PES Manifesto for European Elections June 2009

Watermark said:
The big problem with America's party discipline-less SMP system is that what matters with an individual often isn't the issues. It's usually more, hey, who smiles the best? Well, that guys a pretty nice guy, I'm voting for him. So our democracy suffers terribly because actual issues are irrelevant.

There is none of that with parties. You simply vote for the one you agree with most, and personality doesn't get involved. It produces better democracy. Parties SHOULD be blocks of thinking, and you should have a plethora of thinking to choose from, rather than deciding amongst two people "who has the best smile?"
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That's a choice of priorities and desires in an electoral system, and while I agree with you there are lots of people like Dano who are comparably informed but would make the other choice.
 
Epicurus said:
That's a choice of priorities and desires in an electoral system, and while I agree with you there are lots of people like Dano who are comparably informed but would make the other choice.
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But Damo's belief that SMP is fairer is absurd. Not only is the process of drawing constituencies completely arbitrary, you don't even have to win a majority. Oftentimes who gets elected is decided based on whether there are irrelevant opponents who can't win taking votes from the other big side, which is nonsensical and shouldn't be tolerated in a society.

Apportioning based on views makes more sense than apportioning based on who you happen to live next to. Winner-take-all is like giving the majority the right to cast the minorities vote.
 
Watermark said:
But Damo's belief that SMP is fairer is absurd. Not only is the process of drawing constituencies completely arbitrary, you don't even have to win a majority. Oftentimes who gets elected is decided based on whether there are irrelevant opponents who can't win taking votes from the other big side, which is nonsensical and shouldn't be tolerated in a society.

Apportioning based on views makes more sense than apportioning based on who you happen to live next to. Winner-take-all is like giving the majority the right to cast the minorities vote.
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I agree with you, but I could make a case for SMP advocating that you want a REPRESENTATIVE for your geographic area as much or more than you want a LEGISLATOR who shares your ideology.
 
Epicurus said:
Germany would also be more divided politically if they didn't have that 5% threshold. It keeps the NDP out, but it artificially increases the seats of the major parties.
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I dunno. The Netherlands is perfectly stable and it has no threshold.

The thing about unstable systems like Israel and Italy is that they are closed lists. While Finland and the Netherlands have no threshold and are much more open. So, possibly, open vs. closed lists has more to do with peoples dissatisfaction with the system.
 
Epicurus said:
I agree with you, but I could make a case for SMP advocating that you want a REPRESENTATIVE for your geographic area as much or more than you want a LEGISLATOR who shares your ideology.
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I mean, that would be more true in old times, when the people that lived around you were the only influence on your ideology. In the modern times, it's becoming more and more of a non-issue. The system wasn't completely logical in its time, and its showing its age each year as artificial geographical barriers are becoming more and more irrelevant due to the internet and transport.

Under party lists all the local people in your area COULD team together and vote for an independent you put up. But who would want to do that when you could just vote for someone who actually agrees with you?
 
Watermark said:
I mean, that would be more true in old times, when the people that lived around you were the only influence on your ideology. In the modern times, it's becoming more and more of a non-issue. The system wasn't completely logical in its time, and its showing its age each year as artificial geographical barriers are becoming more and more irrelevant due to the internet and transport.

Under party lists all the local people in your area COULD team together and vote for an independent you put up. But who would want to do that when you could just vote for someone who actually agrees with you?
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My point is that the functions of a Congressman can be distinctly divided into two functions: Legislator and Representative. As a Representative of your geographical area, he is involved in activites that have a direct local implication like securing federal funds for schools, hospitals, etc as well as helping local constitutents with their problems with federal programs like Medicare/Medicaid, TANFL, etc.

In a true PR system, you would simply have one enormous district for the country, and the total seats would be distributed with no connection to geography so you would lose the representative function of a Congressman.
 
Epicurus said:
My point is that the functions of a Congressman can be distinctly divided into two functions: Legislator and Representative. As a Representative of your geographical area, he is involved in activites that have a direct local implication like securing federal funds for schools, hospitals, etc as well as helping local constitutents with their problems with federal programs like Medicare/Medicaid, TANFL, etc.

In a true PR system, you would simply have one enormous district for the country, and the total seats would be distributed with no connection to geography so you would lose the representative function of a Congressman.
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That's why I usually support STV instead of pure party lists. It would just be easier to implement in America because it wouldn't get rid of constituencies, it would just make them larger. Something like Germany's system would be proportional and only require us to slightly increase constituency size, but again, people would simply be uncomfortable voting for parties even if they did have a geographical representative.

I support PR, but I'm a pragmatist. We should look to institute IRV first, so people get used to ranking candidates, and as soon as that becomes acceptable, try our luck with STV.
 
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Well anyway, we should use STV along with party line ballots. If people want to select the party with the issues they agree with most, all they have to do is check the box next to their party, and if everyone did that, it would work mostly like party list anyway.

And if all they want to do is vote for the local guy with the best smile, they can just put a "1" next to his name; hopefully their vote is wasted, so we can get the shit out of our electoral system.
 
KingCondanomation said:
It's only fair if you look at it from the perspective of what parties deserve. But most democracies are NOT based on electing parties but electing representatives for ridings where a majority would form the governing party.
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America, Britian, India, and Canada are the only countries in the world that use SMP for their national legislature. America is the only nation in the world that has no other system besides the dinosaur of electoral systems that is SMP at work, besides a handful of municipalities with common sense that use IRV or STV.
 
Epicurus said:
1.) I was addressing PES who seemed unsure whether or not all of Europe used PR.
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Hi Epi. The reason for my question mark was that I was working from memory and couldn't confidently say that every EU-country except the UK operated a proportional system. However, I've just done a quick check and the systems in use for parliamentary elections across the EU are as follows:

Austria - PR with preferential vote, 4% threshold
Belgium - PR with preferential vote
Bulgaria - PR with closed list, 4% threshold
Cyprus - PR with preferential vote
Czech Republic - PR with preferential vote
Denmark - PR with preferential vote
Estonia - PR
Finland - PR with preferential vote
France - Second Ballot Majority Runoff
Germany - Mixed Member Proportional system
Greece - PR with preferential vote
Hungary - Mixed Member Proportional system
Ireland - PR Single Transferable Vote
Italy - PR system with additional members
Latvia - PR with preferential voting
Lithuania - Additional Member system
Luxembourg - PR with vote-splitting
Malta - Single Transferable Vote
Netherlands - PR with closed lists
Poland - PR with closed lists, 5-8% thresholds
Portugal - PR with closed lists
Romania - PR with closed lists, 3% threshold
Slovak Republic - PR with closed lists
Slovenia - PR with preferential vote
Spain - Additional Member system
Sweden - PR with closed lists
United Kingdom - Simple Majority Vote (First Past The Post)

Every EU country uses a PR system or, in the case of Germany, Hungary and France, a hybrid proportional or elimination system. Only the UK uses a simple majority system like the US.

Interestingly, the UK abandoned FPTP for elections to the European Parliament a few years ago and uses a PR, multi-member list system for these elections instead.
 
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KingCondanomation said:
It's only fair if you look at it from the perspective of what parties deserve. But most democracies are NOT based on electing parties but electing representatives for ridings where a majority would form the governing party.
Proportional representation is more unfair to grassroots democracy of people being represented in their riding and for their riding.
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I don't know where you get the examples for your claim, KingC. I can't speak for non-European democracies without researching it, but every EU country, with the exception of the UK, uses a proportional representation system, hybrid or elimination system of one class or other.

Many EU countries use a combination of what you term "riding" systems of representation alongside regional or national list systems. In Ireland, however, we use a fairly strict proportional system (the Single Transferable or Preferential Vote) in constituencies which elect from 3 to 5 parliamentary representatives. This enables us to retain the direct association of representatives with an individual "riding" while maintaining reasonably accurate proportionality.
 
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KingCondanomation said:
I'd also throw in that proportional representation means an even more fragile democracy where tough decisions are rarely made because governments can fall so easily.
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I'm afraid that the evidence from Europe does not support that argument, KingC. European governments are quite capable of taking "tough" decisions when the need arises.

If you take a look at the economic performance or social cohesion/progress of majoritarian systems versus proportional or coalition systems you will find that there is little correlation between electoral systems and economic or social outcomes. There is, however, a significant correlation between these positive economic and social outcomes and democracy, whatever its flavour. Far more important to achieving positive economic and social progress are the political programmes and policies of parties elected to government.

I think that rather than argue about who has the best system, we should ensure that our systems remain functionally as well as theoretically democratic.
 
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PES Activist said:
Hi Epi. The reason for my question mark was that I was working from memory and couldn't confidently say that every EU-country except the UK operated a proportional system. However, I've just done a quick check and the systems in use for parliamentary elections across the EU are as follows:

Austria - PR with preferential vote, 4% threshold
Belgium - PR with preferential vote
Bulgaria - PR with closed list, 4% threshold
Cyprus - PR with preferential vote
Czech Republic - PR with preferential vote
Denmark - PR with preferential vote
Estonia - PR
Finland - PR with preferential vote
France - Second Ballot Majority Runoff
Germany - Mixed Member Proportional system
Greece - PR with preferential vote
Hungary - Mixed Member Proportional system
Ireland - PR Single Transferable Vote
Italy - PR system with additional members
Latvia - PR with preferential voting
Lithuania - Additional Member system
Luxembourg - PR with vote-splitting
Malta - Single Transferable Vote
Netherlands - PR with closed lists
Poland - PR with closed lists, 5-8% thresholds
Portugal - PR with closed lists
Romania - PR with closed lists, 3% threshold
Slovak Republic - PR with closed lists
Slovenia - PR with preferential vote
Spain - Additional Member system
Sweden - PR with closed lists
United Kingdom - Simple Majority Vote (First Past The Post)

Every EU country uses a PR system or, in the case of Germany, Hungary and France, a hybrid proportional or elimination system. Only the UK uses a simple majority system like the US.

Interestingly, the UK abandoned FPTP for elections to the European Parliament a few years ago and uses a PR, multi-member list system for these elections instead.
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Watermark would be so much more at home in Europe.
 
Possibly. I would basically gasm if a party ran in America that had a reasonable chance of winning that wished to copy the principles of even the most conservative government in Europe. America is by far the most right-wing nation in the developed world, and it's dragging us slowly into oblivion.

Then again, I don't think I've ever heard of anyone who has moved to another place because of political beliefs turn out to be seriously happy about the decision later on.
 
Watermark said:
Possibly. I would basically gasm if a party ran in America that had a reasonable chance of winning that wished to copy the principles of even the most conservative government in Europe. America is by far the most right-wing nation in the developed world, and it's dragging us slowly into oblivion.

Then again, I don't think I've ever heard of anyone who has moved to another place because of political beliefs turn out to be seriously happy about the decision later on.
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You've never heard of European immigrants?
 
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