The establishment of a market model of healthcare in Chile: 1973–1990

Jaime Llambías-Wolff

Chapter 22 in Handbook on the Social Determinants of Health, 2025, pp 306-315 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: This chapter analyzes the development of the neoliberal market approach implemented after the 1973 coup d’état in Chile. In 1974, Decree Law No. 788 was enacted, specifying that constitutional, legislative, and executive powers would be exercised by Decree Laws issued by the military junta. In addition to concentrating legislative and executive powers in a single body, constituent power, which in democracy lies in the people, was “legally” eliminated. A neoliberal economic revolution, carried out by dictatorial rule, destroyed the long-standing and broad societal consensus on developing the welfare state. Radical transformations changed the relationship between state and society by replacing conventional negotiated social reforms, which had addressed important components of the social determinants of health, with pure market principles and a subsidiary state. In the health sector, the rationale was threefold: (1) the withdrawal and restructuring of the public health sector; (2) the creation of a market for the private health sector; and (3) the stimulation of the autonomy for a strong private healthcare system.

Keywords: Economics and Finance; Sociology and Social Policy; Sustainable Development Goals (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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