Analysis of regulatory authority of the municipal ordinance in the context of street harassment: notion, limits and role in the social scenario. Study focused in the municipal ordenance of street harassment of the municipality of Las Condes and Recoleta

Abstract

This article analyzes the legal institution of the municipal regulations, defined as general norms and mandatory to the community, by virtue of the provisions of article 12 of the Law No. 18,695. For these purposes, we examine the regulatory power that legislator grants to municipalities, understood as autonomous public law corporations, by virtue of which, the figure of the municipal ordinances arises, with a series of formal and material limitations, that seek to protect the hierarchy and innovative value in the laws, and seeks to position municipal ordinances with an infralegal value. Neverthelessto which, the year 2018 in our country we witnessed a paradigm shift in terms of feminist claims and advocacy agenda, under which, street harassment was part of the discussion in the various social sectors, and the municipalities did not ignore this debate, but rather, they issued municipal ordinances that sought to protect women in contexts of street harassment. The article suggest that the municipal ordinances by the mandate given by the legislator, would be prevented from regulating street harassment, since it exceeds its competition matter, and gives an innovative quality to these ordinances. Adding also that street harassment as reprehensible behavior threatens the sexual indemnity of women, and undermines their constitutional guarantees, so that the legal good that seeks to protect requires greater protection, which would be through a law. To all the above, this author does not detract from these ordinances, since they have been important at the time of enriching the debate on a topic of great relevance for women in our country, but they are not enough, considering that these cannot assume an innovative position in the creation of law, under the risk of transgressing fundamental principles through which our State of Law is built, that is the separation of powers.