National Congress of Chile

The National Congress (Spanish: Congreso Nacional) is the Chilean legislature. He is based in the port city of Valparaíso and consists of two chambers. The first Chilean Congress was formed on July 4, 1811 by decision ( 1810) the Government junta, then still in Santiago de Chile.

After the coup in Chile in 1973, the Congress was ousted. Only after the end of the military dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet (1973-1989) Congress in Valparaíso was re-constituted on 11 March 1990.

Chamber of Deputies

The Chamber of Deputies ( Cámara de Deputies ) consists of 120 deputies determined through direct election. The whole country is divided into 60 constituencies, where every four years, two representatives are elected. It usually goes one mandate each of the two strongest parties or party alliances. However, the first-placed party provides both MPs when it has twice as many votes as the second-placed party. This electoral system is called binomial electoral system and causes it for small parties hard, but - is not entirely impossible to be elected to Parliament - unlike in a pure majoritarian system. Currently, as 8 of the 120 mandates do not come from one of the two dominant party alliances in the country.

Senate

The Senate ( Senado ) has been a decided on 16 August 2005 constitutional reform 38 members. The elected senators come from 19 electoral districts, each of the twelve regions and the capital has one or two electoral districts. Every four years, half of the senators are elected for a term of eight years.

In addition to the senators elected by the citizens belonged to the constitutional reform ten other members - in the Senate - the so-called " institutional " senators. They were appointed by various institutions and also had a term of eight years. The President could appoint a former minister and a former university rector, the Supreme Court nominated two former judges and a former head of the Court and the National Security Council finally four former army or police chiefs. The former President Eduardo Frei was even " senator for life "; after the loss of this privilege he presented in 2006 successfully re-election. On 11 March 2006 he was elected president of the Senate.