| Chilean Republic República Chilena Timeline: Differently | ||||||
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| Motto: Por la razón o la fuerza "By reason or force" |
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| Anthem: "Himno Nacional de Chile" "National Anthem of Chile" |
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 Location of Chile in South America
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| Capital (and largest city) | Santiago | |||||
| Official languages | Spanish | |||||
| Religion | Roman Catholicism | |||||
| Demonym(s) | Chilean | |||||
| Government | Federal presidential republic | |||||
| - | President | José Antonio Kast | ||||
| Legislature | National Congress | |||||
| Establishment | ||||||
| - | Independence from Spain | 12 February 1818 | ||||
| - | People's Republic | 14 April 1928 | ||||
| - | Second Republic | 4 August 1930 | ||||
| - | Allende Era | 11 September 1973 | ||||
| - | Transition to Democracy | 3 October 1990 | ||||
| Area | ||||||
| - | Total | 571,375 km2 220,609 sq mi |
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| Population | ||||||
| - | Estimate | 17,107,216 (75th) | ||||
| Currency | Chilean peso | |||||
| Drives on the | right | |||||
Chile, officially the Chilean Republic, is a sovereign nation in South America. Chile borders Argentina to the east, and Bolivia to the north. It is bounded by the Pacific Ocean on the west. Its surface area of 571,375 square kilometers makes it the seventh-largest country in South America and the 50th-largest in the world. With a population of over 17.1 million inhabitants, it is the seventh-most populous country in South America and the 75th in the world.
History[]
Independence and First Republic[]
Chile gained independence from Spain on January 1, 1818. After defeating royalist troops in Chacabuco, the army entered Santiago and established the First Republic of Chile. The regime was welcomed by many people, although colonial social classes remained. For fifty years, the Chilean people were ruled by three dictators, who continued the social hierarchy and oppressed the commoners. The popularity sank even more when Chile lost the War of the Pacific, which legitimized Bolivia's claim to the Arica Region.
Coup d'etat and Second Republic[]
Eventually, the people of Chile revolted against the government, calling for a real democracy. The First Republic had already supplied Brazil during the Great War, and the economy had reached the very bottom. Supported by the now-powerful Soviet Union, the people of Chile revolted and established the People's Republic of Chile. However, the army crushed the revolt, and then toppled the First Republic, electing the Chief General as the new president of the Second Republic. The Second Republic was even more tyrannical than the First Republic, being ruled by a military dictatorship. Eventually the people would revolt and topple the dictatorship, but with the continued totalitarianism in Chile's army and the Falangist influence in the military from the 1940s to 1973, a bloody attempt of a coup de'etat against President Salvador Allende would happen between August and September of that same year.
Days of August and the Allende Era (1973 - 1990)[]
Augusto Pinochet was a military commander who would rise to Commander-in-Chief, was vehemently against Allende's ideals, and would launch an unsucessful coup d'etat against him between August and September of 1973. With the former's failure, Pinochet and his clique of Falangists would be swiftly discharged from the army and Pinochet was executed by hanging. Allende, now seeing democracy as "weak and prone to military coups" declared the Socialist Republic of Chile and would firmly ally with the Soviet Union, but at some point both nation's relations would deteriorate, causing Allende to seek more positive relations with the United States. At first this decision was impopular, as the Chilean people would consider the US and it's allies as a bastion of "imperialism and class society" and would cause people to lose trust with the government, but after a while, the Chilean economy would start to improve, and Allende would sleep safe knowing that he would not go through another coup d'etat again. In October of 1995, Allende would voluntarily give up power, as he decided that "the people should have full control of their nations' destiny", and would die peacfully in 2001.
Restoration of democracy and current day (1990 - )[]
With Allende's stepdown from power in 1990, snap elections were held in the sam year where the Christian Democratic Party won in a landslide, having Patricio Alywin as president. Alywin's government would be succeded by Arturo Alessandri Besa, the candidate for the Alliance for Chile coalition. Joaquín Lavín would continue with the conservative government by winning against the Concertación Alliance yet again. Sebastían Piñera would win against Eduardo Frei Ruiz-Tagle in the 2009-10 elections. Michelle Bachelet would end the conservative era and end the de facto two-party system that had continued until her election as president. She would be elected for a non-consecutive term in 2013 under the Socialist Party. In 2017, Alejandro Guillier won against Piñera, vying once again for the presidents' office. The current president is José Antonio Kast, winning against the socialist candidate Isabel Allende.
Culture[]
National identity[]
The term Chilenidad describes the Chilean National identity.
Hernán Godoy describes the psychological characteristics of the Chilean, and hence part of the Chilean national identity, with following words: roto, madness, sober, serious, prudent, sense of humor, great fear to the ridicule, servile, cruel, and lack of foresight, among other qualities. Jorge Larraín criticized these older descriptions as "overgeneralized abstractions" impossible to apply to a whole nation.
Dance[]
The national dance is the cueca (short for Zamacueca) and it first appeared at some point in 1824.
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