Description

The social outbreak of 2019 generated important milestones in Chile, such as the debate on the need to adopt a new constitution. The start of this work began with the signing of a peace agreement held in the former national congress by the political forces with parliamentary representation, who agreed to propose to the country the option of drafting a new constitution, which would include all the aspects and mechanisms for its elaboration.

Faced with this, the mayors of the country proposed that it was important for the people to express themselves through a Citizen Consultation, where the priorities demanded by the citizens and which are the basis of the outbreak, 30 years of privileges for a few to the detriment of the majority of the country, would be set out. The communes of the country are committed to organise in their territories this citizen consultation to determine the participation of citizens in a constituent process, leading to the drafting of a new constitution. This consultation was held on 15 December 2019.

The municipality of Alto del Carmen, aware of the need for its inhabitants to vote informed, in Council session, agreed to conduct citizen dialogues, to encourage participation in the Citizen Consultation, agreed from Congress, which also generates a diagnosis by locality for the community of los Valles, to express the main needs of their territories, this as input to prioritize in municipal management. 

For the development of these dialogues, a methodology was established to encourage participation, where, in the first instance, in each locality, lists of local problems are collected and representatives are appointed to take them to the meetings or citizen dialogues that were held in 5 defined places and where representatives of neighbouring organisations met to discuss the relevant aspects to be considered in the citizen consultation.

The participants are given a number that is then used to separate them and work in groups of approximately 10 to 13 people to discuss their local needs and demands, using a card and pen that is given to each participant, where they write down the two main demands that they consider most relevant to resolve in their locality, Then, in order to ensure the participation and use of the floor by everyone, each participant reads their two priorities to the group and pastes them on a flipchart provided for each group. Finally, a representative is chosen to present to all the participants what has been presented by each group.

Finally, once the dialogues had been held, they were systematised and a report was drawn up and presented to the Honourable Municipal Council, which included them in its work agenda.

Monitoring has been carried out when the Honourable Municipal Council meets in the different localities and reports on the status of the situations raised and which the municipality has committed itself to resolve. 

Sources of information (In Spanish):

• More information

• Application form

• Annexes