Concertación

The Socialist governments (2000–2010)

In that year, the coalition had two possible candidates: the Christian Democrats' Andrés Zaldívar and the Socialists' Ricardo Lagos. Primary elections were held to decide between the two. Lagos won the vote, and went on to defeat the UDI's Joaquín Lavín in the presidential election. However, since he got a plurality as opposed to a majority of the votes, a runoff vote was held, the first in Chilean history, in which Lagos won with 51% of the votes.^{[citation needed]}

In 2005, two candidates were again proposed: the Christian Democrats' Soledad Alvear, a former Minister of Foreign Affairs, and the Socialists' Michelle Bachelet, a former Minister of Defense. As before, the situation was to be resolved through a primary election. However, in May 2005, after months of internal disputes regarding her party's directives, Alvear withdrew from the presidential race, deciding instead to run for senator in Santiago. Bachelet therefore became the Coalition's candidate, and the second woman to run for Chilean President (the first being Communist leader Gladys Marín), competing with the UDI's Joaquín Lavín and RN's Sebastián Piñera.

On 11 December 2005, Bachelet won with 45% of the votes, but was forced to compete with Piñera in a runoff election. In the same month, the coalition won 51.25% of the votes in the parliamentary elections, gaining 20 seats in the Senate and 65 seats in the Chamber of Deputies. This gave them a majority in both Houses for the first time.

On 15 January 2006, the runoff was held. Bachelet won with nearly the 54% of the votes, becoming the first female president of Chile. She was also the fourth Coalition candidate and third Socialist to win.

Bachelet took office as the first female president of Chile on March 11, 2006, thus beginning the fourth Concertación government. Her first year in office was marked by student protests, the Transantiago crisis—events that caused a sharp decline in public approval of the government—and the death of Augusto Pinochet in December 2006, in response to which the president refused to hold a state funeral or declare official mourning. Bachelet’s popularity began to recover midway through her term, characterized by a strong social emphasis through programs such as Chile Crece Contigo and Chile Solidario, as well as by the government’s handling of the 2008 global economic crisis; in this way, Bachelet concluded her term with a historic approval rating of 84%.^[6]

For the 2008 municipal elections, the Concertación split its forces into two electoral pacts: the Democratic Concertación and the Progressive Concertación. Although, in the mayoral election, the Concertación pacts combined achieved a lower percentage than the Alianza, they won more mayoralties, while in councilor races the Concertación obtained a majority of councilors and a higher percentage of the national vote. However, when compared with previous elections, the results show an increase in the Alianza’s vote and a decrease in the Concertación’s vote.^[7]

For the parliamentary elections of the following year, the Concertación and the left-wing pact Juntos Podemos Más joined in an instrumental alliance called “Concertación y Juntos Podemos, for more democracy,”^[8] which made it possible to elect, for the first time since 1989, three deputies from the Communist Party. The Concertación achieved an absolute majority in the Senate but lost it in the lower chamber, as it lost all of its “double wins” in the districts that had favored it, dropping from 65 deputies to 57.^{[9][AI-retrieved source]} For the presidential election, the Concertación chose its candidate through primary elections that adopted a different method from previous ones, giving victory to the Christian Democrat Eduardo Frei Ruiz-Tagle over the Radical José Antonio Gómez Urrutia with votes in only two regions of Chile. Frei advanced to the second round with a meager 29.6% of the vote, along with the right-wing candidate Sebastián Piñera,^[10] who ultimately won the presidential runoff held on January 17, 2010. Thus, the Concertación lost the government for the first time since 1990.^[11]

Opposition to Piñera’s government and the creation of the Nueva Mayoría (2010–2013)

In 2012, the Concertación faced its first election as an opposition force, the municipal elections of October that year. On April 1, 2012, primary elections were held for the first time to define a large part of the coalition’s slate of municipal candidates, in which around 320,000 voters participated across 142 communes of the country.^[12][13] After the primaries, the Concertación decided to seek convergence with the left-wing coalition Juntos Podemos, led by the Communist Party (PCCh) and the Christian Left (IC), which had already had its first rapprochement through the omission pact in the 2009 parliamentary elections; this occurred not without reluctance within the Christian Democratic Party, due to the ideological distance between the two parties.^[14]

Despite having low public approval, the Concertación, together with the PCCh and the IC, managed to defeat the ruling coalition in the municipal elections, both for mayors and councilors, increasing their number of mayors from 147 to 168 and their number of councilors from 1,070 to 1,164. Regarding the percentages in those elections, the Concertación increased its figures in mayoral races from 38.43% to 43.1%, while in the councilor lists the Concertación competed in two lists called “For a Just Chile” (PPD, PCCh, PRSD, and the Christian Left) and “Democratic Concertación” (which brought together the Christian Democratic Party and the Socialist Party of Chile). Both lists increased their percentage figures from 45.13% to 49.46%.^[15]

On April 30, 2013, the parties of the Concertación, together with other opposition parties, created the electoral pact “Nueva Mayoría” for the 2013 presidential, parliamentary, and regional council elections.^[16]It was composed of the Socialist Party of Chile (PS), the Christian Democratic Party of Chile (PDC), the Party for Democracy (PPD), the Radical Social Democratic Party (PRSD), the Communist Party of Chile (PCCh), the Citizen Left (IC), the Broad Social Movement (MAS), and center-left independents.^[17]

From within the Nueva Mayoría pact, figures such as the socialist Osvaldo Andrade, the PPD’s Jaime Quintana, and the communist Camila Vallejo argued that the coalition marked the end of the Concertación and the birth of a new, broad center-left political reference.^[18][19]Other politicians who did not belong to the pact, such as the PH presidential candidate Marcel Claude or RN’s Carlos Larraín, stated that it was merely a change of name for the Concertación, since in essence it would consist of the same parties plus the PCCh.^[20]