In his introduction to this volume, Weyland locates the administrations of Socialist Presidents Ricardo Lagos (2000–06) and Michelle Bachelet (2006–2010) closest to the moderate pole among current leftist governments in Latin America. We concur and hope to contribute to the discussion by elucidating the sources of this moderation and examining the performance of these governments in the areas of political management, economic policies, and social policies and labor market reforms. The Lagos and Bachelet governments have pursued similar market-friendly economic policies to their predecessors. Although both presidents have made important progress in overcoming the political institutional legacies of Augusto Pinochet's dictatorship, moderate progress in labor market policies, and impressive progress in two social policy areas, very little improvement has been seen in the realm of fostering citizen participation and empowering labor and social movements through organization and linkages to political parties. We compare the Lagos and Bachelet governments to those of their Christian Democratic predecessors as well as to each other with the goal of identifying policy successes, failures, and omissions. We argue that the administrations' moderation stems from the political experiences of the leadership and their resulting approach to building relationships to the party rank-and-file and to civil society, the fact that these are coalition governments, and the constraints of the Pinochet political and economic legacies.

POLITICAL CONSTRAINTS AND MANAGEMENT

Political constraints in contemporary Chile originate from institutional design (the Pinochet-era constitution), political learning among left-party elites, the organizational weakness of left-leaning parties, and the fact that these are coalition governments.