ABSTRACT This article traces the changes in the meanings and uses of the concept of democracy in Chile in the period 1822–1851. Based on an extensive revision of newspapers, it shows how the idea of democracy evolved from a negative understanding of it to an increasingly positive vision that saw it as a key mechanism for legitimising political power. Essential for this transition were, first, the doctrinal disputes of the 1820s, which established a series of liberal and republican principles that ended up being constituent characteristics of Chilean democracy. Second, the concept of representation, which by normalising a way of exercising power through delegates democratically elected, allowed to cleanse democracy from what contemporaries considered its most menacing excesses. The article identifies four moments of progress and retreats of democracy during the first half of the nineteenth century, demonstrating the extent to which this was a more complex process than what is commonly believed. In so doing, it aims to question some of the general assumptions about the origins of democracy both in Latin America and Chile and to demonstrate how the acknowledgement of the idea of representative democracy was one of the main legacies of these seminal debates for nineteenth-century Chilean politics.

中文翻译：

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从拒绝到承认和争论：智利代议制民主起源的四个时刻，1822-1851

摘要 本文追溯了 1822 年至 1851 年期间智利民主概念的含义和使用的变化。它基于对报纸的广泛修订，展示了民主理念如何从对它的消极理解演变为越来越积极的愿景，将其视为政治权力合法化的关键机制。这一转变的关键首先是 1820 年代的教义争论，这些争论确立了一系列自由主义和共和主义原则，最终成为智利民主的组成特征。其次，代表权的概念通过使通过民主选举的代表行使权力的方式正常化，允许将民主从同时代人认为最具威胁性的过度行为中清除。这篇文章确定了 19 世纪上半叶民主进步和退步的四个时刻，表明这是一个比通常认为的更复杂的过程。这样做的目的是质疑关于拉丁美洲和智利民主起源的一些普遍假设，并展示对代议制民主理念的承认如何成为这些 19 世纪开创性辩论的主要遗产之一。 -世纪智利政治。