The Chamber of Deputies () was the lower house of

Venezuela Venezuela (; ), officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela ( es, link=no, República Bolivariana de Venezuela), is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many islands and islets in th ...

's legislative under its 1961 constitution; the

Venezuelan Senate The Senate of Venezuela was the upper house of Venezuela's legislature under its 1961 constitution. Under the 1999 constitution, the bicameral system was replaced by the unicameral National Assembly of Venezuela. However, since 1999 the former cham ...

was the upper house. Under the 1999 constitution, the bicameral system was replaced by the unicameral National Assembly of Venezuela. LegislativoCentro

At the

1993 Venezuelan parliamentary election General elections were held in Venezuela on 5 December 1993. Dieter Nohlen (2005) ''Elections in the Americas: A data handbook, Volume II'', p555 The presidential elections were won by Rafael Caldera of National Convergence, who received 30.5% o ...

, the Chamber saw the introduction of a mixed member proportional representation system, modelled on the German system, with some variations. This replaced the previous "closed-list proportional representation system hich hadled to an extremely party-centered system." The traditionally dominant Democratic Action and COPEI "supported it because it looked the most like the system under which they had prospered".Crisp, Brian F. and Rey, Juan Carlos (2003), "The Sources of Electoral Reform in Venezuela", in Shugart, Matthew Soberg, and Martin P. Wattenberg, ''Mixed-Member Electoral Systems – The Best of Both Worlds?'', Oxford:

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the university press of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world, and its printing history dates back to the 1480s. Having been officially granted the legal right to print books ...

, 2003. pp. 173–194(22)

"Seats for the Chamber of Deputies were allocated to each state on the basis of its population. Since 1970 a number of citizens equal to 0.55% of the population is entitled to a deputy, but since 1993 no state can have fewer than three deputies. A quota for additional seats in the Chamber of Deputies is calculated by dividing the total number of votes cast by the number of deputies determined by the size of the population. The number of votes received by each party nationally for deputies is divided by this result, and the difference between the seats already won and this final result is the number of additional seats awarded to the party. As in the Senate, there has always been a limit to the total number of additional seats any given party can receive. (Since 1980 no party has been allowed more than five additional seats in the Chamber of Deputies.)"

At the Chamber's last election in 1998, it had 207 members.

Presidents of the Chamber of Deputies

References

Legislative branch of the Government of Venezuela Defunct lower houses 1961 establishments in Venezuela 1999 disestablishments in Venezuela {{Venezuela-gov-stub

Presidents of the Chamber of Deputies

See also

References