House of Representatives

House of Representatives is a name used by many countries to describe the lower house(s) of their parliament, congress, or legislature. (The corresponding upper house is typically called a Senate.) The functioning of a house of representatives can vary greatly from country to country. Some operate under the rules of a Westminster System while others are more congressional. Members of a House of Representatives are typically apportioned according to population rather than different regions.

The House of Representatives is the name of the lower house of:

the United States Congress; see United States House of Representatives
the Diet of Japan; see House of Representatives of Japan
the Australian Parliament; see Australian House of Representatives
the Irish Parliament; (where it goes under the Irish language title D�il �ireann); see Irish House of Representatives
the Congress of the Philippines; see House of Representatives of the Philippines
most (but not all) of the legislatures of the States in the United States of America; see state legislature.
the Parliament of Malaysia (where it goes under the Malay language title of Dewan Rakyat)
the parliament in other Commonwealth countries such as Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, Fiji and Belize
Puerto Rico; see Puerto Rico House of Representatives

Until 1951 the House of Representatives in New Zealand was the lower house of Parliament, but since then has been unicameral. In Cyprus and Malta, the House of Representatives has always been unicameral.

In Indonesia, the Dewan Perwakilan Rakyat (DPR) is generally known in English as the 'House of Representatives'.

Under apartheid, the House of Representatives was the House for South Africa's mixed race Coloured community, in the tricameral Parliament between 1984 and 1994.