The British electoral system 1885-1970

At a time when the electoral system is coming under renewed scrutiny, this article examines the origins and creation of the present system in 1884-5, and its subsequent survival. This is the first such analysis to draw upon Public Record Office and party archives. Whilst showing that the political classes have been quite prepared to consider the merits of alternatives, particularly S.T.V., for Ireland or in colonial settings, they have usually been seen as less appropriate for Westminster. In exploring why that should be the case this article seeks to provide a new explanation for the longevity of the electoral arrangements of 1885.

The quality of referendum debate: the UK's electoral system referendum in the print media

This paper analyses the quality of debate surrounding the UK’s 2011 electoral reform referendum as represented in the print media. It first considers how debate quality in the context of a referendum campaign may best be conceptualized. It then uses content analysis of media coverage to investigate three aspects of that debate: its quantity; the balance between Yes and No arguments, and the quality of reason-giving. It finds that the quantity of debate was comparable to other recent electoral reform referendums. Coverage was predominantly, but not overwhelmingly, hostile to change. The different indicators of the quality of reason-giving present a mixed picture. The paper concludes by considering how the analysis could be extended through further comparison with other cases.

The extent of the population paradox in the Hungarian electoral system

The Hungarian mixed-member electoral system, adopted in 1989, is one of the world’s most complicated electoral systems, and, as this paper demonstrates, it suffers from the "population paradox". In particular, the governing coalition may lose as many as 8 seats either by getting more votes or by the opposition obtaining fewer votes on each territorial list.

The organizational ecology of ethnic cleavages: The nonlinear effects of ethnic diversity on party system fragmentation

The conventional wisdom regarding party system fragmentation assumes that the effects of electoral systems and social cleavages are linear. However, recent work applying organizational ecology theories to the study of party systems has challenged the degree to which electoral system effects are linear. This paper applies such concepts to the study of social cleavages. Drawing from theories of organizational ecology and the experience of many ethnically diverse African party systems, I argue that the effects of ethnic diversity are nonlinear, with party system fragmentation increasing until reaching moderate levels of diversity before declining as diversity reaches extreme values. Examining this argument cross-nationally, the results show that accounting for nonlinearity in ethnic diversity effects significantly improves model fit.

Voto preferente: como instrumento electoral para la constitución del personalismo político en Colombia, en las elecciones del Senado 2006.

Para Colombia, la reforma política de 2003 marcó una transformación en el sistema político y electoral debido a que proponía reinstitucionalizar los movimientos y los partidos políticos del país, a la vez que planteaba transformaciones importantes al sistema electoral. La hipótesis plantea el hecho de que el voto preferente es la herramienta ideal para mantener los personalismos políticos por parte de aquellos candidatos beneficiados con la reforma. Como justificación se plantea que en Colombia y en los países con sistemas de partidos institucionalizados, un proceso de reforma política se circunscribe a modificaciones o ajustes de alguna norma o ley que se encuentre vigente en el marco jurídico o la Constitución Política actual de un Estado determinado. Cuando estos procesos se llevan a cabo, la intención es, por un lado, suprimir normas que afectan de manera adversa el desarrollo de ciertos sectores específicos, o por el otro, modificar procedimientos de orden institucional que terminan perjudicando, en el caso de nuestro país, el ejercicio democrático en términos de una idónea representación dentro de los cargos legislativos de la nación. Puede decirse entonces que esta monografía logra analizar las distintas situaciones políticas y sociales que enmarcan la reforma política de 2003 y de manera particular se logra comprender todas las implicaciones políticas que tiene el voto preferente como medio para estructurar las estrategias electorales de los sistemas de partidos en Colombia.

Congress composition and electoral advantage

In 2003, an electoral reform changed the mechanism to assign seats in the Colombian Congress. I simulate the 2006 Senate elections using the previous assignment mechanism to determine which senators benefited from the reform, i.e. would have not been elected had the reform not been made. With the results of the simulation, I use a regression discontinuity design to compare the senators that would have been barely elected anyways with those who would have lost, but were near to be elected. I check the differences in the amount of law drafts presented, the attendance to voting sessions, and a discipline index for each senator as proxy of their legislative behavior. I find that the senators benefiting from the reform present a different legislative behavior during the 4-year term with respect to the senators that would have been elected anyways. Since the differential legislative behavior cannot be interpreted as being better (worse) politician, I examine if the behavioral difference gives them an electoral advantage. I find no difference in the electoral result of 2010 Senate election in terms of the probability of being (re)elected in 2010, the share of votes, the share of votes within their party list, and the concentration of their votes. Additionally, I check the probability of being investigated for links with paramilitary groups and I find no differences. The results suggest that political reforms can change the composition of governing or legislative bodies in terms of performance, but it does not necessarily translate into an electoral advantage.

Electoral reform in Europe since 1945

This article surveys and analyses democratic electoral reform in Europe since 1945 in order to pursue three issues. First, it seeks understanding of the processes through which electoral systems change. Second, it asks how the incidence of these processes varies over context and time. Third, it investigates whether there are relationships between the nature of the processes through which electoral system change occurs and the electoral reforms that are thereby adopted. The analysis suggests, most importantly, that electoral system changes occur via multiple contrasting processes, that there is a tendency towards increasing impact of mass opinion upon these changes, and that this is beginning to generate a trend towards greater personalisation in the electoral systems adopted. These findings are, however, preliminary; the article is intended to encourage further discussion and research.

The expenses scandal and the politics of electoral reform

The scandal over MPs' expenses that erupted in 2009 was followed by a surge in discussion of electoral reform. A range of reforms to Westminster's existing electoral system are now high on the political agenda. This article examines the extent and the nature of the scandal's impact on the electoral reform debate and draws out comparative implications for the sorts of conditions that can force politicians to accept electoral reforms that they do not want. It finds that the expenses scandal significantly changed debate about some electoral reform topics, but not about others. It proposes three factors likely to increase the impact of scandal in sparking reform: that the scandal is seen as harming ordinary people in their daily lives; that reforms can readily be understood as likely to mitigate the sources of scandal; and that those reforms do not seriously harm politicians' own perceived interests.

Is the future of electoral reform local?

The Electoral Reform Society has recently published two reports putting the case for electoral reform in local government. These suggest acceptance, in the wake of defeat in the 2011 Alternative Vote referendum, that the group’s ultimate goal of change to the Westminster electoral system is unlikely to be fulfilled soon and that a more gradual strategy is therefore needed. This paper examines this shift by asking three questions. First, is Westminster electoral reform really a dead letter? Second, is local electoral reform more likely—and, if so, just how much more likely? Third, would local electoral reform matter in itself?

Electoral institutions,cleavage structures,and the number of parties

Theory: A classic question in political science concems ",hat deteImines the number of parties that compete in a given polity. Broadly speaking, there are two approaches to answering this question, one that emphasizes the role of electorallaws in structuring coalitional incentives, another that emphasizes the importance of pre-existing social cleavages. In tbis paper, we view the number of parties as a product of the interaction between these two forces, following Powell (1982) and Ordeshook and Shvetsova (1994). Hypotheses: The effective number of parties in a polity should be a multiplicative rather than an additive function ofthe peImissiveness ofthe electoral system and the heterogeneity ofthe society. Methods: Multiple regression on cross-sectional aggregate electoral statistics. Unlike previous studies, we (1) do not confine attention to developed democracies; (2) explicitly control for the influence of presidential elections, taking account of whether they are concurrent or nonconcurrent, and ofthe effective number ofpresidential candidates; and (3) also control for the presence and operation of upper tiers in legislative elections. Results: The hypothesis is confiImed, both as regards the number of legislative and the number of presidential parties .

Mind the gap: Do proportional electoral systems foster a more equal representation of women and men, poor and rich?

Female gender and low income are two markers for groups that have been historically disadvantaged within most societies. The study explores two research questions related to their political representation: (1) ‘Are parties biased towards the ideological preferences of male and rich citizens?’; and (2) ‘Does the proportionality of the electoral system moderate the degree of under-representation of women and poor citizens in the party system?’ A multilevel analysis of survey data from 24 parliamentary democracies indicates that there is some bias against those with low income and, at a much smaller rate, women. This has systemic consequences for the quality of representation, as the preferences of the complementary groups differ. The proportionality of the electoral system influences the degree of under-representation: specifically, larger district magnitudes help in closing the considerable gap between rich and poor.

Loyal to the Game? Strategic Policy Representation in Mixed Electoral Systems

In Germany's compensatory mixed electoral system, alternative electoral routes lead into parliament. We study the relationship between candidates' electoral situations across both tiers and policy representation, fully accounting for candidate, party and district preferences in a multi-actor constellation and the exact electoral incentives for candidates to represent either the party or the district. The results (2009 Bundestag election data) yield evidence of an interactive effect of closeness of the district race and list safety on candidates' positioning between their party and constituency.

The stakes of politics and electoral administration : a comparative study of Southeast Asian democracies

Elections play a crucial role in political stability in post-democratization, and electoral administrations are the key to the electoral process. However, not all newly democratized countries have established reliable electoral administration. New democracies in Southeast Asia, such as the Philippines, Indonesia and Thailand, have independent election commissions which have different characteristics, especially in terms of neutrality. Based on three cases, this paper claims that the stakes of politics are the major determinant of the variations in neutrality. The high stakes of politics in Thailand brought about the partisan election commission, while the low stakes in Indonesia made the electoral system relatively neutral. Like Thailand, the high stakes of politics in the Philippines also cause political intervention in the electoral administration.

Electoral Systems and Ethnic Conciliation: A Structured, Focused Analysis of Vote-Pooling in Northern Ireland Elections 1998-2011

This research project examines the role of electoral system rules in affecting the extent of conciliatory behavior and cross-ethnic coalition making in Northern Ireland. It focuses on the role of the Single Transferable Vote (STV) electoral system in shaping party and voter incentives in a post-conflict divided society. The research uses a structured, focused comparison of the four electoral cycles since the Belfast Agreement of 1998. This enables a systematic examination of each electoral cycle using a common set of criteria focused on conciliation and cross-ethnic coalition making. Whilst preference voting is assumed to benefit moderate candidates, in Northern Ireland centrist and multi-ethnic parties outside of the dominant ethnic communities have received little electoral success. In Northern Ireland the primary effect of STV has not been to encourage inter-communal voting but to facilitate intra-community and intra-party moderation. STV has encouraged the moderation of the historically extreme political parties in each of the ethnic bloc. Patterns across electoral cycles suggest that party elites from the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) and Sinn Fein have moderated their policy positions due to the electoral system rules. Therefore they have pursued lower-preference votes from within their ethnic bloc but in doing so have marginalized parties of a multi-ethnic or non-ethnic orientation.

Mixed-Member Electoral Systems in Constitutional Context : Taiwan, Japan, and Beyond /

After the electoral reform in 1994, Japan saw a gradual evolution from a multi-party system toward a two-party system over the course of five House of Representatives election cycles. In contrast, after Taiwan’s constitutional amendment in 2005, a two-party system emerged in the first post-reform legislative election in 2008. Critically, however, Taiwan’s president is directly elected while Japan’s prime minister is indirectly elected. The contributors conclude that the higher the payoffs of holding the executive office and the greater degree of cross-district coordination required to win it, the stronger the incentives for elites to form and stay in the major parties. In such a context, a country will move rapidly toward a two-party system. In Part II, the contributors apply this theoretical logic to other countries with mixed-member systems to demonstrate its generality. They find the effect of executive competition on legislative electoral rules in countries as disparate as Thailand, the Philippines, New Zealand, Bolivia, and Russia. The findings presented in this book have important implications for political reform. Often, reformers are motivated by high hopes of solving some political problems and enhancing the quality of democracy. But, as this group of scholars demonstrates, electoral reform alone is not a panacea. Whether and to what extent it achieves the advocated goals depends not only on the specification of new electoral rules per se but also on the political context—and especially the constitutional framework—within which such rules are embedded.