Abstract
The Chilean political system is referred to by the literature as one of the most stable ones in the region. In fact, since the return of democracy, two coalitions have ruled in an alternate fashion under a policy of consensus. Such policy, although it has brought about economic prosperity and democratic stability, has also played its part in the wearing out of the party system, showing an even increase of disaffection. The literature explains that the binomial electoral system prevents electing candidates outside the two significant coalitions. A different argument is proposed by this work. The renewal of representatives evidences that even with such binomial system, there was a continuous turnover of the elected congressmen. Analyzing party leaderships and their militancy support, the problem appears to be in the continuous aging of the lists of party members, and a low rotation of people at the head offices of traditional parties.
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Herrera, M. (2021). Opportunities and Constraints of a Stagnate System. A Time of Representation Crisis or Political Innovation?. In: Navarrete, B., Tricot, V. (eds) The Social Outburst and Political Representation in Chile. Latin American Societies. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-70320-2_3
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