Chile is the most developed country in Latin America

Improvisation, opportunism and lack of professionalism in the management of important issues for the future of the country, as the drug policy, show the deep institutional degradation suffered by Argentina. The contrast with Chile is remarkable, where political dynamics have successfully placed the country on a path of sustained economic and social progress in democracy. The Chile’s strategies are not directly transferable to Argentina, but there is much to learn from this small neighboring country.

The opposition political party, led by Michelle Bachelet, returns to the Chilean presidency after 4 years of government led by Sebastián Piñera. Although the ruling political party and the opposition hold different ideological positions, they share a common thinking of how seriously they have to take the polls. As part of the electoral process they both developed and made available to society a formal document with their government proposals. There they described their plans for education, health, addictions, security and justice, taxes, infrastructure, energy, consumer protection, agriculture, fishing and mining among others.

In Argentina, in contrast, polls impose a total submission to the guidelines dictated by marketing. This leads to an avoidance of any kind of ideas or proposal since they may risk generating disagreement among the electorate. So, polls are degraded by proposals that show little substance and a lot of demagoguery.

The quality of Chile’s politics is a sound outcome of a society that has reached maturity during its 23 years of democracy. Poll competition is not only about marketing, but also about the seriousness of proposals. This has allowed the country to progress at a much faster rate than the rest of the region. For example, taking into account CEPAL data, between 1990 and 2012 the per capita GDP had the following evolution:

·  The per capita GDP of Argentina grew 30%, going from U$S 6.954 to U$S 9.066.

·  The per capita GDP of Brazil grew 82%, going from U$S 5.922 to U$S 10.790 in the year 2012.

·   Chile increased its per capita GDP in 225%, going from U$S 4.456 to U$S 14.484

The data show that in 1990 Chile had a GDP per capita about one third and a quarter of the GDP per capita of the two regional leaders (Argentina and Brasil) and now it is the country with the highest GDP per capita in the region. An outstanding outcome for a very small and strait country, with limited natural resources, living in freedom and democracy that has surpassed in only a quarter of a century two very big and extended countries endowed with plenty of natural resources and a privileged weather and geographic position.  

Even more relevant is that Chile has been able to achieve a leading position in social progress as well. According to United Nation’s Human Development Index, in which social and economic variables are included, Chile in the year 2012 was ranked 40th, the highest among Latin American countries, surpassing Argentina (ranked 45th) and Brazil (ranked 85th). This suggests that, although Chile has a very inequitable income distribution, sustained economic growth has promoted an intense and widespread improvement in the quality of life of all its citizens.

The key to success was the creation of good institutions which is connected to the good quality of politics. A very enlightening testimony is given by the educational system, where in Chile much nonconformity is being showed among the young. Facing this situation, both presidential candidates have emphasized education as a central element in the political agenda, but they are still showing the differences regarding some sensitive issues like the treatment to for-profit schools currently subsidized by the state. That is to say, candidates are neither evading technical discussion nor appealing to demagogy in sensitive issues.

In Argentina, who has much severe educational problems than Chile, political candidates hardly overcome the rhetoric full of generic and ambiguous ideas. None of them had the courage to move forward with concrete proposals, probably being advised by a political marketing consultant, on fears to generate rebuff among vested interest such as teachers’ unions. Something similar is happening today with drug policy. Instead of discussing serious proposals, irresponsible opportunistic and media prone speeches prevail.