The Citizen Left Party of Chile (, IC), known until 2013 as Christian Left Party of Chile (, same acronym) was a

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in western South America. It is the southernmost country in the world and the closest to Antarctica, stretching along a narrow strip of land between the Andes, Andes Mountains and the Paci ...

left-wing Left-wing politics describes the range of Ideology#Political ideologies, political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy either as a whole or of certain social ...

political party A political party is an organization that coordinates candidates to compete in a particular area's elections. It is common for the members of a party to hold similar ideas about politics, and parties may promote specific political ideology, ...

. Founded in 1971, in its early days it was suppressed by the

Pinochet Augusto José Ramón Pinochet Ugarte (25 November 1915 – 10 December 2006) was a Chilean military officer and politician who was the dictator of Chile from 1973 to 1990. From 1973 to 1981, he was the leader of the military junta, which i ...

dictatorship. It was part of the

Nueva Mayoría The Nueva Mayoría (), also translated in English as New Majority, was a Chilean centre-left electoral coalition from 2013 to 2018, composed mainly of centre-left political parties supporting the presidential candidacy of Michelle Bachelet in t ...

coalition, supporting the presidential candidacy president

Michelle Bachelet Verónica Michelle Bachelet Jeria (; born 29 September 1951) is a Chilean politician who served as President of Chile from 2006 to 2010 and again from 2014 to 2018, becoming the first woman to hold the presidency. She was re-elected in December ...

in 2013.

History

The Christian Left Party was founded when a number of Christian Democrats left their party in protest against the party's cooperation with the right-wing forces and confrontation with the Allende government. Thus, on 31 July 1971, Bosco Parra declared that he saw no future for

Christian left The Christian left, otherwise referred to as the religious left, is a range of Christian political and social movements that largely embrace social justice principles and uphold a social doctrine or social gospel based on their interpreta ...

positions within the Christian Democrat party. He was joined by six other MPs, Fernando Buzeta, Jaime Concha, Alberto Jaramillo, Luís Maira, Pedro Urra and Pedro Videla, as well as by Silvia Alvarez, the only woman and Luís Badilla, the leader of the Christian Democratic youth organization. At this stage, the new organization was joined by a number of MAPU militants (incl. 3 senators: Julio Silva Solar, Alberto Jerez Horta and

Jacques Chonchol Jacques Chonchol (26 March 1926 – 5 October 2023) was a Chilean politician and professor known for his work in the Chilean land reform, land reform movement during the 1960s and early 1970s. Chonchol served from 1970 to 1972 as Ministry of Ag ...

) who were dissatisfied with their party's affiliation with Marxism-Leninism. Christian Left was part of the Unidad Popular coalition, and declared itself to be a revolutionary party of Christian and

Humanist Humanism is a philosophical stance that emphasizes the individual and social potential, and agency of human beings, whom it considers the starting point for serious moral and philosophical inquiry. The meaning of the term "humanism" ha ...

tradition, and in favour of constructing socialism. It tended to agree with the radical wing of the Unidad Popular (the leftist majority of the Socialist Party and parts of the MAPU). After the 1973 coup, the party members were subject to arrest and torture, like people from other leftist groups. The party's militants continued operating together with and within left-wing groups. After democracy was restored in Chile in 1990, most of the militants joined the

Socialist Party Socialist Party is the name of many different political parties around the world. All of these parties claim to uphold some form of socialism, though they may have very different interpretations of what "socialism" means. Statistically, most of th ...

while others continued as the Christian Left party. According to one study ‘The Christian Left assigned itself as its main task: to contribute to the construction of socialism in Chile. At the same level of importance was the defense of the compatibility between Christianity and socialism. Its position towards the capitalist regime was radical. Its purpose was to replace it as a whole and at its roots. To achieve this objective, "understood as popular liberation, two processes had to be combined. 1) The definitive overcoming of the capitalist structure and 2) the progressive transfer of the authorities to the bases responsible for productive activity and the generation of goods and services. The above, the CI maintained, also implied a cultural change, in the values, behaviors and habits of the people".’ In 2003, IC became a member of the

political alliance A parliamentary group, parliamentary caucus or political group is a group consisting of members of different political parties or independent politicians with similar ideologies. Some parliamentary systems allow smaller political parties, who a ...

"Together We Can Do More" (Spanish: ''

Juntos Podemos Más Juntos Podemos Más por Chile (Spanish literal: ''Together we can do more for Chile'', ''Podemos'' is an acronym of ''Po''der ''Demo''crático ''S''ocial, Spanish for ''Social Democratic Power'') was a political coalition created in 2003, consistin ...

''), together with the

Communist Party of Chile The Communist Party of Chile (, ) is a communist party in Chile. It was founded in 1912 as the Socialist Workers' Party () and adopted its current name in 1922. The party established a youth wing, the Communist Youth of Chile (, JJ.CC), in 1932. ...

and the Humanist Party. Their joint presidential candidate in 2005 was Tomás Hirsch of the Humanist Party. The second national congress of the Christian Left took place in 2006. The activists chose Manuel Jacques as the president of the Party. On 3 October 2007, it started a process to re-enter the Political Party Registry (Spanish: Registro de Partidos Políticos), from which it was removed in 1989, for not having obtained enough votes to continue as a legal party. The process ended successfully on 25 May 2008, when the Electoral Service (''Servicio Electoral'') of Chile re-registered it as a legal political party. In 2012 formed a party with other political leftist movements called Citizen Left. On the eve of the 2013 presidential election, the Citizen Left joined the opposition pact

and supported the presidential candidacy of

, formalizing its existence to change the legal name of the Christian Left in the Electoral Service. In 2018, Citizen Left merged with

MAS Region The MAS Region (), known until 2014 as Broad Social Movement (, MAS) was a Chilean left-wing political party founded by Alejandro Navarro in 2008. The party was created as a political movement in 2008, by Senator Alejandro Navarro, after the then ...

to become MAS Citizen Left.

Presidential candidates

The following is a list of the presidential candidates supported by the Citizen Left. (Information gathered from th
Archive of Chilean Elections
. * 1988 plebiscite: "No" (won) *

1989 1989 was a turning point in political history with the "Revolutions of 1989" which ended communism in Eastern Bloc of Europe, starting in Poland and Hungary, with experiments in power-sharing coming to a head with the opening of the Berlin W ...

Patricio Aylwin Patricio Aylwin Azócar (; 26 November 1918 – 19 April 2016) was a Chilean politician from the Christian Democratic Party of Chile, Christian Democratic Party, lawyer, author, professor and former senator. He was the 30th president of Chil ...

, PDC-''

Concertación The Concertación, officially the Concertación de Partidos por la Democracia (; ), was a coalition of center-left political parties in Chile, founded in 1988. Presidential candidates under its banner won every election from when military rul ...

'' (won) *

1993 The United Nations General Assembly, General Assembly of the United Nations designated 1993 as: * International Year for the World's Indigenous People The year 1993 in the Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands had only 364 days, since its ...

: Eugenio Pizarro, Ind.-ADI (lost) *

1999 1999 was designated as the International Year of Older Persons. Events January * January 1 – The euro currency is established and the European Central Bank assumes its full powers. * January 3 – The Mars Polar Lander is launc ...

Ricardo Lagos Ricardo Froilán Lagos Escobar (; born 2 March 1938) is a Chilean lawyer, economist and social-democratic politician who served as president of Chile from 2000 to 2006. During the 1980s he was a well-known opponent of the Chilean military di ...

, PPD-Concertación (won) *

2005 2005 was designated as the International Year for Sport and Physical Education and the International Year of Microcredit. The beginning of 2005 also marked the end of the International Decade of the World's Indigenous Peoples, Internationa ...

: Tomás Hirsch, PH-''Juntos Podemos'' (lost) *

2009 2009 was designated as the International Year of Astronomy by the United Nations to coincide with the 400th anniversary of Galileo Galilei's first known astronomical studies with a telescope and the publication of Astronomia Nova by Joha ...

: Jorge Arrate, PCCh-''Juntos Podemos'' (lost) *

2013 2013 was the first year since 1987 to contain four unique digits (a span of 26 years). 2013 was designated as: *International Year of Water Cooperation *International Year of Quinoa Events January * January 5 – 2013 Craig, Alask ...

, PS-''Nueva Mayoría'' (won) *

2017 2017 was designated as the International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development by the United Nations General Assembly. Events January * January 1 – Istanbul nightclub shooting: A gunman dressed as Santa Claus opens fire at the ...

: Alejandro Guillier, Ind.-''Nueva Mayoría'' (lost)

References

External links

Home page (in Spanish)
{{Authority control 1971 establishments in Chile 2018 disestablishments in Chile Catholicism and far-left politics Christian democratic parties in South America Christian political parties Christian socialist organizations Defunct political parties in Chile Left-wing politics in Chile Political parties disestablished in 2018 Political parties established in 1971 São Paulo Forum Socialist parties in Chile

History

Presidential candidates

See also

References

External links