People's Uprising in Chile with Alejandra Parra

In this episode of Breaking Green we talk with long-time activist Alejandra Parra about her experiences during the People’s Uprising in Chile and the hopes of recognizing environmental, social and economic reforms in the new Chilean constitution.

In 2019, Chile experienced intense nationwide protests against neoliberalism with calls for sweeping reform. In response the United Nations moved the UN Climate Change Conference COP 25 from Santiago, Chile to Madrid, Spain.

In 2020 the people of Chile voted in favor of a constitutional convention in order to replace its current constitution that was created under the Pinochet dictatorship. The convention, which grew out of the People’s Uprising, is currently underway with work expected to finished by March. The convention is being attended not only by representatives of political parties, but elected representatives of Indigenous Peoples, independent citizen groups, environmentalists, social justice activists, and is designed for gender parity.

In 2021, Gabriel Boric, a young leftist candidate soundly defeated ultra-far right candidate Jose’ Kast for President. Boric is expected to be seated on March 11, 2022.

Breaking Green is produced by Global Justice Ecology Project.

Breaking Green is made possible by donations from people like you. 

Please help us lift up the voices of those working to protect forests, defend human rights and expose false solutions.  Simply click here to send a donation or text GIVE to 1 716 257 4187.

Transcript

Steve Taylor  
Welcome to breaking green, a podcast by global justice ecology project. On breaking green, we will talk with activists and experts to examine the intertwined issues of social, ecological and economic injustice. We will also explore some of the more outrageous proposals to address climate and environmental crises that are falsely being sold as green. I am your host, Steve Taylor. In 2019, Chile experienced intense nationwide protests for societal, economic and environmental reform. In response, the United Nations moved its Conference of Parties from Santiago, Chile, to Madrid, Spain. The next year, the people of Chile voted in favor of a constitutional convention to replace its current constitution that was created under the Pinochet dictatorship. The convention is expected to finish its work this March. The convention is being attended not only by party leaders, but elected representatives of indigenous people, independent citizens groups, environmentalist, social justice activist and is designed for gender parity. In 2021, Gabrielle Boric, a 35 year old leftist candidate soundly defeated ultra-far right-wing candidate Jose Kast for President.  In this episode of Breaking Green, we will talk with longtime activist Alejandro Parra about her experiences during the people's uprising, its broad support for the indigenous Mapuche people and the hopes for environmental, social and economic reforms during those protests. Alejandra listened Temuco chili and earned a master's degree in planning from the University of Otago. Alejandra is a co founding member of the action network for environmental rights, also known as RADA. Alejandra is also with the Global Alliance for incineration alternatives, Gaia, and a board member of the global justice ecology project. Alejandro Pereira, thank you for joining us.

Alejandra Parra  
Thank you, Steve,

Steve Taylor  
Before we get into the current status of the Constitutional Convention, and the recent victory of President Boric in the election, I wanted to ask you a little bit about your own activist history. You have worked with a lot of indigenous people Mapuche, in particular, with their struggles to regain and protect the land that was taken from them. Tell us a little bit about that, and what brought you to that role.

Alejandra Parra  
Yes. Well, Mapuche  communities here in the region are you know, the resistance for the advancing of, of the capitalism here in in Chile. They are actually stopping forestry companies, for example, to keep growing their tree plantations with all the environmental and social consequences of that, and also political and economical consequences of that. And they have a really strong relationship with nature, nature, they, they really need a healthy nature in order to keep up to keep reproducing their culture, their medicine, their spirituality, their knowledge. They need nature for all that. So it's really important for them to have a healthy environment in that that is really good. It's such a privilege to share the territory here with them and be able to learn from them. And so for us, for environmental, environmentalist  people hear it's very important to help Mapuche  people in their struggle.

Steve Taylor  
Could you tell us a little bit how the Mapuche che land was taken from them, and and maybe how tree plantations are impacting them? 

Alejandra Parra  
Yes. So Mapuche people was here in this part of the American continent, from I would say, from Tiaray Island, up to Santiago, where Santiago is  right now the capital of Chile, maybe even farther to the north. And when the Spanish people came to colonize, they move the Mapuche people to the south, but they couldn't conquer them. So they establish a treatment an international treatment treaty. I'm sorry. In the river that was the limit of the Spanish territory and then Mapuche territory. But when Chile got independence, they move that lime farther to the south. And they started this what they call the  pacification, which it was actually genocide of the Mapuche people. And so they took Mapuche people's land and territory and give it to colonists from other countries from European countries, actually, German people, Italian people, etc. People from Switzerland and some Mapuche territory now is reduced to its 5%. It is a very, very small territory right now and actually the worst quality of land are the lands that were kept for the Mapuche people. And so in this territory is where the tree plantations are more developed.

Steve Taylor  
What kind of plantations are they?

Alejandra Parra  
So it's species from, from Australia, the eucalyptus and a species from the global north, north America probably. So it's species that grow under completely different environmental conditions. So when you bring that those species here, they grow really fast, and they use lots of water in they actually dry the land. And also the kind of leaves those trees have do not biodegrade easily here because the leaves of the native trees here are very soft. So the mic microorganisms and fungus that decompose them or are used to those kind of leaves and these other hard leaves, they can't biodegrade easily, and so that also have an impact in the quality of the soil. It makes it more acid. And and it also develops a lots of organic dry material on the soil. That is a very big danger of for fires, no forest fires. And that actually occur a lot here, especially where there are lots of those tree plantations. So it's very, very bad for the environment. And for the people.

Steve Taylor  
You mentioned water, are there water issues with the Mapuche as well?

Alejandra Parra  
yeah, lots of issues with water. Also in the dictatorship, what happened is that they made this law for the water, and they separated the rights to the land to the rights of the water. So you can have a land, you can live in a piece of land where a river flows, but you don't have the right to the water, necessarily, unless you ask for the rights. And so most of the water is already sign up for companies and companies have the entitle or the rights to the water, and especially power companies and mining companies in agribusiness companies. And also, what happens with the water here, our biggest problem is the big tree plantations that use all the water.

Steve Taylor  
One of the reasons we really wanted to talk to you was because, you know, the world has seen, you know, this recent election in Chile for the new president Boric. And also in 2019, 2020, there was a massive people's uprising in Chile, seen by most I believe as push back against neoliberalism. Could you tell us a little bit about what was happening with that?

Alejandra Parra  
Wow, that was so exciting times. We all have nostalgia of those days. At least the people who were on the streets and there were lots of us. So yeah, that started with high school students taking over Metro Station, a Train Station in in Santiago and that just ignite a bigger, biggest movement. First in Santiago, and we saw by television, how people were setting fire on everything in Santiago. And we thought, wow. So they were promoting it like, oh, this vandals people, how can they do this too, you know, public infrastructure? But we all said, no we need to support this. We need to start this all along Chile  so the next day all of Chile was on fire, and full of barricades. And yeah, because we were really, really tired of all the abuse, you know. The companies and how the government's just never took any real measures about anything to change what the dictatorship started in the first place in Chile. And what the dictatorship established from the Constitution. And with all the laws that also I just mentioned, the law for the forestry companies, the law for the privatization of the water. In in so many, you know, unjustices that haven't been meant, since the dictatorship. And even even though several governments supposedly from the left political parties, didn't do anything, and actually just kept going with with that, and kept helping neoliberalism, too.

Steve Taylor  
We've seen reports that there was intentional blinding of protesters that there was use of rape, and all sorts of violence. Could you tell us a little bit about how the National Police responded?

Alejandra Parra  
Yeah, yeah. It was a very violent response. And, yeah, a lot of human rights violations from the behavior of the of the police. All along Chile,  hundreds of people got shot in their eyes. And it was pretty planned, you know, like, we realize it was it was a planned response from the police. And some people wasn't even involved in the protest, like, Campillai, and she is actually now Senator. She was recently elected senator in last elections. She got blinded, because how do you say, the bomb that makes you cry, tear gas was shot to her face. And she was going to work. She wasn't involved in the protests. And she now is blind on both eyes.

Steve Taylor  
This is your host, Steve Taylor. And we will be back right after this.

Theresa Church  
Global Justice ecology project partners with small nonprofits when a group or organization whose non for profit work closely aligns with our mission by becoming a fiscal sponsor. This helps them minimize bureaucracy so they can focus on their crucial work for ecological and social justice, forest protection and human rights. GJEP is proud to sponsor Standing Trees. To overcome the climate and extinction crisis, Standing Trees envisions a future where New England's federal and state public lands are managed to restore the natural, old growth forests that evolved over millennia alongside the region's indigenous peoples. Standing Trees believes that New England's forests are our greatest natural asset, and that protecting and restoring the old forests of New England is an inexpensive, rapidly scalable and proven strategy to support the region's full range of biodiversity, sequester and store planet warming carbon, clean out air and water and protect our communities from droughts and floods. For more information, visit standingtrees.org

Steve Taylor  
Welcome back to Breaking Green. So we were talking about the state's response or the national police's response was often very violent. There was intentional blinding, also attacks against women. Could you tell us a little bit about that?

Alejandra Parra  
Yeah. Well, we we could see every day some video of the police doing, you know, horrific stuff, just beating up people for no reason. And also lots of women's declarations on about how the police abused sexually abused them. So, yeah, we we keep we keep up to now asking for, you know, a re-foundation of our police because it is a very corrupt institution. And they don't have any respect for human rights at all.

Steve Taylor  
These protests were happening while Chile was living under the Pinochet constitution. So what happened? What led? I mean, the protests for sure. But how did we get to the point where there was going to be a constitutional convention? I know I, I think I've heard that there there was a preference for something called an assembly. But But what happened? How did the Constitutional Convention happen?

Alejandra Parra  
Yes, I think it was because we really put private private companies profits at risk because people was attacking, you know, big supermarkets and big companies, buildings, and also the public infrastructure was in danger. And that is not is not nice, nice to see. But it was the only way I think, to to really show the power of the people and make the powerful who are ruling the country since decades, to listen to us. Because we had lots and lots of specific mobilizations, you know, since the 90s. And nothing change, and we were asking for a change in the Constitution since more than 10 years, and nothing happened, not not real intentions of, of changing, of making structural changes in in Chile. So that that was the only way and the political parties got together. Most of them, I think one or two were left out. And they signed this peace agreement, they call it in November 2019. So they they agreed to start the process for Constitutional Convention, which is what we have right now. People was asking for constitutional assembly, which is slightly different, because an assembly we thought we would, we would set, you know, the framework, the rules for the functioning. And the Constitutional Convention, which is what we have right now was the rules of that was was set in this agreement. So political parties were who decided how the convention was going to be built, how it was going to work. But stilll like we were able to, to still move a little bit those frameworks and have, for example, sir, safe seats for indigenous people, and also parity of gender. And also safe seats for people with living in disabilities situations. So we and also what one really important thing was the possibility of having independent lists running as candidates for to be conventional. And that's what we did. And that's how I got to be a candidate. Yes.

Steve Taylor  
So what is there about 155 participants? But it's not just going to be represented by political parties, or then current political parties, but there'll be these independent representatives. There will be representatives from indigenous communities, I believe you said there's going to have to be gender parity. So that's a big shift, isn't it?

Alejandra Parra  
It is and the Constitutional Convention is working. And it started its job last year in June, July, I think. And it is actually the most democratic political body interior right now. We feel that there is a real representation of all the people in the Constitutional Convention. And it's a big difference from what we see in the local governments or in the Congress. Like in the deputies is or senators, we don't see that diversity that we can see in the Constitutional Convention, and is really nice to see. It was really exciting to see the opening of the convention when Elisa Locong was elected president of the convention, and she started, she opened the convention in the language of the Maputo people. And that, so that was so exciting, in and it was a, you know, a way to show that real changes are being made. 

Steve Taylor  
And you were a candidate for one of those seats. You weren't successful. But I have looked at your platform that you ran on, and there were, there were 12 points. And I want to go over some of those, maybe you could talk a little bit about it. And hopefully these are being represented. I mean, you said that the Constitutional Convention was opened in the language of the Mapuche and you feel that there is a democratic process here. But you talked about the importance of self determination. I think you said in English, all peoples have the right to self determination and autonomy, whether they are native peoples Creoles or migrants, the state must recognize these rights in the new constitution and guarantee them through citizen participation and control mechanisms. The popular initiative of law and referendums are useful instruments for guaranteeing these rights. But you talked about self determination. You also talked about indigenous rights and human rights, as well as decentralization You said the exercise of autonomy and self determination of peoples requires a decentralization of the state, so that decisions can be made from the territories in a democratic and fair manner. Territorial ordering by basin and territorial planning with an ecosystem approach are useful tools for this. Are these ideas being represented in this constitutional convention?

Alejandra Parra  
Yes, I think they are. And we also keep, like making inputs to the discussion inside the convention. And as I said before, there are or I'm not sure if I said it, but there are 17 representatives of indigenous people in the Constitutional Convention, from different peoples native peoples from this territory called Chile today. So they are representing themselves in that's really exciting thing to see is the first time that we have that in Chile. And it's, I would say, I come on demand, the recognition of the native peoples in Chile and Chile as a multinational including prenational country, like recognizing we are made up of several nations that share this territory. And, and also, those people are the best to decide what to do with their land. Indigenous people knows how to take care of the environment. In so they are the ones who should make the decisions. And the people who live in the territories are the ones who should make a decision. So what to do and what not to do in those places. So that's decentralization, and a more direct way of democracy. We want to, you know, take distance from this representative democracy where you just vote for somebody and cross fingers, so they do a good job. We really need more involvement, more political involvement of the people living in in the territories and for that we need to be able to make decisions. And I think all that is being represented in because we got really good people elected and we keep following the discussion and we keep building up the local discussion to feed into the discussion in the in the convention. And we haven't abandoned, you know, that place, like the representative democracy wanted to, but we really want to keep, you know, living the democracy and, and the process that is going on there.

Steve Taylor  
So, during the uprising in 2019, I think it was cop 24 was supposed to happen. There was a last minute change to move it from Santiago to Madrid. Tell us a little bit about that.

Alejandra Parra  
Yeah, actually, it was a pretty good moment to have a people's uprising, because we were going to have the cop 25 I think it was here in Chile. And so the eyes of all the world was, you know, looking to us, and that, I felt protected by that. Because that meant that all the killing and the violation of human rights was going to, you know, go out to the world and be seen by everybody. And so yeah, they move it, they move it to Madrid. And but they still, we still had some People's Assembly, and we had our citizens and social movements, gatherings and conversations and discussion. And that keeps feeding, keep feeding to the people's uprising, and we went to the streets and march with, you know, our environmental, social, environmental demands. We took them to the streets to and we face the police, also bringing together you know, social demands with environmental demands, which are actually the same and have the same growth that custom. So it was, was pretty exciting. 

Steve Taylor  
What do you think about the decision overall, to move the conference?

Alejandra Parra  
It was a way to protect the government. It was a measure to protect the government actually. And and because we were not going to stop because the COP was going to take place in in Santiago. Actually, we will use it to show our demands. And our also also our but we think we should happen. What the changes, we think it should happen to solve all these problems to solve wall global global warming, which are the same, had the same cost that all the social injustice is that we are enduring here in Chile, since they get to go. So it was a measure of the government to protect itself. Not to protect the people, of course.

Steve Taylor  
So you were a longtime are a long time, environmental, social justice activist. What did it feel like to you personally seeing this unfold in 2019?

Alejandra Parra  
Yeah, I feel really good. I was pretty disappointed. If I'm, you know, honest, with all the years that I have been working on, raising awareness and, you know, starting mobilizations and supporting communities, but nothing really changed. I was thinking it doesn't make a difference, all the work that I do, and that we all the people, all the activists do. But then the people's uprising came in, I said, Yes, it was working, it was working. It was building up, you know, the movement was building up. And you you need to get to a point where where all the social, social movements have, you know, a maturity. And that's the point where you see you can really see the changes. But all the job we were doing was just building up to that moment.

Steve Taylor  
Well, now there's a constitutional convention, and that should wrap up maybe in March or something like that. But also in March, there'll be a new a new president, President Borik Who is famously I think 35 years old, a former student activist, and also seen as quite the opposite of what his candidate was, which was the far right, establishment Pinochet legacy candidate. Tell us a little bit about Borik versus Kast what what was that? Like? I mean, if they seem to be diametrically opposed,

Alejandra Parra  
yeah. Yes, yes, it was really insane to see how a fascist candidate, like Kast was winning the first round of the elections and for by far. And how people was believing in all the lies he was saying, and only false promises, and how he was taking advantage of the miseducation, bad education, the lack of education, and the ignorance of lots of people exploiting the fear, exploiting the needs of the people. And in the other side, there was several candidates from the list, but Boric was the strongest. And he as you said, he's pretty young, he comes from the students movements. Who, you know, they achieved to have free, higher education, universities, cut a couple of years ago. Before that, all the students had to go in dept to go to the university. And now lots of students can study free for free. And that was achieved by the moment where Boric was first saw. And he also comes from the extreme south of Chile. So he knows a lot about how centralization is really unfair. And in I wouldn't say he's perfect, or his political program is perfect, but what I can say is that that political sector comes from the people who is on the streets who is in foreign territories, who face the the injustice of centralization, and power. And they are open to listen to social movements and proposals from organizations. And so yeah, we had like two, very faraway, you know, figures, far away from each other. It was really scary, really scary to see the possibility that fascist could take over the government of Chile. And we mobilize, you know, in mass to stop that from happening. And lots of people went to vote in the second round. And lots of Mapuche people went to vote in the second round, and lots of women, also to and young people. And so yeah, Boric had the best turn up in the history of Chilefor when we won the second round of the elections,

Steve Taylor  
and that was around 550 5% of the vote. I think he got a million more votes than Kast. So that was a very sound victory. Yes. But the right isn't giving up just yet. Isn't there a lot of social media disinformation going on about the Constitutional Convention process?

Alejandra Parra  
Yeah, that has been since the beginning. They have been trying to discredit the Constitutional Convention and discredit the constituencies themselves. But, you know, we knew that would happen. They won't give up their privileges easily of course. And they have all the media, in their sides in their pockets. They own you know, the, the communications. And so we need, we knew that was going to happen and we keep, we need to keep defending what we have achieved. And that's what we are doing up to now.

Steve Taylor  
So from where you're sitting, does it? Do you think the the new constitution is going to happen? And Boric is going to be seated, do you? Is that your belief?

Alejandra Parra  
Yeah, of course, and we will fight for that. We are fighting for it.

Steve Taylor  
I want to ask you one more question. And that's It's Alejandra when this new government is seated. Do you think it will be different from the last and how?

Alejandra Parra  
Yes, I think is going to be different. And I won't be sitting here waiting it to be different, you know. And I think that's the change, that's the big change. We can't just keep sitting and waiting, criss crossing our fingers for the government to be good. We need to go there and support them, and give them advice and proposals to make the things right. And, and, you know, demand them for, to listen to us. Because they they really come from the social movements. So they know that organizations have a lot of knowledge to give. And they should take advantage of that and use it for the new government. And I think that's the change we need to do like not just hope for the government to do the things right. But we ourselves take a more and more strong position in and keep always vigilant of what is going on.

Steve Taylor  
Well, Alejandra, thank you so much for joining us today.

Alejandra Parra  
Thank you Steve for inviting me. It was really nice talking to you.

Steve Taylor  
You have been listening to Breaking Green, the global justice Ecology Project podcasts. Find us at Global Justice ecology project dot org. Visit to find more interviews, podcast organizations, and ideas for addressing climate change.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai