The Plurinational State in the Chilean constitutional process: an analysis of discursive positions

The plurinational state (PS) became one of the most contested elements in Chile’s 2022 constitutional proposal, despite being framed by its proponents as a project of recognition, coexistence, and historical repair. We examined how Indigenous demands were translated, reframed, and contested as the PS entered formal constitutional politics. Drawing on Situational Analysis, we analyzed the discourses regarding the PS during the constitutional process. We used a positional map framed on two larger axes of concern: whether the PS was understood as consistent with the diversity of Chilean society, and the extent to which it was perceived as producing social unsettledness. The PS was simultaneously constituted as historical repair, unfair privilege, legal and social threat, and elite political imposition. We also focused on a meaningful discursive silence regarding how Indigenous communities themselves envisioned the PS. The article provides a contemporary analysis of how discourse shaped the intelligibility of constitutional change, Indigenous rights, and political legitimacy during Chile’s constitutional process.