There's a large gap between managing incivilities and this direction.
Kast's registry would penalize non-criminal conduct and strip social benefits like education subsidies and housing assistance from those registered. Collado warns the policy confuses minor infractions with organized crime, sending wrong signals and misallocating state security resources.
- President Kast announced the Vandal Registry during his first State of the Union address on Monday
- The policy would remove education subsidies, universal pensions, and housing assistance from those registered
- Rafael Collado served as Chile's first undersecretary of public security under Boric
Ex-subsecretario Rafael Collado rejects President Kast's proposed Vandal Registry, arguing it conflates administrative infractions with serious crimes and discriminates against vulnerable populations through benefit removal.
Rafael Collado, a criminal law attorney who served as Chile's first undersecretary of public security under Gabriel Boric, delivered a sharp critique this week of a new policy announced by President José Antonio Kast: a registry that would catalog people for acts of vandalism and incivility, then strip them of social benefits. During his first State of the Union address to Congress on Monday, Kast outlined the measure, which would classify certain non-criminal behaviors as infractions and authorize the removal of education subsidies, universal pensions, and housing assistance from those registered.
Collado's objection cuts to what he sees as a fundamental confusion at the heart of the policy. The registry, he argues, conflates minor administrative violations with serious criminal activity—a categorical mistake that will misdirect state resources away from organized crime and toward the stigmatization of individuals. "Controlling incivilities is correct," Collado said in an interview, "but having a Vandal Registry doesn't seem like the right path. There's a large gap between the shared goal of managing incivilities better and the direction this government is taking."
The ambiguity of what constitutes a "vandal" troubles him most. Is it an economic criminal? A gang leader? A young person playing loud music in a plaza? The term itself resists clear definition, yet the policy treats all such cases as equivalent threats. This muddying of categories, Collado contends, sends a confused signal to organized crime while treating administrative infractions with the severity reserved for felonies. "It mixes administrative incivilities, which can be addressed through fines or community service, with criminals committing serious crimes," he explained. "Those criminals should be treated as such, subjected to criminal process, and punished with prison sentences."
Beyond the conceptual problem lies a question of fairness. Collado flagged the removal of social benefits as inherently discriminatory—a mechanism that will fall hardest on those already economically vulnerable. A person without resources cannot easily absorb the loss of education subsidies or housing assistance the way a wealthier person might. The policy, in effect, weaponizes poverty against the poor.
Yet Collado's critique is not wholesale rejection of the government's security agenda. He noted continuities between Kast's announced approach and strategies from the previous administration, particularly the "Streets Without Violence" plan and the territorial intervention model that Security Minister Martín Arrau has outlined. Collado sees merit in the focus on specific neighborhoods and sustained investment in public space recovery. "Security is made in the territory," he observed, and the new government appears to understand that much. What troubles him is that this sensible territorial approach may be overshadowed or undermined by the registry's blunt instrument of benefit removal—a policy that conflates the minor with the serious and punishes the vulnerable for the sake of appearing tough on disorder.
Citações Notáveis
It mixes administrative incivilities, which can be addressed through fines or community service, with criminals committing serious crimes.— Rafael Collado
The loss of social benefits is a discriminatory measure.— Rafael Collado
A Conversa do Hearth Outra perspectiva sobre a história
When Kast announced this registry, what was your first instinct about what it was really trying to do?
It felt like a response to public frustration with visible disorder—graffiti, noise, broken windows. But the mechanism they chose doesn't match the problem. They're using a sledgehammer on a nail.
You said the policy sends a confused signal to organized crime. What did you mean by that?
If you treat a kid spray-painting a wall the same way you treat a drug trafficker, you've lost the ability to distinguish threat levels. Criminals see that and realize the state isn't serious about the real threats—just about appearing tough.
The benefit removal piece seems to be where your concern sharpens. Why is that worse than, say, a fine?
A fine is proportional and reversible. Losing education subsidies or housing assistance? That's permanent damage to someone's life trajectory. It's not a penalty—it's exclusion.
Do you think the government understands the difference between what they're trying to do and how it will actually work?
I think they understand the territorial strategy—that part is sound. But the registry feels like political theater layered on top of something that could work. It's the wrong tool for the job.
What would you do instead?
Enforce the laws that already exist. Invest in the neighborhoods where disorder is concentrated. Make the consequences clear and swift, but proportional. Don't create permanent records for temporary problems.