Hydric Discussions and the Impact of Ideas on the Water Code Reform in Chile (2011-2022)

Abstract

In 2022, the most comprehensive reform to the Chilean Water Code was enacted since its establishment in 1981. It incorporates a series of important changes in the way water resources are conceived in the country. This reform presents an interesting problem to investigate: on the one hand, the duration of its discussion (11 years) and its promulgation in the context of strong pressures to reject it is striking. On the other hand, various authors have questioned the degree of transformation of the changes made. This article aims to advance in these directions: analyze the factors that contributed to the enactment of the reform and evaluate the magnitude of the changes made. In particular, using the advocacy coalitions framework, the article analyzes the role of ideas in coalition formation and policy change and uses them as a reference to evaluate the degree of policy change. To do this, we elaborated a database from press articles and performed a qualitative content analysis to track changes in discourses over time. The article shows the existence of two coalitions with identifiable groups of ideas, which go through a learning process in which they incorporated fundamental elements of the contending coalition, thus facilitating policy change. It is argued, based on the above, that although there is an important change in this policy, it is not paradigmatic with respect to the statu quo.