Chile’s path to a new constitution : lessons for Libya?

Abstract

This paper analyses the unique Chilean constitutional process that emerged out of a country-wide protest movement in October 2019. The protests arose from grievances connected to Chile’s 1980 constitution, which was forged under a military dictatorship and was unsuccessfully reformed in the past thirty years. The ongoing constitutional process is characterised by a plurality and diversity of political and social representation, gender parity, and independent indigenous people’s groups for the first time in Chile’s constitutional history. Chile’s experience could offer valuable lessons to Libya, a country where the constitutional process is heavily politicised and yet to be agreed on by the main political actors.