I am considering trying to start an organization to promote proportional representation in the US. I recognize we already have organizations like FairVote, but they seem to be primarily focused on RCV, which, while I prefer it to FPTP, is not an adequete alternative to genuine PR in legislatures, imo.
My initial thoughts are to try to figure out how to fundraise in order to fund a commission of electoral system experts to study electoral reform and propose specific recommendations, akin to what, for example, New Zealand commissioned in the 1980s, and then use those recommendations as a framework for drafting initiatives and bills that people in states that allow for citizens' initiatives for constitutional amendments can use or modify to their liking (as well as any state legislators who might be interested, but I am expecting whatever small chances of success there is of getting proportional representation in state legislatures, the best chances, especially in the early going, may be with citizen initiatives rather than state legislatures).
I am interested in hearing any thoughts/suggestions people might have on this.
For the record, I have tried to discuss this with numerous state legislators in my own home state (CT), and, as I expected, I was largely blown off.
In Ireland we vote for our representatives in government with a thing known as proportional representation. This is where we have multiple options for voting in an election. When I vote I number my candidates starting with 1. If the candidate I voted for has already been elected before my vote was counted or my candidate was eliminated from the first count then my vote will go to the person who I wrote a 2 beside. This will go on until I run out of candidates or my vote is used in a successful candidates count. Would you like this in your elections or would you consider this too time consuming and expensive as it will result in the entire country having the vote counted at least 6 times which could be extremely expensive.
https://twitter.com/jmeredith96/status/1476470614588149762?s=21 Worth asking and something I'd genuinely like to hear an answer on if anyone can. As FPTP's supposed legitimacy comes up a lot but I've never heard a good answer. At any rate, happy new year all and here's hoping Labour adopts PR in 2022
I live in Canada, and we have a first past the post electoral system. Thus, we often have majority parliaments and smaller parties have virtually no political power. The official opposition can, at most, criticize the government and keep it accountable, but cannot actually wield any real power.
Smaller parties frequently argue for reform to a proportional representation system (similar to Germany) on the grounds that small parties could get key concessions.
Do coalition partners in Germany have more power?
Britain's largest trade union has voted and formally supported proportional representation.
Unite members have voted to oppose Westminster’s First Past the Post electoral system, pledging support for moves towards a new voting system in UK elections.
Unite’s general secretary Sharon Graham said,
“Today, Unite Policy Conference voted to support Proportional Representation in Westminster elections for the first time in our history. Our political class has failed working people and our system is broken. It is time to change our democracy.”
What is proportional representation?
- In simple terms, a voting system where the number of MPs would equal the % of votes.
Where is it used?
- Devolved Parliament & Assembly elections in Scotland, Wales, London & Northern Ireland.
- 26 European countries like Germany & Spain, plus New Zealand, Israel & South Africa.
Are there any active interest groups like fairvote or center for election science advocating for prop rep on a state or municipal level in the USA?
I hope it's okay for me to mention this here, but, in case anyone is interested, I just wanted to let people know that I created a new subreddit "Campaign for PR" and a new Facebook group "Campaign for Proportional Representation."
We should only have one legislative district per state with a proportional voting system. What do you think?
I’d imagine that with proportional representation, no single party is likely to get 50% of the seats in parliament/legislature, forcing the formation of coalition governments.
In these coalition government, small parties would have a great deal of bargaining power over large parties. If a larger party wants a coalition partner to vote with them, then the smaller party can extract certain favours.
For instance, a Christian Democratic Party could extract certain socially conservative policies from a bigger tent Conservative party on the condition of defection to the left coalition to achieve certain economic policy goals.
Nothing in the constitution from what i could tell technically stops that.
edit: how about voting by party instead of individual? Like in other countries.
https://twitter.com/antacsb/status/1473719587799773195?s=21 It's always good to debunk this excuse. We already have an extreme far right government which would simply be impossible under PR since the majority of the population are not extremists
https://twitter.com/labour4pr/status/1465443399373369344?s=21 Although it's not quite a valiance issue in the general public, it's amazing to see how PR is becoming one within the Labour Party
I hear that multi-member districts with proportional representation eliminate gerrymandering, but they also reduce accountability to voters. I would like to understand why this is the case.
I am asking because I am interested in electoral systems that avoid the problem of gerrymandering while maximizing accountability to the voters, so I would like to know which electoral systems work best for that criteria.
The German counterparts of UK Labour, Greens and Lib Dems have officially formed a government and launched their progressive agenda.
"The German Social Democrats, the Greens, and the Free Democrats offered up several progressive steps in their new coalition contract announced Wednesday."
https://www.dw.com/en/germany-post-merkel-coalition-promises-progressive-agenda/a-59924301
- Right to vote at 16.
- Phase-out coal by 2030.
- legal, sell & tax cannabis.
- £10 minimum wage, now.
- 400,000 new homes per year.
- 80% from renewable energy by 2030.
- 3yrs for immigrants to apply for Citizenship.
Once again, Germany uses a Proportional Representation voting system and Labour's counterpart is the Chancellor of Germany.
Voting figures from Delta Poll UK.
https://preview.redd.it/z10yzq1kag481.png?width=421&format=png&auto=webp&s=63e36e1e850ef60c3fa55c68cf45c6a74aa0b82b
https://preview.redd.it/fsjcjr1kag481.png?width=414&format=png&auto=webp&s=67f456b975dfc4455c56f7b73232c729216de297
I live in Canada, and we have a first past the post electoral system. Thus, we often have majority parliaments and smaller parties have virtually no political power. The official opposition can, at most, criticize the government and keep it accountable, but cannot actually wield any real power.
Smaller parties frequently argue for reform to a proportional representation system on the grounds that small parties could get key concessions.
Do coalition partners in countries with proportional representation have more power?
This is historic, Britain's largest trade union has voted and formally supported proportional representation.
Commenting on the vote, Unite’s general secretary Sharon Graham said: “Today, Unite policy conference voted to support proportional representation for the first time in our history."
DID YOU KNOW?
- A majority of voters in the UK have never voted for the Conservative party since WWII.
- Proportional presentation is used in London, Scotland, Wales & Northern Ireland.
- 26 of the 27 EU countries use Proportional Representation for their national elections.
GET INVOLVED!
- Follow @Labour4PR
- Follow @MakeVotesMatter
