21-12-2017: Latin American Weekly Report

Chile’s see-saw politics since 2006 will continue after Sebastián Piñera won the second round of presidential elections on 17 December. On 11 March next year President Michelle Bachelet will hand over power to Piñera for the second time, and Chile will once again shift from the Left to the Right of the political spectrum. By 2022 Bachelet and Piñera will have held sway in Chile for 16 years between them. Piñera’s most pressing challenge upon taking office will be forging a working relationship with a congress in which his right-of-centre coalition, Chile Vamos, lacks a majority. He will also need to find a better balance in his cabinet between technocrats and professional politicians than he managed at the start of his first term in office in 2010 when his government was repeatedly caught reacting to events.