La diversidad institucional del bicameralismo en América Latina

Abstract

This paper centers on the study of institutions in bicameral legislative systems in Latin America, paying attention to their variations and the potentially different results affecting the decision making system. It aims to identify the impact each institutional arrangement may have on the legislators' strategies and behavior and on various aspects of public policy development. For this purpose, various institutional characteristics are examined, such as: the rules of legislators' selection, the representation basis, chambers' size, election requirements, term duration, partial seat renewal, and the different modalities for treating legislative bills. The sample of countries for systematic comparison is composed of Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, Paraguay and Uruguay. Secondarily, the following countries that formerly had bicameral systems were included: Ecuador, Nicaragua, Peru and Venezuela.