The article describes participation processes developed in the Biobio region in order to answer the question that if these were indeed binding for the political authority and therefore make effective the empowerment of the local community, using the documentary research of the cases added to qualitative interviews with key informants. The conclusion is the existence of a triangle of synergistic factors for a model of participatory territorial democracy: this implies the design of a multi-stakeholder governance system with public, private and citizen intergovernmental cooperation; binding consultation processes as a form of direct democracy, and social empowerment in order to make visible subordinate subjects to be part of the decision-making agora of local and regional policies.