Chile is approaching its 2025 general election amid signs of a potential political shift. Four years after left-wing Gabriel Boric rose to power on a wave of social unrest, a resurgent right wing is seeking to capitalize on public concerns over crime and immigration, according to Al Jazeera. In the first-round vote on Nov. 16, Jeannette Jara – the candidate of Boric’s leftist coalition – won a narrow lead with 27%, becoming the first Communist Party member ever to reach a Chilean presidential runoff, reported Reuters. However, her far-right rival José Antonio Kast finished close behind at 24%, and the combined vote for right-leaning candidates exceeded 70% (Reuters). This points to Chile potentially taking a sharp turn rightward in the December runoff, breaking from the progressive reform agenda that defined the last election.

The campaign has been dominated by “law-and-order” rhetoric – a striking departure from the wave of hope and social change that swept Boric into office (Reuters). Public anxiety about violent crime and immigration has pushed hardline security promises to center stage. Kast vows to “defeat organized crime” and clamp down on undocumented migration, even proposing border trenches and military patrols in high-crime areas. These pledges resonate in a climate where many Chileans feel unsafe, and where a broad segment of working-class voters – once distrustful of the conservative elite – are now swinging behind the far right in search of stability. “The majority of Chileans need a change… the current government never delivered on its promises,” one Kast supporter said, voicing a common frustration with slow reforms (Reuters).

President Boric’s approval rating has slipped to around 31% amid these currents (Latin America Bureau). Economic woes, stubborn inflation, and rising unemployment (about 8.5% at last count) have chipped away at public confidence (Reuters). A major tax reform to fund social programs was defeated in Congress, undercutting Boric’s plans to expand pensions and healthcare (Reuters). Taken together, disillusionment with the left-wing status quo and fear of crime have given Chile’s right wing an opening to regain power.

Beneath the immediate election issues lies a deeper struggle over Chile’s economic model. The outgoing Pinochet-era constitution – drafted under the 1973–90 military dictatorship – famously locked in pro-market policies, and it is widely blamed for Chile’s deep inequalities (Al Jazeera). Decades of market-driven growth left the country with one of Latin America’s highest inequality rates (Jacobin). Critics argue that by subordinating social needs to market logic, this neoliberal framework eroded ordinary Chileans’ living standards and fueled public discontent.

In 2019, those frustrations erupted in a massive estallido social (social uprising). Students, pensioners, indigenous activists and others flooded the streets, demanding a new constitution to finally address the inequities that piecemeal reforms had failed to fix (Al Jazeera). An overwhelming majority of voters even approved drafting a new charter in a 2020 referendum (Latin America Bureau). This push to overhaul the neoliberal model set the stage for Boric’s election and remains at the heart of Chile’s political divide.

Boric’s leftist government – led by former student activists – tried to answer the call for change. Jeannette Jara, Boric’s ex-labor minister and now presidential contender, highlights the coalition’s social reforms: a long-awaited pension overhaul creating a mixed public–private system, a 50% increase in the minimum wage, and a gradual cut of the workweek from 45 to 40 hours (Al Jazeera). These measures begin to roll back Chile’s “authoritarian-neoliberal” legacy by strengthening workers’ rights and social protections (Jacobin). “Reducing the workday, increasing wages, and reforming pensions – all of this meets historical demands of the Left,” one political analyst noted (Jacobin).

Yet such gains only scratch the surface: conservative pushback meant, for example, that private pension fund administrators were not fully abolished, and transformative steps like nationalizing Chile’s copper mines never materialized (Jacobin). Many activists in the No+AFP movement (No More Pension Funds) feel let down, arguing Boric’s administration softened its radical promises in favor of centrist compromises (Jacobin). The collapse of the first constitutional rewrite in 2022 – with 62% of Chileans voting to reject a progressive draft – dealt a heavy blow to hopes for a new social contract  (Latin America Bureau). A second attempt in 2023, this time a conservative-leaning draft, was also rejected by voters, reflecting public fatigue and distrust in an elite-driven process (Al Jazeera).