The politics of vertical densification in Chile

Bridging planning, contestation and housing welfare under progressive municipalism

Bibliographic Data

ID10859633
AuthorsErnesto López-Morales (0000-0003-2878-7143, Association of Land Appraisers, Chile, corresponding author), Rodrigo Caimanque Leverone (0000-0002-3020-3365, University of Chile), Nicolás Herrera (0000-0002-0451-4813, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile), Nicolás Herrera Castillo (0009-0005-9290-8730, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile), Odette Garrido (0009-0005-1006-7748, University of Chile)
Year2025
Publication date2025-11-11
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueUrban Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0042-0980 • E-ISSN: 1360-063X
PublisherSAGE Publications (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/00420980251377714
OpenAlexW7104599845
LanguageEN
Citations received1
References cited44

While vertical densification offers numerous benefits, it can also lead to environmental harm, damage to cultural heritage, increased housing costs and exclusionary gentrification, posing significant challenges for urban governance. In Chile, new progressive local governments are working to regulate vertical densification. This study compares the development paths of two boroughs: Valparaíso and San Miguel. By utilising official property datasets, density maps and qualitative data analysis based on semi-structured interviews, the study explores how previous market-orientated, laissez-faire vertical densification policies are superseded by stricter regulations driven by progressive local politics, under the promise of alternative, less-dense densification. The cases illustrate, in the first instance, grassroots mobilisation and judicial challenges that restrict vertical growth; and in the second instance, restrictions on density regulations that do not affect floor area ratios. The study reveals the limited effectiveness of these approaches, as they lead to either a shortage of affordable and social housing or exclusionary gentrification, despite the central government’s funding of social housing estates aimed at preventing this. Therefore, more comprehensive densification policies are essential. This case study highlights the fragile governance of vertical densification in Chile’s ‘progressive municipalism’, its centrality in the political trajectories of the boroughs and the challenges in reconciling local community opposition with the need for housing welfare under the (still neoliberal) market rule

Affordable housing · Corporate governance · Grassroots · Horizontal and vertical · Local government · Opposition (politics · Politics · Welfare · Housing, Finance, and Neoliberalism · Latin American Urban Studies · Urban Planning and Governance

Tools

Open DOI