Chileans once thrived on democratic government. Their political parties were numerous, ranging from Communists and Socialists on the Left to Conservatives on the Right, and every six years between 1932 and 1970 they elected a new president who peacefully replaced an incumbent whose party he had defeated. But this was ended abruptly in September 1973 by the nation's armed forces. It would be fifteen years before the Chilean people were given an opportunity to try democracy again. In a 1988 plebiscite in which General Augusto Pinochet sought confirmation of his authoritarian government, 54 percent of the Chilean electorate rejected it, forcing him to deliver on his promise to restore democratic government by 1990 if he were defeated. Thus, the nation that had once been one of Latin America's most admired democracies, before it was closed by the armed forces in 1973, chose to dismiss its military dictator and start over. Why this became necessary deserves some explanation.

Democratic rules

Latin Americans have experimented with various forms of liberal democracy ever since they gained their independence over 170 years ago, but from the beginning it was frequently undermined by the most powerful members of their societies. Constitutions modeled on the United States document have been written and rewritten, stressing popular sovereignty, majority rule, minority rights, and free elections, but until the middle of this century most of them only served as pretenses to legitimize the political monopolies of entrenched elites.

It pays to recall that liberal democratic rules are not arbitrary, but are derived from fundamental beliefs about the nature of society and its governance.