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Insurance for Good Losers and the Survival of Chile's Concertación

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2018

John M. Carey  and
Peter M. Siavelis
John M. Carey
Affiliation:
Dartmouth College
Peter M. Siavelis
Affiliation:
Wake Forest University
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Abstract

In the transition from military rule to democracy, the government of Augusto Pinochet bequeathed to Chile a unique electoral law by which all legislative seats are contested in two-member districts. A key implication of this rule is that in order to secure legislative majorities, coalitions have to put their strongest candidates in the most precarious electoral list positions. This generates a divergence of interests between coalitions and politicians. Chile's largest coalition, the Concertación, has resolved the dilemma by providing appointed posts to unsuccessful congressional candidates who accept personal political risk on the coalition's behalf. This study argues that this insurance system has provided the critical glue to hold the coalition together since Chile's transition to democracy in 1990. Recent changes in the electoral environment could threaten the Concertación's control over the appointed posts that have sustained this informal institution. This could jeopardize the Concertación's cohesion during the process of negotiating coalition candidate lists for the 2005 legislative elections.

Type
Research Article
Information
Latin American Politics and Society , Volume 47 , Issue 2 , Summer 2005 , pp. 1 - 22
Copyright
Copyright © University of Miami 2005

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