Chilean Political Exile

Abstract

Forced exile was important to Chilean politics both during the military regime and after the dictatorship's end in 1990. Exile was central to Pinochet's strategy for eliminating the left in Chile and consolidating and retaining absolute political power. At the same time, exile kept the opposition alive when the left was decimated in Chile, as exiles reconstituted their parties abroad and fought the dictatorship from the “external front.” Exiles' return in the mid-1980s contributed to the success of the opposition effort to defeat Pinochet in the 1988 plebiscite. Finally, the exile experience was central to the reconfiguration of Chilean politics, particularly the “renovation” of the Socialists, which led to the breakup of the long-standing Socialist-Communist alliance and the formation of the Socialist—Christian Democrat alliance, the core of the Concertación de Partidos por la Democracia, which has elected presidents and majorities in the Chamber of Deputies in each election since 1989.