The political design of housing and infrastructure financialization process in Chile

Abstract

The article presents the results of an investigation that aimed to analyze the role of construction entrepreneurs in the transformations of capitalism in Chile from 1951 to 2018. For this, an analysis of documentary content and more than twenty interviews with key actors in the process from businessmen to former ministers of state. Additionally, a network analysis was carried out. All this demonstrated, among other things, that the Chilean construction business acts simultaneously as a union, business group, and structure of Corporate Social Responsibility, in a highly diversified way in various sectors of the economy, which has allowed it to exercise leadership in the political design of the markets within the framework of the Chilean financialization process. The results presented in this document show the incidence of the construction business community in the elaboration of the institutional frameworks that will regulate financial activities in the framework of housing and infrastructure from 1951 onwards.