Electoral systems have always fascinated political science scholars from all around the globe due to their very diverse and complex nature. Particularly how their evolution and different characteristics could impact the stability and effectiveness of governments, how these systems ensure that the people in power are held accountable for the quality of their statesmanship, how voters’ preferences can be translated, and many more. They have been designed with one aim in mind, specifically, ensuring that the majority is in power and that minorities also get to have a say (Bogdanor, 1997, p. 80). However, the ways these systems go about achieving these aims differ from one another, pointing out their qualities and their inefficiencies. It is worth acknowledging that while most of the world’s democracies are well established and functional, there are also some which lack democratic legitimacy or not all members of society are equally and fairly represented, which means that they could need electoral reform as this may as well be a state’s only solution out of corruption and inequality (Tremblay, 2007). The purpose of this essay will be to examine the impact that various electoral systems have when it comes to how efficiently voters’ preferences are reflected by each one, as well as point out their differences and it will do so by looking at three in particular: proportional representation systems, plurality, and mixed systems.
The first electoral system that the essay will look at is the plurality electoral system, also known as the first-past-the-post system. Having been around for a long time, this type of electoral system is considered to be functional, and robust, yet simple and effective to implement and understand. As the name implies, this is a system where the majority has to have 50 per cent plus one of the total votes to win, provided this is a race between two parties, and voters are allowed to cast only one vote for one candidate. The same rule applies if three, four, or more candidates participate in the electoral race. It is a system geared more towards efficiency, one of its primary aims being to “produce an effective working parliamentary majority for the government” (Norris, 1997, p. 301), which will result in the smooth running of a nation. However, such attributes do not come without a cost. This means that they will usually result in compromises in other areas that could stand in the way of other aspects, such as maximising the chances all voters are given or having a representative parliamentary system. To highlight this idea, one could imagine the effects of an election where the majority would represent almost a fourth of the total number of voters while the rest, or the remaining three quarters, would be unsatisfied with the final result. In such a case, the majority would be a ruling ‘minority’, making the entire electoral process feel as if it is unjust to the rest of the voters and that their votes do not make a difference.
However, in general, when it comes to plurality systems, they tend to show increased long-term stability compared to others, which is because politicians try their best to improve the happiness of all of their voters (Presson and Tabellini, 2006, p. 3). To illustrate this point, one could examine countries such as the United States, Canada, or the United Kingdom. These countries have very well-established democracies that have been functioning well for a very long period without too many incidents, which shows the stability and resilience of the majoritarian electoral systems they have since they have been able to pass most of their legislation or manifesto policies without facing too many challenges post-election or having to negotiate with their coalition partners (Norris, 1997).
It is worth noting that plurality and majoritarian systems are subject to much criticism from scholars, as some of them argue that they do not manage to achieve either full majoritarian rule or fair representation of minorities (Bogdanor, 1997), while others believe that a system such as the first-past-the-post fails to account for the voter’s order of preferences when it comes to selecting a candidate, which could lead to misleading results. Another flaw this type of electoral system presents can observed by looking at Canada’s system. Not too long ago, women and Aboriginals did not manage to successfully secure seats in the House of Commons proportionally to their population size (Courtney, 1999). This reflects how one type of electoral system tends not to favour gender equality or the representation of minorities. Certain circumstances, however, could make this election inequality be seen as something ‘favourable’ as such an electoral system would have the ability to stop a less desirable political group from obtaining a significant number of seats, such as extremist political parties.
Proportional representation addresses one of the main flaws of the plurality systems, which is, as its name suggests, the fair representation of minority groups. This type of electoral system is present in most of the continental European countries (Persson and Tabellini, 2006, p. 4) and is also being used in about a third of the countries in the world. It achieves a fairer representation by distributing the seats proportionally to the number of votes (Norris, 1997), hence increasing the chances of other candidates and smaller parties having a say in the governance process. Besides offering better chances to all candidates and giving voters better opportunities to select their preferences, advocates of proportional representation electoral systems suggest that governments also tend to perform better when they are not exclusively male-dominated, as it has been observed that they generally tend to be more corrupt. A parliamentary system which represents more women will also have much lower levels of corruption than otherwise, as additional evidence shows that voters tend to hold female candidates to a much higher standard than men, therefore increasing the overall accountability of a government and making it less prone to corruption (Esarey and Schwindt-Bayer, 2018).
However, no electoral system is perfect, and proportional representation is no exception. As mentioned previously, plurality systems are engaging better behaviours of the politicians towards their voters, and they tend to have more incentives to please them. When it comes to proportional representation, there are some controversies as these incentives are smaller since additional effort in attracting more voters would likely result in a less significant visible improvement (Presson and Tabellini, 2006, p. 7). Also, it is worth noting that while proportional representation does bring about more equality and offers better opportunities for less popular candidates and smaller parties, it does not always offer “a proportional share of government power” as smaller parties may quickly become less relevant when it comes to forming new government coalitions (Lijphart and Grofman, 1984, p.6).
Mixed systems, as the name implies, are a type of electoral system which combines elements from both plurality and proportional representation systems. One good example of such a system is Germany, where elections share characteristics of closed-list proportional representation, as well as the nominal plurality vote in single-member districts (Manow, 2007). Although these mixed systems attempt to put into practice the best of both worlds of the electoral systems mentioned previously, very few countries have them in place, and many of the ones who did introduce them quickly reverted to either plurality or proportional representation. Aside from Germany, only 25 of the world’s countries, only three of which are G-7 countries (Blais and Massicotte, 1996). The decreased interest in mixed systems shows that their intrinsic nature is significantly more complex compared to the classic first-past-the-post or proportional representation systems from both the voter’s perspective and the people in charge of designing and implementing such a system. This increased difficulty in adopting mixed electoral systems has made many countries shy away from attempting to introduce them, such as Denmark, which reverted to proportional representation from a mixed system in 1915 (Blais and Massicotte, 1996). Whereas Germany, shortly after the Second World War, managed to successfully implement a mixed electoral system, which is still in use today. Other countries have shown that a mixed system could even outperform proportional representation when it comes to giving better chances to ethnic minorities. One such example is Russia, where due to its very geographically dispersed population, the mixed electoral system was responsible for helping minorities attain substantial representation (Moser, 2008).
Conclusion
While there is no perfect recipe when it comes to a nation choosing its electoral system, it is clear that there are more variables to take into account, such as how geographically dispersed the population of that country is, a nation’s attitude towards preferring an effective government rather than a fairer representation of minorities and smaller parties or simply keeping in place a system that, although maybe dated, is functional and easy to live with. Some systems favour the winner and disregard the presence of smaller candidates, some offer better chances to all candidates at the expense of governing efficiency, while others try to combine the two. Every electoral system has its ways of reaching its goals, and the ways these are implemented differ from country to country, but many advantages and disadvantages can be observed in every one of them, which ultimately can decide what kind of democracy that nation will choose to have. While both Sweden and the United States are considered to be democracies, they can almost be considered the two most distinct democracies that exist, for that reason, no electoral system is the perfect fit for a country, and there will always be areas that will be favoured, but also compromises that will be made.
References
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- Persson, T. and Tabellini, G., 2006. Electoral systems and economic policy. Oxford Handbook of Political Economy.
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- Manow, P., 2007. Electoral rules and legislative turnover: Evidence from Germany’s mixed electoral system. West European Politics, 30(1), pp.195-207.
- Blais, A. and Massicotte, L., 1996. Mixed electoral systems: An overview. Representation, 33(4), pp.115-118.
- Lijphart, A. and Grofman, B., 1984. Choosing an electoral system. Issues and Alternatives, New York.
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- Tremblay, M., 2007. Electoral systems and substantive representation of women: A comparison of Australia, Canada, and New Zealand. Commonwealth & Comparative Politics, 45(3), pp.278-302.
- Esarey, J. and Schwindt-Bayer, L.A., 2018. Women’s representation, accountability, and corruption in democracies. British Journal of Political Science, 48(3), pp.659-690.
