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Types of Electoral Systems: Comparative Analysis

This lecture provides an overview of different types of electoral systems, including their impact on party systems, government coalitions, and representation in democracies. It discusses various dimensions of electoral regulations and the categorization of electoral systems based on magnitude of constituencies. The lecture also examines the three main categories of proportional representation (PR) systems and non-PR systems, such as single-member plurality and alternative vote. Key factors such as district magnitude, intra-party choice, and thresholds are explored.

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Types of Electoral Systems: Comparative Analysis

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  1. Core Issues in Comparative Politics(PO233)Module Director: Dr. Renske DoorenspleetAssociate Professor in Comparative Politicsdirector Centre for Studies in DemocratizationDepartment of Politics and International StudiesUniversity of Warwick, UK www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/pais/staff/doorenspleet/ www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/pais/research/csd/ e-mail: renske.doorenspleet@warwick.ac.uk

  2. Types of Democracies • Consensus versus Majoritarian Systems • (Lijphart 1999, see also week 11): • Executive-parties dimension (how easy is it for one party to take control of the government?) • concentration of executive power (week 14) • dominance of executive (week 14) • two-party vs. multiparty system (week 12) • majoritarian electoral rules vs. PR (week 13) • types of interest groups • Federal-unitary dimension

  3. Content Lecture week 13 • Electoral Systems • Types of Electoral Systems (read Gallagher 2008; Hague and Harrop 2007, Ch. 10!) • Link Electoral and Party Systems • C. Back to Lijphart (read literature week 11) • D. Contents of seminar week 14

  4. A. Types of Electoral Systems Elections and referendums: the two main voting opportunities in democracies Elections: people’s participation, link between people and their representatives, legitimation Referendums… see Gallagher 2008: 250-259! Focus in this lecture: elections  electoral systems

  5. A. Types of Electoral Systems • dimensions of electoral regulations: • Extent of franchise (see also week 3, 4, 5) • Voluntary or compulsory voting • (see Hague and Harrop 2007: 202; Gallagher 2008: 243) • Terms: Presidential versus Parliamentarian Systems • (see also week 14)

  6. A. Types of Electoral Systems • electoral system: the set of rules governing the conversion of votes • into seats •  impact on a country’s party-system, government-coalition, representation etc. • Electoral systems can be categorized along the magnitude of the • constituencies: • Multi-member constituencies (PR-systems) •  ‘proportionality’ is key! • Single-member constituencies (Majoritarian- or non PR-systems) •  ‘winner takes all’ is key!

  7. A. Types of Electoral Systems • Three main categories of PR-systems: • List systems: The party presents a list of candidates. • Voter votes for party (sometimes for candidates on party list) • Methods to award seats in list PR-systems: • Perfect proportionality means (%) of votes = (%) of seats

  8. A. Types of Electoral Systems List systems: in 70 countries including Brazil, Israel and the Netherlands

  9. A. Types of Electoral Systems • Three main categories of PR-systems: • Mixed systems: Voter has two votes, one for a candidate and another for the party-list. But… in the end: PR!

  10. A. Types of Electoral Systems Mixed systems: in nine countries, including Germany and New Zealand

  11. A. Types of Electoral Systems • Three main categories of PR-systems: • Single transferable vote: Application of alternative vote to PR-systems. Extremely complicated! Used in Malta and Ireland

  12. A. Types of Electoral Systems Three main categories of non PR-systems (majoritarian and plurality systems): 1. Single-member plurality (First past the post): The candidate with the most votes is elected, majority not needed, within single-member districts.

  13. A. Types of Electoral Systems Single-member plurality: in 47 countries, including Canada, India, UK and USA

  14. A. Types of Electoral Systems Three main categories of non PR-systems (majoritarian and plurality systems): 2. Alternative vote: Rank order of candidates. The lowest placed candidate is eliminated and his votes are redistributed to second preference. The process is repeated until one candidate gets the majority.

  15. A. Types of Electoral Systems Alternative vote in Australia, Fiji, Papua New Guinea

  16. A. Types of Electoral Systems • Three main categories of non PR-systems (majoritarian and plurality systems): • 3. Two-round systems: • If no candidate reaches the majority in the first round, the least successful candidates are eliminated and a second round takes place • Used in 22 countries, including Egypt, Mali and Vietnam

  17. A. Types of Electoral Systems • Electoral systems vary in the following dimensions: • (1) District magnitude: • From single-member constituencies to whole-country constituencies • The bigger the constituency the more proportional

  18. A. Types of Electoral Systems • Electoral systems vary in the following dimensions (continued) • (2) Intra-party choice: • How much intra-party choice is there among candidates? • Single-member constituencies: No choice • PR-systems: • Closed lists: Party determines order of candidates • Preferential lists: Voters can express their preference

  19. A. Types of Electoral Systems • Electoral systems vary in the following dimensions (continued) • (3) Thresholds: • Electoral systems often contain some institutions to prevent very small parties from winning seats: • Preventing fragmentation • Facilitating stable government • Thresholds are normally between 3-5% (Netherlands 0.67%, • Russia 7%). Thresholds usually exist at national level, rarely at constituency level.

  20. B. Link Electoral and Party Systems • Link Electoral and Party Systems: • 1. Duverger (1954): electoral system  party system • versus • 2. Rokkan (1970): social cleavages  party system  electoral system • And Jasiewicz (2003): political fragmentation  adoption PR (not other way around, cf post-communist Europe) • And Miller (2005): cracks in two-party system BEFORE adoption of PR (based on New Zealand’s introduction of PR in 1996)

  21. C. Back to Lijphart Lijphart’s executive-parties dimension (how easy is it for one party to take control of the government?): Fourth element: types of electoral systems According to Lijphart, most important indicator of different types of political systems, to distinguish consensus and majoritarian systems Problem of dichotomy, again! Strong link with types of party systems (week 12)

  22. D. Contents of Seminar week 14 • Homework seminar week 14: • Read the required literature of week 13 • 2) Choose one country and describe the following: • Types of electoral system over time • Why has the system been changed? • Advantages and disadvantages of the change/ different systems • See www.electionworld.org/ and www.ipu.org/ and https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/ and links in module outline • Prepare a presentation (around 5 minutes)

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