Monday, January 16th 2012 - 03:56 UTC

Chilean student leader launches book and considers entering formal politics

The popular student leader and vice president of the University of Chile’s Student Federation (FECh), Camila Vallejo launched her new book “Podemos cambiar el mundo” or “We can change the world” at a central park in the capital Santiago de Chile on the second day of the centenary celebration of the Communist Party, Fiesta de los Abrazos.

Camila: “We can change the world” with the support of the Communist party

On the stage Camila stressed the idea that the struggle for deep structural changes in the education system is a response to the demand from the public and urged the social movement “to come out of marginality” and said it is “not enough to make suggestions for others to carry out.”

The book consists of collected texts written by Camila in 2011, including opinion articles and an unedited interview with Vallejo by Francisco Herreros, a Chilean journalist. Subjects within the texts include the discrepancies within Student Confederation of Chile (CONFECH), the fall of former Minster of Education Joaquín Lavín and the relation between the students’ movement with political parties.

The book is on sale at a special of price of 5.000 Chilean Pesos (approximately 10 dollars) and has already proved popular with sales of 4.500 on the day of release.

The Chilean Communist Party has strengthened its leading young people and proclaimed the former president of the Student Federation of Santiago, Cameron Ballestero, as a candidate for mayor of the Estación Central commune in municipal elections taking place in October of this year.

The party is also considering Vallejo for their candidate for parliamentary elections in November 2013, especially after the survey from Centro de Estudios Públicos or Center for Public Studies, ranked her fourth in the most influential political figures in Chile.

Ms Vallejo reputation is not limited to Chile: she was voted person of the year in a poll of guardian.co.uk readers and has lectured in several Latin American and European countries even before business forums.

 

12 comments Feed

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1 Think (#) Jan 16th, 2012 - 05:24 am Report abuse
TWIMC

As I said before………………………..:

3 Think Aug 28th, 2011
May I present:
Camila Vallejo Dowling....................
Today: Elected President of FECH
Tomorrow: Elected President of Chile
Venceremos
en.mercopress.com/2011/08/27/pinera-yields-and-calls-on-students-and-teachers-to-a-round-of-negotiations
2 wesley mouch (#) Jan 16th, 2012 - 12:35 pm Report abuse
Ms Vallejo is a Socialist/Communist who wants someone else to provide her a free education, lunch, etc. These policies have failed repeatedly but are held very much in esteem by the kook organizations such as the Guardian, mainstream media, etc. We are witnessing the worldwide collapse of Socialism for the second time as socialist scheme come undone because they cannot pay the ridiculous debts they have accumulated.
3 ManRod (#) Jan 16th, 2012 - 01:50 pm Report abuse
An elected comunist president in Chile... good Joke.
Even in their peak power times it was a miracle to get Allende to power (and Allende called himself a socialist, not communist!)
4 xbarilox (#) Jan 16th, 2012 - 05:10 pm Report abuse
So this is what her “love for poor Chilean people” was all about, promotion for her book :)
5 Think (#) Jan 16th, 2012 - 05:42 pm Report abuse
(3) Manrod

She is young, clever, pretty and communist.
She will, eventually, become mature, brilliant, ravishing, socialist…….. and President.

Besides………….
Allende’s election was no miracle…
Not even a surprise…...
Anybody with “2 dedos de frente”could see it coming.

I see that you are Chileno-Alemán……………
Auf welche Deutsche Schule bist du gegangen?
6 Marcos Alejandro (#) Jan 16th, 2012 - 06:57 pm Report abuse
Otto Krause Technical School? :-)
(Paseo Colón Avenue and Chile Street}
7 Think (#) Jan 16th, 2012 - 08:11 pm Report abuse
(6)
Tenía que ser........
Bostero y del Krause!

El Think
Ex CNBA
Bolivar 263
8 xbarilox (#) Jan 16th, 2012 - 09:24 pm Report abuse
CNBA, how surprising is this, NOT!
9 Marcos Alejandro (#) Jan 16th, 2012 - 10:18 pm Report abuse
7 :-)))) Bostero yes, gallina never!

I took only one special class at the Krause, great school as CNBA.
Saludos
10 ManRod (#) Jan 17th, 2012 - 12:14 pm Report abuse
5 Think (#)
” (3) Manrod
She is young, clever, pretty and communist.
She will, eventually, become mature, brilliant, ravishing, socialist…….. and President.“
__________

Indeed, she's young and beautiful... she will become what mostly communist ”icons” become, a marketing product bringing in alot of $ like Che's image...
Become mature? Maybe... Communists mostly become mature sooner and later, and that mainly means they become pragmatic and take distance from their past utopies.
Best example for that is Nicolás Eyzaguirre, former comunist politican and then healed and refined minister of Finance in Chile, and now nothing less then the Director of the International Monetary Fund of the Western Hemisphere. Not bad, huh?

Nicolas as communist daydreamer in the 70ies (yes, the first one with moustache!):
www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLhzm05bWxo

Nicolas as Dicrector of the IMF with anti-debt, and so anti-left wing policies:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5Lc6yCZrCM

Nicolas Wiki entry where you can verify all that:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicol%C3%A1s_Eyzaguirre

____________
Besides…
Allende’s election was no miracle…
Not even a surprise…
Anybody with “2 dedos de frente”could see it coming”
____________

Sorry, but that it totally bulls... I respect your opinion, even it might not be matching with mine, but what you have just said is not an opinion, but simply false.
Allende election was everything else but obvious.
in thr 70 elections, there were 3 candidates:

Alessandri, center-right wing
Tomic, center/conservative
Allende, socialist/marxist

All three had a quite balanced piece of votes, about a third each. Allende 36%, Alessandri 35% and Tomic 29%.
Alessandri and Tomic were quite near in their political points of view, but too proud to step back for the other candidate or to concilliate. THIS is the reason, why Allende won. Chile was not a MATURE democracy then, because there WAS NO popular RUN-OFF round for the last 2, history would have been different
11 Think (#) Jan 17th, 2012 - 06:33 pm Report abuse
(10) ManRod

I do REMEMBER quite well the the 60’s and 70’s political settings in South America.
I do REMEMBER quite well the the 60’s and 70’s political settings in Chile.
I WAS there…………………………………….. Were you?

What I said (and sustain) is that Allende’s election was neither a miracle nor a surprise.
The democratic rules at the time were clear and applied to everybody.
As a matter of fact Alessandri defeated Allende in the 1958 elections with a mere 31.5 percent!

All the rest you write are just Post-rationalizations that may make you feel better but that do not detract an Iota from Dr. Salvador Allende’s democratic victory in 1970

Viele Grüβe aus Chubut
El Think
12 Fido Dido (#) Jan 18th, 2012 - 04:24 am Report abuse
I see that you are Chileno-Alemán…………

Manclown a Chile-German? Pfff those are fake, give me a break, he's a joke like this story. If she's a “communist” she would give her books out for free..but oh wait, that doesn't exist. Socialists love money and spend it buy using other's people's money...sounds likes that other clown pinera.

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