This week on the Digital Debate, we present the debate about the Constituent
Convention and the constituent process on Twitter from Monday, September 20 to Friday, October 1st. The conversation on the networks focused on the vote regarding the regulation and the controversy involving the detention of the Constituent of the Rapa Nui nation, Tiare Aguilera.

Words

The most used words in the publications on Twitter between September 20 and October 1st were “chile”, “reglamento” (regulation), “proceso” (process), “aguilera”, “tiare” and “gobierno” (government). The name of the Constituent Tiare Aguilera appeared on conversations on Twitter during the early morning of Sunday, September 26, when the police was called to her house in Ñuñoa due to an alleged domestic violence report. During the police operation, one of the officers violently grabbed the Constituent by the neck, which was recorded in video and quickly shared on social networks. The Constituent made a publication denying the existence of a domestic violence situation and criticized the actions of the police. She filed a mistreatment report against the officers and an administrative process was started. The case is still being investigated.

The actions of the officers were criticized by some of the members of the Constituent Convention, especially those inside the group representing the native peoples. On the other hand, other users on the social network said the Convention was intoxicated during the operation, which was shared using the hashtag #borracha (drunk), which became one of the most used hashtags on the past few days on Twitter.

Summary
582,400 tweets
493,900 retweets (85%)
42,600 replies (7%)

Hashtags

The hashtags used the most during these days were #laconvencionsedefiende (the Convention must be defended), #laconstitucionexige2tercios (The Convention demands 2 thirds), #borracha, #convenciontramposa (dodgy Convention) and #circoconstituyente (Conventituent circus). The hashtag #LaConvencionSeDefiende remained strong on Twitter publications after the beginning of a campaign in the second week of September organized by Constituents and other relevant political actors, as published in our Digital Debate in the week of September 7. On the other hand, the hashtag #LaConstitucionExige2Tercios appeared on Twitter during the discussions and vote for the definition of the necessary quorum to approve the proposals for the Convention regulations. Those criticizing the format approved (simple majority) used the hashtag to accuse the Convention of acting arbitrarily and illegally. In addition, the Association of Lawyers for Freedom and Democracy, together with other citizens (including the congressmen Gonzalo Fuenzalida and Jorge Alessandri), filed an appeal at the Santiago Appellate Court against the Constituent Convention and requested that the sessions held between September 18 and 20 were nullified. The Appellate Court considered the request inapplicable.

Timeline
The highest frequency of tweets per hour was registered on September 26 at 10pm.

Tweets with the most retweets

This week, the tweets with the highest number of retweets were published from the account of the presidential candidate for the Republican Party, José Antonio Kast, as well as the accounts of Teresa Marinovic and Jaime Bassa, and the media outlet @PiensaPrensa. José Antonio Kast criticized the Constituent Convention, accusing it of “excluding” the Republic of Chile in the new Constitution: “The more damage they cause to Chile, the more illegitimate they become”, he wrote. On the other hand, the Constituent Teresa Marinovic published two of the five tweets with the most retweets. In one of them, she asked her followers to share a video posted by the YouTube channel of Fundación Nuevamente, in which she appears commenting about “what is happening inside the Convention”. In the other tweet, Marinovic shared a news report published by the media outlet Ex-Ante, which informs about the appeal filed at the Appellate Court to nullify the regulation vote, and again asked her followers to share it. When it became known on September 22 that the Budget Office did not comply with the Convention’s request to complement the funds available, which triggered a conflict between the government and the constituent body, Jaime Bassa published: “The President must comply with the constitutional mandate of providing economic and administrative support to the CC. The requested funds are for our workers, to develop decentralization and territorial equity in our work. #LaConvencionSeDefiende”.

Lastly, the media outlet @PiensaPrensa published information about the aggression against the Constituent Tiare Aguilera, sharing the video and a part of her publication.

Tweet 1:
The Constituent Convention has just excluded the Republic of Chile from the new Constitution. The more damage they cause to Chile, the more illegitimate they become.

Tweet 2:
PLEASE, HELP SHARE THIS
Tere Marinovic: What is happening inside the Convention

Tweet 3:
PLEASE SHRE:
TODAY, 6 CONSTITUENTS FILED A PROTECTION APPEAL TO NULLIFY THE REGULATION VOTE
Constituents from Chile Vamos filed an appeal at the Appellate Court to nullify the regulation vote | Ex-Ante

Tweet 4: The President must comply with the constitutional mandate of providing economic and administrative support to the CC. The requested funds are for our workers, to develop decentralization and territorial equity in our work.
#LaConvencionSeDefiende

Tweet 5:
POLICE OFFICER COKED the Constituent Tiare Aguilera.
In a publication, Tiare said there was no domestic violence (there was no report): “the press lied regarding a discussion with my partner”

Analysis of networks and communities

This week, the account of the Constituent Teresa Marinovic’s regained strength both within her community and in the general debate on Twitter. During these days, unlike in previous Digital Debate publications, we observed the existence of accounts connecting the two communities. In this case, the accounts were CNN and T13.

On the other hand, the most influential accounts in this week’s debate, and also in part of the previous week, were the accounts of Teresa Marinovic, José Antonio Kast, and the Vice President of the Convention Jaime Bassa, followed by the account of President Elisa Loncón and the accounts of Marcela Cubillos and @jou_kaiser.

Methodological note

This week’s analysis was carried out through the following query: (constituyente OR constituyentes OR constitucional OR constitución OR constitucion OR convencion OR convención OR convencionales OR convencional) OR (#convencionconstituyente OR #convenciónconstituyente OR #convencionconstitucional OR #convenciónconstitucional OR #convencion OR #convención) -electoral

With this query, we sought to obtain conversations related to the constituent process. We collected data on conversations produced by users located in Chile and in Spanish. The query considered the period between Monday, September 20 and Friday, October 1st, 2021, aiming to include the regulation vote at the Convention.

* The Digital Democracy Room is a project of FGV DAPP in Brazil in partnership with Animal Político, Bolivia Verifica, Chequeado, Confidencial, Espacio Público, Linterna Verde and Ojo Público. It’s goal is to monitor and analyze the digital conversations regarding the electoral context.

The analysis is available the website of Espacio Público here.