Transparencia y leyes secretas en chile secret laws and transparency in chile

The author analyzes the constitutional problem of secret laws in Chile, after the 2005 reform to the Constitution. First, describing briefly the normative basis for the publicity of laws in a democratic State. Then, the article reviews the new constitutional publicity principle, established in article 8° of the Chilean Constitution. Additionally, it examines the constitutionality of secret laws from two approaches: confronting their compatibility with the general principle of transparency -as a foundation of the state's institutions- and reviewing the possibility of a breach of the essential content of the fundamental right of freedom of information.