Comparing and Contrasting the Majority System and the Proportional System - Essay Example

? The Majority System and Proportional System al affiliation: Comparing and Contrasting the Majority System and the Proportional System All democracies are said to have legislatures elected in at least free and fair elections. Electoral systems have many consequences concerning what form of government a nation will have. There are various electoral systems in liberal and electoral democracies. One of them is the majority system named so due to their tendencies to give majority of seats to one party. In majority system there are no attempts to make the last percentage of seats match with the overall vote percentage won by each party. Next is the proportional system this involves matching the share of seats which have been won with the share of votes won with an exemption of few parties according to LeDuc, Niemi, and Norris (2010). In comparing the majority system for both United Kingdom and United States of America, for one, they both apply single-member plurality. To win a certain seat a candidate should have more votes compared to others. The main idea here is plurality of votes. In both countries as far as the system is concerned, there is particular share of the vote needed to win under single-member district. The election is usually a series of personal races no matter how many districts there are. In the proportional electoral system in both United Kingdom and United States, there is matching of the share of seats that have been won. In both countries proportional system rewards diverse preferences. Also groups of different opinions are able to combine forces to get the pluralism required for victory. In the United Kingdom the legislature which is elected through the majority system is unicameral with the House of Lords having little power while in United States it is bicameral. In the United Kingdom, the constitution can be amended by a simple majority who are in the House of Commons while in United States of America amendments are done by majority in the legislature. In the United Kingdom there are no judicial reviews while in the USA, there is a judicial review which separates the court from the president and the congress. In UK there is concentration of power in the upper house while in the US, there is power separation with the executive being independent from the legislature. As noted by LeDuc, Niemi, and Norris (2010), majority systems are highly used in Australia and France. In both cases, the electoral system uses the majority electoral formula. In both countries the system is based on the single member districts, hereby the successful candidate is one with the majority number of votes. The two countries also use the dual ballot which is a used for presidential elections. There are two main types of majority electoral system that is, runoff system and as well the alternative vote. Australia usually uses the alternative vote option. The alternative vote requires voters to rank all the candidates who were running in the election and then the one with highest average score wins. The system requires a lot of thinking on the part of the voters as they have to develop an opinion about each and every candidate. In contrast, France employs the runoff-plurality system which allows more than two candidates in the second round during the dual balloting. In proportional representation, there is an attempt to convert parties’ share of vote to almost a proportional share of the seats in the legislature. Both Australia and France use the party list system whereby political parties prepare a list of candidates well ranked with as many of the candidates as there are seats in the legislature. The advantages of the majority system One advantage of the majority system is that small parties do not get chance to win unless some constituencies have population with different views from the rest of the country. The advantage here is that those with different views are represented. Furthermore, the majority system leads to parties forming blocks until there remain two major players in the political scene. This is an advantage in that since voters select only from two parties there tends to be a stable parliamentary system. The majority system also tends to be clear and simple since there is no party conflicts which lead to instability in the parliament. Disadvantages of the majority system There are several disadvantages associated with the majority system. For one, the formation of blocks by unification of parties forces voters to select only person from two parties which is very mean as they end up lacking a representative from their party. Also, there may fail to be a well represented pluralistic society in the modern set up. Many villages as well as small towns must be combined to form a constituency while big cities are to be divided into many constituencies. In a case where the government and the opposition party almost have same impact, the government may end up forming minor changes in the definition of constituencies in their favor. This system leads to complex decisions may not be understood by the voters hence they end up losing trust in the government. In addition, the winning candidate in a district may have been voted for by the least number of voters and thus having the minority support which is not democratic at all. Advantages of the proportional system A number of advantages are credited to the proportional system. With the presence of large number of parties choice are many and voter is able to find a party which represents his or her political convictions. There is also the probability of supporters of a small party being at least represented by one Member of Parliament. Furthermore, there are large constituencies and the possibility of manipulating them is low as their borders are fixed by historical considerations. Disadvantages of the proportional system The proportional system is not without disadvantages. For one, any disagreement by the many small political parties may lead to political instability in the government. Small parties may also end up abusing their positions so as to get support for special interest, by threatening not to support government policy. Since in proportional government parties chose who to represent them in parliament, the system may result in disagreements on who to represent the others. Yet again, in the proportional system there is lack of accountability and transparency hence it cannot be relied on for decision making as far as political issues are concerned. Reference: LeDuc, L, Niemi, R. & Norris, P.(2010). Comparing Democracies. London: SAGE Publications Ltd. Read More