During Gabriel Boric’s Presidential campaign, and even during the president’s last accounts before the nation, the promise of achieving true decentralization and ending the figure of regional Presidential delegates has been latent.
However, other concerns and the constant torpedoing of the political world have relegated the issue to the background, turning it into another pending issue.
Heinrich von Baer, past president of the Decentralized Chile Foundation and staunch regionalist, has a particular view of the current state of the process.
He is not pessimistic when it comes to evaluating progress, and believes that to achieve true decentralization, it is not necessary to end the figure of Presidential delegates.
-Is the decentralization process currently stopped? Have you been a victim of the country contingency?
-Not so much, not so little. He was unfortunately detained for a time, among others, due to the changes of three Undersecretaries of Subdere, which has hindered the continued progress of the much-needed decentralization process. However, although late, an important and hopeful boost has recently been taking place, led by the Minister of the Interior, Carolina Tohá, and the Undersecretary Francisca Perales. In the main, this new air implies the design and promotion of a “Chilean Decentralization Policy”, accompanied by a widely participatory process of social actors from local and regional communities, and an Advisory Council composed equally of a group of twelve outstanding personalities with proven track record, knowledge and commitment to effectively advancing the process.
Presidential Delegates
-Do you think it is possible to end the figure of Presidential delegates? Everything indicates that with the current unitary model it is almost impossible to delegate functions to governors. How can the commitment made by the President himself be fulfilled?
-Being a determined and persevering supporter of a national effort to transform Chile into a decentralized and developed country, capable of mobilizing all the human and productive potential of each of our regions, I do not share the premise that to do so we must “end” the figure of the Presidential delegates. Just as it is about moving away in a significant and sustained way from the current model of a unitary and highly centralized State, it would be a leap to another extreme, in addition to an excessive bureaucratic cost in relation to its benefits, to define as a goal or “port of arrival” of the process the federal State model. On the other hand, the appropriate model for the present and future reality of Chile is that of a unitary – decentralized State (unitary only in essentials: internal government). In this institutional design, it is logical and natural that the central government continues to have a representative in the territories, but only at the level of the provinces, to exercise the functions of internal government. To achieve this, it is necessary that more and more powers, currently exercised by the central government through the current Presidential delegates, be transferred to the level where in each case they are best exercised: to regional governments or municipalities.
-At the level of regional governments there has been some progress, especially in terms of development and investment. Instances with local decision-making power have been generated. What other advances would you highlight?
-Despite all the difficulties of its installation, the main advance continues to be the democratic election of regional governors, an institutional framework that must continue to be consistently perfected. Another very important advance is undoubtedly the mining royalty law, whose resources we hope will positively impact the quality of life of so many still very poor communities from the north to the south of Chile.
-With ad porta elections, could this Presidential period be considered lost in terms of decentralization? Or has progress been made “as far as possible”?
-For what the country needs and deserves, it would certainly have been desirable to advance much further, without interruptions for contingent reasons. But this does not mean that we should consider the current period “lost”: we are “half-time”, and all actors, not just the government, must make the maximum possible effort to contribute.
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