To dance a presidential tango you need three | The Observer

By Roberto Gormaz Araya, economista and professor of the School of Engineering and Business of the University Viña del Mar

OPINION.- The first round is over and the results are the empirical sample of social discontent, out of a registry of 15,030,974 citizens entitled to vote, 7,115,590 showed up, that is to say, a 47.3% participation, therefore, it is valid to ask ourselves… Why? ”.

Because in my opinion “it takes two to dance a tango”. On the one hand, we have to José Antonio Kast, with a “shock doctrine”, which, as proposed by the Nobel Prize winner in Economics, Milton Friedman, consists of three parts. The first of her, “Create a problem idea”In this case we have concepts such as protecting freedom, family, Chile. Second, “Position itself as the solution to these problems”, delivering a nationalist vision of foreign policies, establishing old precepts such as “the family”, showing a “strong hand” in the face of unresolved problems such as the conflict in Araucanía and drug trafficking. And third “Eliminate freedoms, with the purpose of solving these problems”.

Eliminate FLACSO, the Human Rights Institute, persecute “extreme left” movements, strongly reduce taxes, etc., are the measures presented by the candidate, which would be impossible to carry out in periods of social stability, but they are a “viable option” in times of insecurity.

Now the other dance partner is Gabriel Boric, an individual who fights for all the ideals represented in the October 2019 protests, but who nevertheless fails to summon voters. And in this sense, it is worth asking why does this phenomenon happen? The reasons are simple: they assumed that the 80% who voted “approve” in the plebiscite were representatives of the left and not Democrats with the intention of re-founding the country. Two: minimized the violence generated in the social outbreak against the SMEs and the consecutive disorders of Friday afternoon in Santiago Centro.

Third: They never managed to communicate their economic policy coherentlyon the contrary, it became his Achilles heel. Fourth: They openly exposed such a broad government plan that they proposed 8 years for its full operation, in other words, they themselves said that it was impossible to fulfill it in his presidential term and that they depended on external factors.

So what now? As it usually happens at a party, sometimes you want to dance with someone else and that’s where the person who forever changed the way of campaigning in Chile comes in. Franco Parisi and the People’s Party (PDG), who without setting foot in the country achieved a third national majority, surpassing Gabriel Boric in several regions, obtaining 12.80% of the votes, now, the question is, How will both candidates get these votes? The answer is not simple at all, for Kast the solution will be to moderate With regard to social rights such as health and education, make strong changes to the pension model and not limit or go back on individual freedoms such as gay marriage or abortion. For Gabriel Boric, it is much more complex, since it will have to land and make its economic program more flexible, which aims to “end the neoliberal model” and which has been strongly influenced by the communist party, who have repeatedly “demanded compliance to the letter”, therefore Therefore, the question that candidates must ask themselves now is How to make Parisi dance with me?