Chile Turns Hard Right: How José Antonio Kast Rose to Power After Years of Political Exhaustion
Photo source: https://english.elpais.com/international/2023-05-14/jose-antonio-kast-the-far-right-catholic-who-seduces-chile.html
The victory of José Antonio Kast in Chile’s December presidential election marks the sharpest rightward turn the country has taken since the end of the Pinochet dictatorship. Kast, an ultraconservative politician with open admiration for Augusto Pinochet and deep roots in Chile’s old right, did not come to power through a coup or manipulation, but through a high-turnout democratic vote. He won decisively in the second round, carrying all regions of the country and mobilizing more votes than any previous Chilean president. This outcome reflected not enthusiasm for Kast’s ideology so much as widespread fatigue, anger, and disappointment with the political process of the last six years.
Chile entered this cycle after the massive social protests of 2019, when millions demanded social justice, an end to inequality, and a new constitution to replace the one adopted under Augusto Pinochet. What followed instead was a prolonged institutional paralysis. Two constitution-writing processes failed, one driven by the left and rejected as overly radical and ideological, the second led by the right and rejected as too conservative and protective of the status quo. The result was three years of endless debates, referendums, expert panels, and political theater, while crime rose, migration surged, prices climbed, and ordinary voters saw little improvement in daily life.
Against this backdrop, the government of Gabriel Boric steadily lost credibility. Boric entered office promising deep reforms, but quickly ran into congressional resistance, constitutional dead ends, and economic constraints. When both constitutional projects collapsed, it became clear that the left had no workable plan for reform within the existing framework. For many voters, especially in the middle class and conservative regions, the constitutional agenda began to look detached from reality, obsessed with symbolic issues while failing to address security, employment, and public order.
Kast capitalized on this vacuum with a blunt, unapologetic message. He promised economic freedom for capital, lower taxes, deregulation, cuts to public spending, longer working hours, and a hard line on crime and migration. He avoided elaborate ideological language and framed his platform as an “emergency government” designed to restore order and discipline. His personal background reinforced this posture: the son of a former Wehrmacht officer who fled to South America after World War II, Kast has long defended the military regime, opposed divorce, abortion, LGBTQ rights, and anti-discrimination laws, and maintained ties to figures nostalgic for authoritarian rule. None of this was hidden; voters knew exactly who he was.
Internationally, Kast fits neatly into a broader right-wing wave across Latin America. He openly aligns himself with Javier Milei, the libertarian president of Argentina, and echoes the same rhetoric of market absolutism, hostility to social programs, and contempt for progressive politics. For Chile, a country long praised for institutional stability and gradualism, Kast’s rise signals not a sudden embrace of authoritarianism, but something more troubling for the political class: a protest vote born of exhaustion. Voters did not swing right because they rejected democracy, but because democratic politics failed, repeatedly, to deliver tangible results.
Author: Maxim Petrov
