Gabriel Boric, the student activist who is establishing himself as an emerging leader of the left in Latin America.

From the Regional News Agency - The burden that Gabriel Boric will carry on his back starting March 11th is not light. The eyes (and hopes) of a significant portion of the Latin American left will be especially attentive to what happens in Chile over the next four years.

The landscape of the regional left changed after successive defeats that consolidated an air of "change of era," marked by the victory of Mauricio Macri in Argentina in November 2015, the victories of Sebastián Piñera in Chile and Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil in 2018, the coup against Evo Morales in Bolivia, and the defeat of the Broad Front in Uruguay in 2019 at the hands of Luis Lacalle Pou.

After a five-year period of decline, the situation seems to be changing again. The left has returned to power in Argentina with Alberto Fernández and in Bolivia with Luis Arce, and Pedro Castillo in Peru and Andrés Manuel López Obrador in Mexico have also won elections. Furthermore, Boric won in the second round in December 2021, and this year there are expectations for the possible victories of Gustavo Petro in Colombia and Luiz Inácio "Lula" da Silva in Brazil.

However, the 'boric cycle' that opens this Friday has unique characteristics within the regional progressive field, in terms of generational change, gender parity, and even the symbolism that links it to an unfinished process like the one undertaken by the socialist Salvador Allende in the 70s.

Furthermore, his leadership is inextricably linked to a process of social mobilization that began with the student protests of 2011 and culminated in the "social outburst" of 2019 and the subsequent 2020 plebiscite, which endorsed the ongoing constitutional reform process. Like Allende, Boric comes to power with the support of a heterogeneous coalition of parties, and it is likely that his government will also experience moments of tension and internal conflict.

The origins and student mobilization

Boric (36 years old) comes from the south, from the Magallanes region and Chilean Antarctica. He recalls that when he went to Santiago, Chile to study law, it was difficult for him to adapt, and that is why he always asserts his origins.

His great-grandfather, Juan, arrived from Croatia at the end of the 19th century. His great-uncle Vladimiro was the first diocesan bishop of Punta Arenas, and his father, Luis, was a member of the Christian Democratic Party.

When he arrived in the country's capital, he enrolled in the law faculty at the University of Chile. While studying at the faculty, he was an assistant in the departments of Chilean Institutional History, Theory of Justice, and International Human Rights Law.

During this period, she was actively involved in student activism and was one of the most visible faces of the 2011 student mobilization. She even became president of the Student Federation of the University of Chile, after winning an election against the communist activist Camila Vallejo. 

A political career and the first difficult decisions.

Student mobilizations catapulted him onto the national stage, and in March 2014 he assumed the position of deputy, which he renewed in the 2017 elections. In 2018 he founded Convergência Social, a left-wing party that is part of the Frente Ampla (Broad Front).

As a legislator, he participated in the "Social Peace Agreement and the New Constitution," signed on November 15, 2019—a month after the "social outbreak"—which served as the basis for calling for the election of a Convention. This position earned him criticism within the internal Social Convergence, a conflict that ended with the resignation of 73 activists, including the mayor of Valparaíso, Jorge Sharp.

Putting his signature on that document was one of the hardest things he had to do, he acknowledged two years later, already as a presidential candidate. 

Despite declaring in 2019 and 2020 that he was not willing to run for office, on March 17, 2021, his party, Convergencia Social, proclaimed him a candidate for the presidency of Chile. A few days later, it added the support of the Democratic Revolution party, whose main figure is Giorgio Jackson, one of Boric's closest allies.

Although he was not the favorite in the internal coalition "Approve Dignity" - a name that honors the constituent process - he was the surprise of the primaries, defeating the Communist Party candidate, Daniel Jadue. "If Chile was the cradle of neoliberalism, it will also be its tomb," were Boric's first words on the night of July 18th, already proclaimed the presidential candidate.

The rest of the story is well known. In the first round, on November 21st, he obtained 25,8% of the votes (1.814.809 people), a result below expectations, but in the second round he managed to defeat the far-right candidate José Antonio Kast, with 55,8% of the votes.

“The campaign command was hit hard by coming in second place, it was something that wasn’t expected. However, I think the result ended up being important for what came after, because it showed that the danger was real and that it was necessary to mobilize. That’s what marked the second round: a feeling that change was necessary or Kast would become the government,” admitted Sebastián Kraljevich, chief strategist of that campaign, in an interview with ARN.

The path of moderation

To win in the second round and avoid a victory for the far-right, Boric had to make "substantive shifts" and moderate his discourse, says Josefina Araos Bralic, a researcher at the Institute for Social Studies (IES).

“Alongside the campaign against Kast, Boric summoned the former Concertación, with whom he previously maintained quite tense relations, and at the same time, paradoxically, appropriated part of Kast's discourse. He had to moderate. He reduced the prominence of his 'no borders' agenda on the migration issue and began to give more weight to demands for security,” the researcher assesses.

He adds: “He also began to speak more explicitly about the need for gradual changes, thus calming the business world. It’s a story that moderates and reconciles somewhat with recent history. The spirit became ‘we are heirs to paths that others began, that advanced as far as they could, and now we have to change, but in this respect’”.

According to Araos Bralic, this tendency led Boric to "moderation in history," something that also reflects his political capacity to understand "the complexity" of Chilean society. "He understood that leftist projects must be able to incorporate change and security, transformations and certainties. This is in his favor and explains that certain optimistic and hopeful air that surrounds him. It's a new air," concludes the analyst.

The rapprochement between the social-democratic sectors of the former Concertación and Boric's delegation is no small event for the Chilean progressive camp. A review of comments made by young Chilean students on social media more than a decade ago shows the distance between the two worlds.

"(Ricardo) Lagos is terribly arrogant, self-referential and a politician of the past," Boric wrote on his Twitter account in March 2011, almost ten years before the former Chilean president gave him his support in the second round. "What I am, what my history is, my past, obviously at this moment I have to say Boric" were the words used by former President Lagos to express his support for Boric, who obviously appreciated the gesture.

The synthesis of this rapprochement between the former Concertación and Approve Dignidad sectors can be seen in the composition of the cabinet. In addition to the sign of gradualism with the appointment of Mario Marcel to the Ministry of Finance, there will be three members of the Socialist Party in key positions: Maya Fernández in the Ministry of Defense, Carlos Montes in Housing, and Antonia Urrejola in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The Party for Democracy (PPD) will be represented by Jeanette Vega in the Ministry of Social Development, the Radical Party (PR) by Marcela Hernando in Mining, and the Liberal Party (PL) by Juan Carlos García in Public Works. The Christian Democracy (DC), an important player in the former Concertación cycle, was left out of the formation of Boric's cabinet, which was also influenced by the need to have more powerful majorities in a Parliament that was, a priori, quite hostile.

These difficulties led Boric to adopt a more moderate and gradualist approach, which has already earned him initial criticism from the Communist Party, for example after the appointment of Marcel as head of the economic team.

Araos Bralic believes that these internal tensions could complicate the first months of Boric's government, which will have to use its "political nose" to deal with these situations. "He is skillful and there's a reason he won the way he did," he says.

"Everything will depend on knowing how to manage and interpret reality well, with great caution, moderation, and humility. Moderation doesn't mean you can't make profound changes, but rather that you need the attitude of always being attentive to ensure you are interpreting society correctly," he concludes.

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