When Camila Vallejo announced in 2012 that she intended to run for the Chilean Congress, many on the Left accused her of being a “sellout.” The previous year she had become one of the most visible faces of student protests demanding free and quality education, as spokeswoman for the Confederation of Chilean Students (CONFECH). Indeed, there was so much international media attention around her that in October 2011, Guardian readers chose her as person of the year.

But for many in Chile, her bid for Congress was a betrayal of the protests’ antiestablishment sentiment. Twenty years after the return to democracy, the neoliberal misery imposed by Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship persisted — and many saw parliamentary politics as the place where promises went to die, including ones from figures on the Left.

Today, Camila Vallejo is nearing the end of her second term as a congresswoman, and this August she announced that she will not seek a third. The reactions to this news were quite different from the response to her first candidacy nine years ago, as a wave of support on social media lamented the Communist legislator’s departure from Congress. But it’s also true that Vallejo’s legislative work has been an uphill struggle — not only because of the Right’s staunch defense of the neoliberal system, but also because of a stubborn center-left stranded in failed Third Way politics.