Elections in Chile

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Chile

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Chile holds nationwide presidential, parliamentary and municipal elections. Presidential elections elect a president, who serves as chief of state and head of government for a period of four years (six years between 1994-2006 and before 1973). Parliamentary elections elect 38 senators (two for each constituency) and 120 deputies (two for each constituency). Municipal elections elect one mayor and a number of councilmen per municipality.

Contents

[edit] Voting system

[edit] Presidential

The President is directly-elected nationwide by absolute majority. If no candidate obtains such majority, a runoff between the two most voted candidates is held.

[edit] Parliamentary

Chile's bicameral Congress consists of a Chamber of Deputies (lower house) and a Senate. The country is divided into 60 constituencies for the lower house and 19 for the Senate. Each constituency elects two representatives.

For parliamentary elections Chilean parties may group themselves into groups (called pacts or lists). Each group may submit up to two candidates per constituency. The two most voted candidates in each constituency are elected. However, if the most voted group obtains double or more the amount of votes of the second most voted group, the two candidates from the most voted group are elected.

The system has been much criticized, in part due to the difficulty that the most voted list can double the amount of votes of the second most voted list, opening up the possibility for a second most voted list candidate to be elected with a percentage of the vote smaller than that of the second most voted candidate overall. This has resulted in an almost evenly divided Congress between representatives of the governing Coalition of Parties for Democracy (CPD) and of the right-wing Alliance for Chile (APC), and negating representation to candidates of the extreme-left parties within the Together We Can Do More (JPM) pact.

This system was established by the military dictatorship that ruled the country until 1990, replacing the previous proportional system. Some view this system as undemocratic, while others say it has given the country stability. In April 2007, president Michelle Bachelet sent a bill to Congress to reform this system, so that 20 additional seats in the Chamber of Deputies are elected under the rules of a proportional system, in which parties or coalitions obtaining over 5% of the votes are guaranteed representation in Congress.

[edit] Examples

In this example, List A does not "double" List B in total votes, therefore the elected candidates for Constituency X are Candidate A from List A and Candidate A from List B, even though the unelected Candidate B from List A obtained more votes than the elected Candidate A from List B.

This means that unless a list obtains an overwhelmingly large majority, it can only aspire to win 1 seat per constituency.

Constituency X
List Candidate A Candidate B Total Result
A 35% 30% 65% 1 seat
B 20% 13% 33% 1 seat
C 1% 1% 2% —

The reverse may also happen, that is, that a candidate is so strong that it helps a much weaker fellow list candidate gain a seat too.

In this case List A "doubles" List B, therefore its two candidates are elected, regardless of the fact that Candidate B of List A actually came out in fourth place, below both candidates from List B.

Constituency Y
List Candidate A Candidate B Total Result
A 60% 5% 65% 2 seats
B 25% 7% 32% —
C 2% 1% 3% —

[edit] Municipal

In municipal elections, mayors are elected by a simple majority, while councilmen seats are decided using the D'Hondt method.

[edit] Latest elections

[edit] Presidential election, 2005–2006

Main article: Chilean presidential election, 2005–2006
e•d Chilean presidential election results
Candidates and nominating parties Votes 1st rnd. % Votes run-off %
Michelle Bachelet Jeria - Socialist Party of Chile/CPD 3,190,691 45.96 3,723,019 53.49
Sebastián Piñera Echenique - National Renewal 1,763,964 25.41 3,236,394 46.50
Joaquín Lavín Infante - Independent Democratic Union 1,612,608 23.23 - -
Tomás Hirsch Goldschmidt - Humanist Party/JPM 375,048 5.40 - -
Total valid votes 6,942,041 100 6,959,413 100
Null votes 180,485 2.5 154.972 2.16
Blank votes 84,752 1.18 47,960 0.67
Total votes (Turnout 87.67% / 87.12%) 7,207,278 100 7,162,345 100
Total voters enrolled 8,220,897 8,220,897
Source: Tricel [1] (1st rnd.) / Tricel [2] (PDF) (runoff)

[edit] Parliamentary election, 2005

Main article: Chilean parliamentary election, 2005
e•d Chilean parliamentary election results
Coalitions and parties Chamber of Deputies Senate
Votes % Seats Votes % Seats 20051 Seats 20012 Total
A Independent Regional Force (Fuerza Regional Independiente) 1.18 1 0.64 0 0 0
National Alliance of Independents (Alianza Nacional de los Independientes) 0.31 0 0.28 0 0 0
Regionalist Action Party of Chile (Partido de Acción Regionalista de Chile) 0.41 1
Independents List A 0.46 0 0.36 0 0 0
B Coalition of Parties for Democracy (Concertación de Partidos Por la Democracia) 51.78 65 55.74 11 9 20
Christian Democrat Party (Partido Demócrata Cristiano) 20.81 20 29.65 5 2 7
Party for Democracy (Partido por la Democracia) 15.45 21 10.74 1 2 3
Socialist Party of Chile (Partido Socialista de Chile) 9.98 15 12.12 4 4 8
Social Democrat Radical Party (Partido Radical Socialdemócrata) 3.54 7 2.44 1 1 2
Independents List B 2.00 2 0.79 0 0 0
C Together We Can Do More (Juntos Podemos Más) 7.39 0 5.98 0 0 0
Communist Party of Chile (Partido Comunista de Chile) 5.13 0 2.17 0 0 0
Humanist Party (Partido Humanista) 1.56 0 1.46 0 0 0
Independents List C 0.7 0 2.35 0 0 0
D Alliance for Chile (Alianza por Chile) 38.70 54 37.26 8 9 17
Independent Democrat Union (Unión Demócrata Independiente) 22.34 33 21.56 5 4 9
National Renewal (Renovación Nacional) 14.13 19 10.8 3 5 8
Independents List D 2.23 2 4.90 0 0 0
Independent (off-pact) 0.95 0 0.38 1 0 1
Total   100.0 120   100.0 20 18 38
Source: Interior Ministry

1 Only 20 out of 38 seats were contested in this election.
2 These 18 seats were contested in the 2001 election.

[edit] Past elections and referendums

v • d • e
Chilean presidential elections Flag of Chile
1826 | 1827 | 1829 | 1831 | 1836 | 1841 | 1846 | 1851 | 1856 | 1861 | 1866 | 1871 | 1876 | 1881 | 1886 | 1891 | 1896 | 1901 | 1906 | 1910 | 1915 | 1920 | 1925 | 1927 | 1931 | 1932 | 1938 | 1942 | 1946 | 1952 | 1958 | 1964 | 1970 | 1989 | 1993 | 1999–2000 | 2005–06 | 2009
Chilean parliamentary elections Flag of Chile
1811 | 1818 | 1823 | 1824 | 1825 | 1827 | 1829 | 1831 | 1834 | 1837 | 1840 | 1843 | 1846 | 1849 | 1852 | 1855 | 1858 | 1861 | 1864 | 1867 | 1870 | 1873 | 1876 | 1879 | 1882 | 1885 | 1888 | 1891 | 1894 | 1897 | 1900 | 1903 | 1906 | 1909 | 1912 | 1915 | 1918 | 1921 | 1924 | 1925 | 1930 | 1932 | 1937 | 1941 | 1945 | 1949 | 1953 | 1957 | 1961 | 1965 | 1969 | 1973 | 1989 | 1993 | 1997 | 2001 | 2005
Chilean referendums Flag of Chile
1925 | 1978 | 1980 | 1988 | 1989

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

v • d • e
Elections in South America
Sovereign states Argentina · Bolivia · Brazil · Chile · Colombia · Ecuador · Guyana · Panama* · Paraguay · Peru · Suriname · Trinidad and Tobago* · Uruguay · Venezuela
Dependencies Aruba* (Netherlands) · Falkland Islands (UK) · French Guiana (France) · Netherlands Antilles* (Netherlands) · South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands (UK)
* Territories also in or commonly reckoned elsewhere in the Americas (North America).
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