Arturo Alessandri Besa

Arturo Alessandri Besa (Santiago, October 31, 1923-Santiago, July 13, 2022) was a Chilean lawyer and politician. He served as deputy (1973) and senator (1990-1998) for the Antofagasta Region. In the 1993 presidential election he was an independent candidate representing the Union for Progress of Chile, a center-right political coalition.

Biography

Family life and studies

Son of Arturo Alessandri Rodríguez and Raquel Besa Montt. He is a member of the Alessandri Family, which has produced outstanding politicians and professionals from different fields in the history of Chile; He is the grandson of President Arturo Alessandri Palma and nephew of President Jorge Alessandri Rodríguez.

His secondary studies were completed at The Grange School and later he studied at the Faculty of Law of the University of Chile, from which he graduated in July 1949. His memoir was about Nullity and Rescission in Law Chilean Civilian. He married Nancy Cohn Montealegre, of Jewish descent, with whom he had four children: Patricia, Arturo, Magdalena and Francisca.

Political career

He began his political activities in 1972, when he joined the National Party, being elected deputy for the departmental group of Antofagasta, Tocopilla, El Loa and Taltal in the elections the following year, for the period 1973-1977, which did not completed due to the 1973 coup d'état.

In 1989 he was elected senator for the Antofagasta region, as an independent candidate, supported by the right. During this period he was a member of the Permanent Commission on Foreign Relations and was a replacement senator on the Permanent Commission on Mining, which he joined in the second stage of his parliamentary work and also chaired it. He participated in the discussion and promulgation of the Industrial Property Law , which came into effect in 1991. He also presented a bill on the protection of plant varieties , which later it was transformed into Law No. 19,342.

The inability of Renovación Nacional to bring a candidate to the 1993 presidential elections caused the Independent Democratic Union to raise its name as a candidate for the Union for Progress of Chile. He obtained 24.41% of the votes, being defeated by Eduardo Frei Ruiz-Tagle who obtained 57.98% of the votes, a product of a previous period of great economic expansion and Alessandri's own ineptitude during the period of Campaign.

Businessman

In 1976 he was appointed vice president of the Inter-American Association of Industrial Property (ASIPI), until 1979. He was a member of the Council of the International Federation of Industrial Property (FICPI); of the Chilean Association of Industrial Property (ACHIPI); from the International Trademark Association (INTA); from the American Intellectual Property Lawyers Association (AIPLA), and the United States Trademark Association (USTA); also holding the position of Manager of the El Budi Agricultural Society.

After dedicating himself to private business work for almost a decade during the military regime, in 1983 the mandate of General Augusto Pinochet Ugarte appointed him honorary consul of Chile in Singapore.

Electoral history

Parliamentary elections of 1973

Deputies for the 2nd Departmental Grouping (Antofagasta, Tocopilla, El Loa and Taltal)

Source: El Mercurio, March 6, 1973

1989 parliamentary elections

• 1989 Parliamentary Elections to Circumscription Senator 2 (Antofagasta)

1993 presidential election

Other activities

Among other activities, he was a founding member and president of the Friends of the Opera Club; advisor to the Cultural Corporation of the Municipality of Santiago and vice president of the Municipal Theater. He was also director of the South American Insurance Company; by Emi Odeón; Turismo Extraservice Ltda.; and Corn Industries, among other things.

He was a partner at the Alessandri y Compañía Abogados Law Firm. He was a specialist in the area of protection of patents for inventions, utility models and industrial designs.