A divisive bestseller: copies of Chile's new constitution hit the streets
-
Loading... - Maria Acosta
- 15 Jul 2022
- 116 Views
- 0 Like
- 0 Comment
In cities around Chile, bookstores and street vendors are touting a new, purple book that promises – or, depending on the reader's view, threatens – to reshape society in the Andean nation.
The book outlays the country's proposed new constitution. Its 388 articles touching on social rights, gender, politics and the environment aim to close the door on the current text, drawn up in 1980 under the military dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet.
Chileans will vote to approve or reject the new constitution on Sept. 4. While they overwhelmingly backed the plan to write a new one in a referendum two years ago, opinion polls suggest the final draft may be rejected. Support has dropped on fears that some of the proposals from the assembly in charge of formulating the text are too radical. read more
In capital Santiago, long lines have been forming outside bookstores and street stalls of people looking to pick up the recently-finalized text - a bright purple paperback decorated with a Chilean flag. Street vendors said they were selling dozens of copies a day.
"The money's here now," said Alfredo Lopez, a vendor who normally sells fruit on Santiago's Ahumada thoroughfare.
Lopez sold masks when the pandemic hit and now has a table full of the books and a hand-made yellow sign touting the text for 3,000 pesos ($3). While Lopez hasn't read the text and doesn't plan to, the stream of customers is constant and Lopez says he's been selling 70 to 80 copies a day.
The new constitution, born from anger about stark inequality in one of the region's richest nations that burst out in fiery protests in 2019, has become a lightning rod for debate between those who want to protect Chile's market-orientated economic model that helped drive decades of growth and those seeking a more socially-inclusive ideal. Read More...
