The politics of Costa Rica take place in a framework of a presidential, representative democratic republic, with a multi-party system. Executive power is exercised by the president and their cabinet, and the President of Costa Rica is both the head of state and head of government. Legislative power is vested in the Legislative Assembly. The president and 57 Legislative Assembly deputies are elected for four-year terms. The judiciary operates independently from the executive and the legislature, but is involved in the political process. Costa Rica has a strong system of constitutional checks and balances. Voting is compulsory de jure, but this is not enforced.
The National Liberation Party, nicknamed the verdiblancos, is a political party in Costa Rica. The party is a member of the Socialist International. Social-democratic by statute, the party has a few internal factions, including liberals, Third Way supporters, centrists, and social conservatives.
The Social Christian Unity Party is a centre-right political party in Costa Rica.
Democratic Force nicknamed “El Naranjazo” was a political party in Costa Rica.
General elections were held in Costa Rica on 26 July 1953. José Figueres Ferrer of the National Liberation Party won the presidential election, whilst his party also won the parliamentary election. Voter turnout was 67% in the presidential election and 68% in the parliamentary election. Local elections were also held.
General elections were held in Costa Rica on 2 February 1958. Mario Echandi Jiménez of the National Union Party won the presidential election, whilst the National Liberation Party won the parliamentary election. Voter turnout was 64.7%.
General elections were held in Costa Rica on 4 February 1962. Francisco Orlich Bolmarcich of the National Liberation Party won the presidential election, whilst his party also won the parliamentary election. Voter turnout was 81%.
General elections were held in Costa Rica on 6 February 1966. José Joaquín Trejos Fernández of the National Unification Party won the presidential election, whilst the National Liberation Party won the parliamentary election. Voter turnout was 81%.
General elections were held in Costa Rica on 1 February 1970. Former president José Figueres Ferrer of the National Liberation Party won the presidential election, whilst his party also won the parliamentary election. Voter turnout was 83%.
General elections were held in Costa Rica on 3 February 1974. Daniel Oduber Quirós of the National Liberation Party won the presidential election, whilst his party also won the parliamentary election. Voter turnout was 80%.
General elections were held in Costa Rica on 7 February 1982. Luis Alberto Monge of the National Liberation Party won the presidential election, whilst his party also won the parliamentary election. Voter turnout was 79%.
General elections were held in Costa Rica on 2 February 1986. Óscar Arias of the National Liberation Party won the presidential election, whilst his party also won the parliamentary election. Voter turnout was 82%.
General elections were held in Costa Rica on 4 February 1990. Rafael Ángel Calderón Fournier of the Social Christian Unity Party (PUSC) won the presidential election, whilst his party also won the parliamentary election. Voter turnout was 81.8%.
General elections were held in Costa Rica on 1 February 1998. Miguel Ángel Rodríguez of the Social Christian Unity Party won the presidential election, whilst his party also won the parliamentary election. Voter turnout was 70%, the lowest since the 1950s.
General elections were held in Costa Rica on 3 February 2002. For the first time in the country's history, no candidate in the presidential election passed the 40% threshold. This meant a second round of voting had to be held on 7 April which saw Abel Pacheco of the Social Christian Unity Party defeat the National Liberation Party's Rolando Araya Monge.
Liberalism in Costa Rica is a political philosophy with a long and complex history. Liberals were the hegemonic political group for most of Costa Rica's history especially during the periods of the Free State and the First Republic, however, as the liberal model exhausted itself and new more left-wing reformist movements clashed during the Costa Rican Civil War liberalism was relegated to a secondary role after the Second Costa Rican Republic with the development of Costa Rica's Welfare State and its two-party system controlled by social-democratic and Christian democratic parties.
The Reform State or Reformist State is the period in 20th-century Costa Rican history when the country switched from the uncontrolled capitalism and laissez-faire approach of the Liberal State into a more economically progressive Welfare State. It began about 1940 during the presidency of social reformer Rafael Angel Calderón Guardia, and ended in the 1980s with the neoliberal reforms inherent in the Washington Consensus that began after the government of Luis Alberto Monge.
Calderonism or Calderonismo is a political and ideological doctrine of Costa Rica, which emerged in the 1940s under the leadership of caudillo Dr. Rafael Ángel Calderón Guardia, before, during and after he was president with his National Republican Party, and which was continued by various political forces such as Unity Coalition, National Unification Party and the current Social Christian Unity Party and its split the Social Christian Republican Party. It is together with Liberacionismo one of the two traditional political tendencies of Costa Rican politics, with which it represented a certain type of Costa Rican bipartisanship from 1986 to 2002 and revolves around the Calderón family. It is a form of populist and Catholic Christian socialism very similar to Argentine Peronism. Considered a progressive interpretation of the Catholic social teaching, as well as a form of socialism, Calderonism identified itself with comunismo a la tica, defined as indigenous and Catholic communism exclusive to Costa Rica. Because of this, Calderonism is also referred to as calderocomunismo.
Figuerism or Figuerismo is a political and ideological movement in Costa Rica of social democracy and democratic socialism initiated by José Figueres Ferrer, who exercised the presidency of Costa Rica on three occasions; as de facto ruler after the Costa Rican revolution between 1948 and 1949, and then as democratically elected president twice: 1953–1958 and 1970–1974. Several Costa Rican political parties proclaim themselves as continuators of figuerism and as their most faithful representatives, among them the National Liberation Party, Citizens' Action Party and the Patriotic Alliance, all of whom pay homage to the figure of José Figueres and have personalities in their ranks close to the former president Figueres and of figuerist extraction.
General elections were held in Costa Rica on 6 February 2022, to elect the president, two vice-presidents, and all 57 deputies of the Legislative Assembly. As none of the presidential nominees obtained at least 40% of the votes, a runoff was held on 3 April 2022, between the top two candidates, José María Figueres and Rodrigo Chaves Robles.
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Costa Ricaportal 
