2001, courses in human rights became part of the core curriculum in police academies for both rank and file police and officers, and similar courses were introduced at the academy for prison guards and officials. Prisons are overcrowded and antiquated, with facilities nationally running at about 163 percent of capacity.

In 1990, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission was formed to investigate rights violations committed under military rule. Its report implicated the military and secret police leadership in the death or forcible disappearance of 2,279 people between September 1973 and March 1990. Chilean courts have recently convicted several former military officers of heinous crimes, ruling that a 1978 amnesty decree set down by the Pinochet government was inapplicable to cases of enforced disappearance, which, they have held, is an ongoing crime. Hundreds of former military members now face trial. At the same time, the army, the military branch most implicated in rights crimes, has extended limited cooperation to judicial investigations and army commander General Juan Emilio Cheyre has made speeches distancing the institution from the military regime.

Native American groups in the country's southern region are increasingly vocal about their rights to ancestral lands that the government and private industry seek to develop. Chile has some 1.2 million indigenous people, more than 10 percent of the country's total population, two-thirds of them Mapuches. Upon taking office, Lagos began to make good on a campaign promise that the "Indian question" would receive priority attention. In October 2003, Lagos proposed constitutional recognition for the country's indigenous peoples.

Violence and discrimination against women and violence against children remain problems. Abortion in any form has been banned since 1989. In 2000, Lagos appointed five women to his 16-person cabinet. The Chilean defense minister, Michelle Bachelet Jeria, is the daughter of a Chilean general tortured to death for his opposition to the 1973 coup.