Kast & Chile’s Shift toward Negentropy

Source: Wikimedia Commons

2,149 words

Author’s note: I strongly recommend reading the article “Communist Entropy in the Chilean Miracle.” [1]

Chile’s presidential campaign period concluded a few days ago with the election of José Antonio Kast Rist, a candidate running for the presidency for the third time. Several aspects of this outcome are worth noting. [2][3]

As has often been the case, a large portion of Chile’s political elite is Euro-descended, and this election was not an exception. However, the candidate who ultimately became the Left’s standard-bearer—and therefore the incumbent coalition’s nominee—departed somewhat from the prevailing pattern. Jeannette Jara, who first belonged to the Communist Youth of Chile (Juventudes Comunistas, JJCC) and later to the Communist Party of Chile (PCCh), did not fit the conventional biological and socioeconomic stereotype frequently associated with Chile’s top political strata, and her supporters used that contrast strategically in campaign messaging. [4]

In parallel, three Right-wing candidates were publicly identified (by the cyber-Left) as having German ancestry: José Antonio Kast Rist (Partido Republicano), Evelyn Rose Matthei Fornet (UDI/Chile Vamos), and Johannes Maximilian Kaiser Barents-von Hohenhagen (Partido Nacional Libertario). [5][6] This was leveraged by Jara’s supporters to frame a sharp, almost irreconcilable contrast between “the Chilean” and “the German.” In that framing, the “German” profile was associated with conservatism, privilege, landownership, and upper-class status, while the communist candidate was presented as a working-class figure without an apparent link to Europe—i.e., a representative of “the people.”

This is, at minimum, a noteworthy rhetorical maneuver, given that supporters of the outgoing administration had previously elevated the public profile of Irina Karamanos Adrian—former partner of President Gabriel Boric—often emphasizing her Greek family background (and, by extension, Greece’s symbolic status in Western civilizational narratives). [7][8]

From the standpoint of the hard Right, the most effective anti-Left messaging did not come from opposition advertising, but from the incumbent government’s own performance, which provided campaign material that could be mobilized against the governing coalition.

In practical terms, Chile’s Leftward turn has been rejected by voters (i.e., through democratic mechanisms) twice in the last three years. Although the Left won the presidency, the coalition’s campaign did not persuade the public to approve the constitutional proposal submitted in 2022: the “Rechazo” (Reject) option prevailed with 61.86% of the vote. [9]

The events that unfolded in Chile during October 2019 can be read as the culminating expression of a longer drift toward political ungovernability, catalyzed by an earlier trauma—the experience of dictatorship—which newer generations (who did not live it consciously) have tended to repudiate across political lines. Empirically, the 2019 cycle of unrest began with protests over a Santiago Metro fare increase and then expanded into nationwide mobilizations tied to broader grievances about inequality, living costs, and public services. [10][11]

In this reading, progressive ungovernability has roots in the sacralization of “democracy” beyond the merely discursive. This intersects with the broader problem of ideology—understood, in Paul Ricoeur’s framework, as involving distortion and dissimulation of reality—within political language and institutional self-justification. [12] The result is a paradox in which democracy, idealized as an ultimate good, can come to undermine the capacity of the political system to govern coherently, especially under conditions of persistent polarization and institutional distrust.

Even so, and even if Chile has clearly moved Leftward in several registers since 2019, certain issues tend to generate public resistance that is difficult to overcome. One of these is identity politics. While Indigenous ancestry—particularly Mapuche ancestry—appears widely across Chilean family histories, a smaller share of the population self-identifies in Indigenous terms: in the 2017 census, 12.8% reported belonging to an Indigenous people, and among those respondents the majority identified as Mapuche. [13] Within this context, many voters have been reluctant to endorse institutional designs that appear to differentiate citizenship in practice—such as recognition mechanisms that include distinct jurisdictional frameworks associated with ethnicity. Notably, the 2022 draft constitution recognized legal pluralism and affirmed that Indigenous peoples and nations have the right to create, maintain, and develop their own legal systems, exercising jurisdiction through their authorities, norms, and procedures. [14][15]

Being brutally honest, from a historical-structural perspective, Indigenous “privileges” have only been a relatively recent state policy, arising as a way to balance—or to deal with—the consequences of the colonial caste system. From a historical-structural perspective, Chilean social hierarchies have been shaped—at least in part—by colonial stratification: across Spanish America, scholarship has documented how the Spanish Crown mandated caste-like classifications that distinguished Spaniards, Indigenous peoples, Afro-descendants, and their various combinations, with concrete consequences for status and social ordering, and functioning as a tool for social control by shaping individual rights, legal standing, and patterns of residential segregation. [16] Put differently, Chile did in fact experience a kind of “white privilege” at some point in its history, insofar as a legal and political system existed that favored the Euro-colonial population, while “colored” social groups faced restrictions on rights and liberties, including limits on which occupations they could access as sources of income. Over time, these hierarchies left durable legacies in education, wealth, and political recruitment. Thus, today, the Euro-colonial population—descended from peninsulares and criollos—is not only more educated, but also tends to enjoy greater economic well-being. In a later phase, market-oriented reforms implemented under the Pinochet regime are often cited as factors that contributed to shifts in growth patterns and in the distribution of welfare and opportunity, with effects that continued into the post-authoritarian period. This latter advantage began to spread to the rest of the social groups relatively recently due, among other things, to the economic measures adopted under the Pinochet dictatorship. [17]

Against this backdrop, the Constitutional Convention—the constituent body tasked with drafting a new constitution—placed strong emphasis on Indigenous symbolism and on constitutional recognition of Indigenous peoples, within an overall redefinition of the state. The draft’s opening provisions defined Chile as a social and democratic state under the rule of law, and explicitly as plurinational, intercultural, regional, and ecological. [15] In the broader debate, other Left priorities also became central: movement toward a welfare-state model, away from the principle of subsidiarity associated with Chile’s constitutional-political order for decades; expanded rights language and protections; increased regional autonomy; the explicit designation of Chile as plurinational and ecological; and heightened recognition of groups framed as historically marginalized. These elements did not secure majority support in the 2022 plebiscite.

The second rejection of the Left’s broader political project occurred a few weeks ago, when José Antonio Kast won the presidential runoff with about 58% of the valid vote (reported as 58.16% in multiple official-media tallies). [18][19][20] Although Kast’s rhetoric and debating performance have arguably weakened over time, a combination of dissatisfaction with the incumbent administration, sustained partisan polarization (including perceptions of moralizing political discourse), and a heightened sense of insecurity helped create a pathway for the Right—often characterized by observers as hard-Right or far-Right—to reach government.

While Chile has often been described as comparatively stable within the region, the increased visibility of crimes that were less salient in prior years, together with rising perceptions of political anomie, have led many voters to conclude that the country is nearing disorder and that criminality is escalating. In response, many Left-leaning voters argue that major media are structurally aligned with the far Right; at the same time, they attribute responsibility for recent migration dynamics to the Right. In public discourse, Venezuelan migration is frequently central to these debates. According to the official 2023 estimate presented by Chile’s migration authority and national statistics office, Venezuelans constituted the largest foreign nationality group in Chile (reported as 728,586 people, 38% of the total estimated foreign-resident population). [21]

Finally, Kast’s discourse can be characterized as a liberal-conservative form of populism—strongly oriented around order, security, and migration control. From an external viewpoint, the trajectory can seem difficult to reconcile with Chile’s 2020 plebiscite result: in October 2020, after the social unrest and mass mobilizations that followed 2019, Chile voted 78.27% in favor of initiating a process to replace the constitution associated with the Pinochet era. [22][23] That cycle of mobilization also included episodes such as the toppling of statues and attacks on symbols associated with the established order (including churches), as well as subsequent debate over patrimonial damage. [24][25][26] Five years later, the country elected a candidate associated with the hardest Right, who rejects the “far-Right” label, has defended his earlier support for the Pinochet regime, has stated he does not regret having voted for Pinochet, has disputed the interpretive framing of 2019 in campaign discourse, and has signaled willingness to confront Mapuche territorial conflict in the center-south through a security-focused approach. [27][28][29][30][31]

Notes

[1] Albanese, F. (2019, November 11). Communist entropy in the Chilean miracle. Counter-Currents. https://counter-currents.com/2019/11/communist-entropy-in-the-chilean-miracle/

[2] Reuters. (2025, December 14). Chile elects Kast as president in sharp Rightward shift. https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/chile-votes-presidential-race-expected-lurch-country-right-2025-12-14/

[3] El País. (2025, December 15). Así le contamos la segunda vuelta presidencial en Chile (Live coverage of Chile’s presidential runoff). https://elpais.com/chile/2025-12-15/resultados-de-las-elecciones-presidenciales-de-chile-2025-en-vivo.html

[4] Al Jazeera. (2025, November 14). Who is Jeannette Jara, the communist leading Chile’s presidential election? https://www.aljazeera.com/news/longform/2025/11/14/who-is-jeannette-jara-the-communist-leading-chiles-presidential-election

[5] El País. (2025, May 4). Matthei, Winter, Kast y Kaiser: la huella alemana en las presidenciales chilenas (Matthei, Winter, Kast and Kaiser: the German imprint in Chile’s presidential race). https://elpais.com/chile/2025-05-04/matthei-winter-kast-y-kaiser-la-huella-alemana-en-las-presidenciales-chilenas.html

[6] Biblioteca del Congreso Nacional de Chile. (s. f.). Partido Nacional Libertario (National Libertarian Party). Historia Política. Recuperado el 31 de diciembre de 2025, de https://www.bcn.cl/historiapolitica/partidos_politicos/wiki/Partido_Nacional_Libertario

[7] Meganoticias. (2021, December 28). Irina Karamanos Adrian: ¿Cuál es el origen de sus apellidos? (Irina Karamanos Adrian: What is the origin of her surnames?). https://www.meganoticias.cl/nacional/362999-irina-karamanos-origen-apellido-gabriel-boric-28-12-2021.html

[8] T13 (Ex-Ante). (2022, January 18). Lo que hay que saber de Irina Karamanos como “primera dama” y el rol que han desempeñado las primeras damas en Chile (What to know about Irina Karamanos as “First Lady” and the role Chile’s first ladies have played). https://www.t13.cl/noticia/ex-ante/politica/lo-hay-saber-irina-karamanos-y-rol-han-desempenado-primeras-damas-chile

[9] Biblioteca del Congreso Nacional de Chile. (s. f.). Plebiscito de Salida 2022 (Proceso Constituyente): Resultados (2022 Constitutional Exit Plebiscite: Results). Recuperado el 31 de diciembre de 2025, de https://www.bcn.cl/procesoconstituyente/plebiscito2022

[10] The Guardian. (2019, October 19). Chile protests: State of emergency in Santiago amid violence. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/oct/19/chile-protests-state-of-emergency-declared-in-santiago-as-violence-escalates

[11] Time. (2019, October 22). 18 killed as hundreds of thousands of protestors take to the streets in Chile. Here’s what to know. https://time.com/5710268/chile-protests/

[12] Ricoeur, P. (1986). Lectures on ideology and utopia (G. H. Taylor, Ed.). Columbia University Press.

[13] Instituto Nacional de Estadísticas (INE). (2020, October 12). Día del Encuentro entre Dos Mundos: Los pueblos originarios en Chile según el Censo 2017 (Encounter of Two Worlds Day: Indigenous peoples in Chile according to the 2017 Census). https://www.ine.gob.cl/sala-de-prensa/prensa/general/noticia/2020/10/12/d%C3%ADa-del-encuentro-entre-dos-mundos-los-pueblos-originarios-en-chile-seg%C3%BAn-el-censo-2017

[14] Biblioteca del Congreso Nacional de Chile. (2022). Propuesta Nueva Constitución 2022 (extracto: sistemas jurídicos indígenas) (Proposed 2022 Constitution: Extract on Indigenous legal systems) [PDF]. Recuperado el 31 de diciembre de 2025, de https://www.bcn.cl/obtienearchivo?id=recursoslegales%2F10221.3%2F69046%2F1%2Fpdf_2786_1678482501167.pdf

[15] Convención Constitucional de Chile. (2022, July 4). Texto Constitución Política de la República de Chile (propuesta) (Text of the Political Constitution of the Republic of Chile—draft proposal) [PDF]. https://www.chileconvencion.cl/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Texto-CPR-2022.pdf

[16] Ruiz-Tagle, J. (2021). Ethnoracial otherness in urban exclusion [PDF]. Cedeus. https://www.cedeus.cl/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/Ethnoracial-otherness-in-urban-exclusion.pdf

[17] Encyclopaedia Britannica. (s. f.). Augusto Pinochet. En Encyclopaedia Britannica. Recuperado el 31 de diciembre de 2025, de https://www.britannica.com/biography/Augusto-Pinochet

[18] The Guardian. (2025, December 15). Ultra-conservative José Antonio Kast elected Chile’s next president. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/dec/15/jose-antonio-kast-wins-election-chile-president

[19] Associated Press. (2025, December 14). Landslide win for Kast gives Chile its most right-wing president in decades. AP News. https://apnews.com/article/chile-elections-kast-jara-president-boric-trump-e9ef32b53359f3152ee80d62c106c5f6

[20] Diario Financiero Online. (2025, December 14). Con más de un 99% de las mesas escrutadas, José Antonio Kast vence a Jeannette Jara y es electo nuevo Presidente de la República (With more than 99% of precincts counted, José Antonio Kast defeats Jeannette Jara and is elected President of the Republic). Diario Financiero. https://www.df.cl/economia-y-politica/politica/resultado-elecciones-segunda-vuelta

[21] Servicio Nacional de Migraciones. (2024, December 30). SERMIG e INE presentaron la estimación de personas extranjeras residentes habituales en Chile 2023 (SERMIG and INE presented the estimate of foreign residents habitually living in Chile, 2023). https://serviciomigraciones.cl/sermig-e-ine-presentaron-estimacion-de-personas-extranjeras-residentes-habituales-en-chile-2023

[22] Servicio Electoral de Chile. (2020, October 26). Plebiscito Nacional 2020 fue la mayor votación de la historia de Chile (The 2020 National Plebiscite was the largest vote in Chile’s history). https://www.servel.cl/2020/10/26/plebiscito-nacional-2020-fue-la-mayor-votacion-de-la-historia-de-chile/

[23] Biblioteca del Congreso Nacional de Chile. (s. f.). Plebiscito 2020 (Proceso Constituyente): Resultados (2020 Constitutional Plebiscite: Results). Recuperado el 31 de diciembre de 2025, de https://www.bcn.cl/procesoconstituyente/plebiscito2020

[24] La Tercera. (2022, October 15). Daño patrimonial: Una reparación pendiente (Heritage damage: a pending repair). https://www.latercera.com/la-tercera-domingo/noticia/dano-patrimonial-una-reparacion-pendiente/U5AKO6XN5VHOXJ7OUIF6YZIND4/

[25] The Guardian. (2019, November 5). Conquistadors tumble as indigenous Chileans tear down statues. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/nov/05/chile-statues-indigenous-mapuche-conquistadors

[26] Al Jazeera. (2020, October 19). In pictures: Churches set ablaze as Chile protests turn violent. https://www.aljazeera.com/gallery/2020/10/19/in-pictures-chile-protests

[27] Euronews (Reuters). (2021, November 12). “No me siento de ultraderecha”, dice el candidato presidencial chileno Kast (“I don’t consider myself far-right,” says Chilean presidential candidate Kast). https://es.euronews.com/2021/11/12/chile-politica-kast

[28] CNN Chile (EFE). (2021, November 13). “No se encerró a los opositores políticos”: Kast defendió la dictadura de Pinochet ante medios extranjeros (“Political opponents were not imprisoned”: Kast defended Pinochet’s dictatorship to foreign media). https://www.cnnchile.com/elecciones2021/jose-antonio-kast-defendio-dictadura-militar-medios-extranjeros_20211113/

[29] El Dínamo (Redacción). (2018, August 23). Así respondió Kast cuando Iván Valenzuela le preguntó en vivo si estaba arrepentido de votar por Pinochet (This is how Kast responded when Iván Valenzuela asked him live whether he regretted voting for Pinochet). https://www.eldinamo.cl/pais/2018/08/23/asi-respondio-kast-cuando-ivan-valenzuela-le-pregunto-en-vivo-si-estaba-arrepentido-de-votar-por-pinochet/

[30] El País. (2025, October 16). El estallido social de 2019 reaparece en la campaña: Kast interpreta que hubo “miedo y terror” y Jara dice que fue una “expresión de dolores” (The 2019 social uprising returns to the campaign: Kast says there was “fear and terror” and Jara says it was an “expression of pain”). https://elpais.com/chile/2025-10-16/el-estallido-social-de-2019-segun-los-candidatos-a-la-presidencia-de-chile.html

[31] BioBioChile. (2025, September 25). Kast anuncia su plan “Araucanía Libre” para “erradicar el terrorismo y recuperar el territorio” (Kast announces his “Free Araucanía” plan to “eradicate terrorism and recover the territory”). https://www.biobiochile.cl/noticias/nacional/region-de-la-araucania/2025/09/25/kast-anuncia-su-plan-araucania-libre-para-erradicar-el-terrorismo-y-recuperar-el-territorio.shtml