Ernesto Silva Méndez

Ernesto Silva Méndez (born 15 August 1975) is a Chilean politician who served as deputy.

Biography He was born on 15 August 1975 in Santiago, the son of Ernesto Silva Bafalluy and María Cristina Méndez Ureta.

He is married to Jimena Álamos and is the father of five children.

Professional career He studied at Colegio del Verbo Divino in Santiago, where he served as president of the Student Center in 1993. He pursued higher education at the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile, earning a Licentiate in Legal and Social Sciences in 2000 with a thesis entitled "Horizontal Mergers under United States Antitrust Law". He was admitted to the bar on 8 August 2001. He also participated in a student exchange program at Duke University in the United States.

In 2002, he received the Presidente de la República Scholarship for postgraduate studies and was admitted to the University of Chicago, where he obtained a master's degree in Public Policy. In 2016, he earned a Ph.D. in Political Science from the Autonomous University of Madrid with the dissertation "The Chilean Senior Public Management System: A Case Study from the Principal–Agent Model Perspective".

In academia, he served as a teaching assistant in courses such as Roman Law and Constitutional Law at the Law School of the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile.

Professionally, until 2002 he worked as a legal clerk and, after qualifying as a lawyer, as an attorney at Carey y Compañía Limitada Abogados. Since 2004, he has taught various economic and political courses at the Universidad del Desarrollo, where he served as Vice-Rector for Undergraduate Studies in 2007. He also worked as a university evaluator through the National Accreditation Commission. Additionally, he has been a columnist for La Segunda and Diario Financiero, and has published research on state modernization and political competition.

After completing his parliamentary duties, he devoted himself to academia, serving as Pro-Rector and later as Vice-Rector for Postgraduate Studies, Continuing Education and Extension at the Universidad del Desarrollo.

Political career He has been involved with the Independent Democratic Union (UDI) since his school years, and in 1993 supported the candidacy of Carlos Bombal for deputy in District No. 23 of the Santiago Metropolitan Region.

In 1996, he was vice president of the Student Center of the Faculty of Law and, two years later, became its president. In 1997, he served as secretary general of the Movimiento Gremial UC and organized various social activities, including winter and summer volunteer programs.

He has been a member of the Economic Commission of the UDI.

On 10 May 2014, the General Council of the Independent Democratic Union ratified him as president of the party, succeeding Patricio Melero Abaroa, who had led the UDI between 2012 and 2014. On 11 March 2015, he publicly announced his resignation from the presidency of the UDI.