IFES Election Guide - Country Profile: Bolivia

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Parliamentary
December 2014
Presidential
December 2014

Bolivia
Republic of Bolivia
Region: Americas

Description of government structure:

Chief of State: President Juan Evo MORALES Ayma
Head of Government: President Juan Evo MORALES Ayma
Assembly: Bolivia has a bicameral Plurinational Assembly consisting of the Senate with 36 seats and the Chamber of Deputies with 130 seats.

Description of electoral system:

The President is elected by absolute majority vote to serve a 5-year term.*
In the Senate 36 members are elected through a closed-list proportional representation system to serve 5-year terms*. In the Chamber of Deputies, 70 members are elected by plurality vote in single-member constituencies to serve 5-year terms, 53 members are elected through a closed-list proportional representation system to serve 5-year terms and 7 members are elected by plurality vote in single-member constituencies to serve 5-year terms.**

* If no candidate receives a majority of votes, the Senate chooses a President from among the two candidates who receive the most votes.

* Each of the nine Bolivian states elects four Senators. Allocation is by the D'Hondt method. (Before December 2009, there were three Senators per state, and no party could win more than two of the three seats in each.)

** PR seats are apportioned to each state in proportion to population, and these are allocated to parties in proportion to their respective shares of the Presidential vote in each state. Seven reserved indigenous seats are apportioned to non-contiguous, rural areas in seven of the nine states. Voters who declare themselves indigenous may vote for an indigenous deputy instead of in the regular, single-member district election.