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Electoral Systems

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Electoral Systems

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    1. Electoral Systems

    2. Route to Representation

    3. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mtbfG_eKlZg

    4. 1983 UK Election

    5. 1983 UK Election

    6. 2010 UK Election

    7. 2010 UK Election

    8. Two Great Visions of Democracy Majoritarian Government should respond to the interests of the majority Proportional Government should respond to as many interests as possible

    9. Goals of each vision Majoritarian Clarity of responsibility and identifiable choice Majority Government Majority governments, which dominate policy making Proportional Multiple Choices Proportional governments Coalition government in which many groups participate

    10. Summary of Goals

    11. Does the UK satisfy any vision?

    12. Does the UK satisfy any vision?

    13. Electoral Systems An electoral system is a set of laws that regulate electoral competition between candidates or parties or both. Electoral systems are the primary means of affecting the majoritarian and proportional visions

    14. Route to Representation

    15. Main effects of electoral system

    19. Majoritarian Electoral Systems A majoritarian electoral system is one in which the candidates or parties that receive the most votes win.

    20. SMDP Systems A single-member district plurality (SMDP) system is one in which individuals cast a single vote for a candidate in a single-member district. The candidate with the most votes wins. Examples: United Kingdom, India, Canada, Nigeria, Zambia

    21. SMDP Systems

    22. Alternative Vote The alternative vote is a system of preferential voting. Preferential voting involves voters ranking one or more candidates or parties in order of preference on the ballots.

    23. Alternative Vote The alternative vote, used in single-member districts, is an electoral system in which voters mark their preferences by rank ordering the candidates. A candidate who receives an absolute majority is elected. If no candidate wins an absolute majority, then the candidate with the fewest votes is eliminated and her votes are reallocated until one candidate has an absolute majroity of the valid votes remaining. Example: Legislative elections in Australia and Fiji.

    34. Proportional Electoral Systems A proportional, or proportional representation, electoral system is a quota- or divisor-based electoral system employed in multimember districts. The rationale behind PR systems is to produce a proportional translation of votes into seats. Proportional electoral systems can be divided into those that use party lists and those that do not.

    36. District Magnitude A critical variable for determining the proportionality of an electoral system is the district magnitude. The district magnitude is the number of representatives elected in a district. The larger the district magnitude, the greater the degree of proportionality. In USA, District Magnitude is 1 for federal elections

    37. District Magnitude Although all PR systems use multimember districts, the average size of these districts can vary quite a lot. In the Netherlands and Slovakia, the average district magnitude is 150. In Chile, the average district magnitude is 2.

    38. Electoral Thresholds All proportional systems have an electoral threshold that stipulates the minimum percentage of votes that a party must win to gain representation. This threshold is either legally imposed (formal threshold) or it exists as a mathematical property of the electoral system (natural threshold). When the electoral threshold is high, electoral system proportionality is low.

    39. Electoral Thresholds Natural Threshold Since there is only one district in the Netherlands, the natural threshold is 0.67% of the votes i.e. 100% divided by 150 legislative seats. Formal or Legal Threshold Germany requires that parties win 5% of the national vote or at least 3 constituency seats to be eligible to receive votes from the upper tier. Turkey has a 10% threshold, while Poland has a 5% threshold for parties but an 8% threshold for coalitions.

    40. Electoral Thresholds Formal thresholds are often introduced in an attempt to reduce legislative fragmentation. The 5% threshold in Germany was largely a response to the fractious and unstable party system of Weimar Germany in the interwar period.

    41. Electoral Thresholds Side-Effects of Thresholds In the Turkish legislative elections of 2002, so many parties failed to surpass the 10% threshold that fully 46% of all votes cast in these elections were wasted. In the Polish legislative elections of 1993, fully 34% of the votes were wasted because of the 5% threshold for parties and 8% threshold for coalitions. In the Polish case, these wasted votes were crucial in allowing the former communists to return to power.

    43. List PR In a list PR system, each party presents a list of candidates for a multimember district. Parties receive seats in proportion to their overall share of the votes. These seats are then shared among candidates on the list in various ways.

    44. List PR List PR systems differ in important ways: The type of party list employed. The precise formula used to allocate seats to parties The district magnitude The use of electoral thresholds

    45. Types of Party List In a closed party list, the order of candidates elected is determined by the party itself, and voters are not able to express a preference for a particular candidate. In an open party list, voters can indicate not just their preferred party but also their favored candidate within that party. In a free party list, voters have multiple votes that they can allocate either within a single party list or across different party lines.

    46. Closed Party List The electoral formula determines how many seats a party wins. In a closed list system, these party seats are allocated according to the order of the party list. Example: If a party wins 10 seats, then the top 10 candidates on the party list are elected.

    49. Open Party List The electoral formula determines how many seats a party wins. In an open list system, these party seats are allocated according to whichever party candidates win the most votes. Example: If a party wins 10 seats, then the top 10 vote-winners on the party list are elected.

    51. Effects of Party List Countries with closed list systems have high levels of party discipline. Easy to assign responsibility Easy to predict future behavior Countries with open list systems have relatively low levels of party discipline. Hard to assign responsibility Hard to predict future behavior

    52. Electoral Formulas: Quotas and Divisors All PR systems either employ quotas or divisors to determine how many seats each party wins. In quota systems, the quota indicates the number of votes that guarantees a party a seat in a particular electoral district.

    53. Electoral Formulas: Quotas Hare quota Valid Votes/Seats. Examples: Benin, Liechtenstein, Colombia, Brazil, Peru Droop quota Valid Votes/(Seats+1). Examples: Slovakia, Luxembourg There are other quotas such as the Imperiali quota and the Reinforced Imperiali quota.

    54. Electoral Formulas: Quotas Example: Hare quota Imagine that there are 100,000 voters in a district that is electing 10 members. The Hare quota is 100,000/(10) = 10,000 Thus, each party wins a seat for every 10,000 votes it wins.

    56. Electoral Formulas: Quotas Several ways of allocating the unallocated seats Largest remainder method (Costa Rica, Colombia, Honduras) Highest average method (Brazil) Modified Highest Average Method (Luxembourg)

    59. Electoral Formulas The different electoral formulas influence how proportionally votes are translated into seats.

    60. Mixed Electoral Systems A mixed electoral system is one in which voters elect representatives through two different systems, one majoritarian and one proportional.

    61. Mixed Electoral Systems An electoral tier is a level at which votes are translated into seats. The lowest electoral tier is the district level. Higher tiers are constituted by grouping together lower tier constituencies; they are typically at the regional or national level. Many mixed electoral systems have multiple electoral tiers, with majoritarian formulas used in a lower tier and proportional formulas used in a higher tier.

    62. Mixed Electoral Systems There are two types of mixed electoral systems. An independent mixed system is one in which the application of one electoral formula does not depend on the outcome produced by the other. Example: Russia elects 225 legislators using SMDP and 225 legislators from a single district at the national level.

    64. Mixed Electoral Systems There are two types of mixed electoral systems. An dependent mixed system is one in which the application of one electoral formula is dependent on the distribution of seats or votes produced by the majoritarian formula. In these systems, the proportional component of the electoral system is used to compensate for any disproportionality produced by the majoritarian formula at the constituency level.

    65. Mixed Electoral Systems In most dependent mixed systems, individuals have two votes. One vote is for the representative at the district level (candidate vote) One vote is for the party list in the higher electoral tier (party vote). Example: Germany and New Zealand.

    67. Main effects of electoral system

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