National Renewal (Chile)

National Renewal Renovación Nacional
Leader	Carlos Larraín
Founded	April 29, 1987 (1987-04-29)
Headquarters	Antonio Varas 454, Santiago de Chile
Coalition	Coalition for Change
Ideology	Conservatism, Patriotism, Liberal conservatism, Liberalism, Neoliberalism
Political position	Centre-right/Right-wing
International affiliation	International Democrat Union
Regional affiliation	Union of Latin American Parties
Chamber of Deputies	18 / 120
Senate	8 / 38
Local government	55 / 345
Website
www.rn.cl
Politics of Chile Political parties Elections

National Renewal (RN) (Spanish: "Renovación Nacional"), is a liberal conservative political party belonging to the Chilean right-wing political coalition Coalition for Change in conjunction with the Independent Democratic Union (UDI) and the Chile First movement (CH1). The party president is Carlos Larraín, and its principal leaders are Sebastián Piñera, president of Chile, and Andrés Allamand.

History

National Renewal was formed in 1987 when three rightist organizations — the National Unity Movement (Movimiento de Unidad Nacional MUN), the National Labor Front (Frente Nacional del Trabajo FNT), and the Independent Democratic Union (Unión Democráta Independiente UDI) — joined together in preparation for the 1988 Plebiscite that would determine the continuity of rule of Augusto Pinochet who had been in power since the coup of 1973. The UDI soon broke away to run as a separate party due to its strong support for the plebiscite and a Pinochet candidacy, while the remaining National Renewal party indicated its preference for an open election or a candidate other than Pinochet. However, once Pinochet was proclaimed candidate, the overwhelming majority of National Renewal supported him.

The party was founded on April 29 with 351 founding members. In this way, National Renewal was the first political party to form in Chile after the lifting on the ban of political parties that had been established after the coup; by December of that year, 61,167 members, led by Andrés Allamand, had joined. The principal idea that the party proclaimed was to generate an environment of calm during the return of democracy. The party supported UDI candidate Joaquín Lavín as the sole Alliance candidate in the 1999/2000 presidential elections, who went on to obtain 47.5% of the votes in the first round, but was subsequently defeated in the second round by Ricardo Lagos.

During early 2005, the party initially supported Lavín to again run as the sole candidate of the Alliance in the presidential election of that year. However, in face of Lavin's declining opinion poll numbers, Sebastián Piñera announced his candidacy as the National Renewal candidate thus ensuring that the Alliance have two candidates for the election. In the first round on 11 December, Piñera obtained 25.4% of the vote, which was enough to send him to the run-off on 15 January 2006 with Michelle Bachelet. With 46.5% of the vote, Piñera was defeated by Bachelet.

In the legislative elections, also on 11 December 2005, the party won, as part of the Alliance for Chile, 20 out of 120 seats in the Chamber of Deputies and currently holds 7 out of 38 seats in the Senate.

In the 2010 presidential election, Sebastian Piñera was elected president of Chile.

Presidents of National Renewal

National Renewal has had eight party presidents in its history:

• Ricardo Rivadeneira (1987)
• Sergio Onofre Jarpa (1987-1990)
• Andrés Allamand (1990-1999)
• Alberto Espina (1999)
• Alberto Cardemil (1999-2001)
• Sebastián Piñera (2001-2004)
• Sergio Diez (2004-2006)
• Carlos Larraín (2006-)

See also

• Alliance for Chile
• Independent Democrat Union
• Joaquín Lavín

External links

• National Renewal (Spanish)
• National Renewal Youth (Spanish)