9.1 Elections as a tool of political representation

The idea of elections is closely linked to parties; it is designed to ensure people’s sovereignty and representation of all interested classes, strata and groups in the power system through the party. The elections, in fact, are one of the leading institutes of the legitimacy of the existing political system and the political system as a whole.

Elections are the major component of modern politics. They are a method of forming the government and administration by the expression of the political will of the citizens by following certain rules. In the outcome of the election the elected candidates are vested powers. Elections are used in various democratic institutions: political parties, trade unions, voluntary associations, cooperatives, joint stock companies, etc.

A characteristic feature of the modern world electoral system is an alternative choice of the citizen. Elections legitimize power, through elections the people determine their representatives and give them a mandate to exercise their sovereign rights.

Compound and extensive issues of elections are one of the most important and complex in comparative politics. The features of the electoral system can lead to deeper consequences, up to the country’s disintegration. Modern political practice shows that elections can play a destabilizing role. A striking example for this are the so-called “colour revolutions” in Yugoslavia, Georgia, Ukraine and Kyrgyzstan. In all these cases, it is the elections that caused mass protests, because the supporters of opposition parties, dissatisfied with the result of the election, refused to recognize their legitimacy and openly opposed the ruling elite group.

Elections can stabilize a non-democratic political order, legitimizing the authoritarian power. In this case, the election will consolidate the political elite and the community around the ruling groups and non-democratic rules of the game.

Elections in a democracy serve several important functions:

– First of all, it is, of course, the creation of a functioning representative system and the formation of public authorities (Parliament, the heads of state and government). The elections to the authorities create a relationship of citizens’ representation in these bodies, and allow influence on their activities.

– The articulation of the interests of different social groups. The elections represent a real political market in which candidates receive trust and authority from the voters in exchange for their electoral programs. Elections also perform the function of peaceful competition among the interests of different groups. Political parties are the representatives of different social groups who are in conflict with each other, and the competition between them in the elections to the authorities turns into a mechanism for the peaceful resolution of social conflict in socially acceptable ways.

– The recruitment of the best representatives of society to the political elite. Theoretically, every member of society that is able to adequately represent the interests of any social community may be its representative in authority bodies. In reality, far from all can accomplish this. Only those of the politicians, who were able to pass the “fire, water and copper pipes” campaign and elections, pouring in the ruling elite.

– Formation of public institutions. This results in a truly democratic mandate to obtain power from the voters, which is free expression of the will and the civil law, and in the political and socio-psychological terms.

– Political socialization and re-socialization of the individual. During the elections the voters often revise or clarify their political position, identifying themselves with one or the other socio-political forces. Elections are always carried out according to a specific system.

 

9.2 Criteria for election systems classification

The electoral system is one of the most important institutional elements of the electoral process. It has a direct substantial impact on the political development of the country as a whole and, in particular, on the development of the party system.

The term “electoral system” has two interpretations broad and narrow. In a broad sense, the electoral system is perceived as the totality of the institutions related to the conduct of elections. In the narrow sense, the electoral system is a way to transfer the preferences expressed in the elections in the distribution of disputed positions of power, i.e. a method of determining the winners, based on the votes received by the candidates. The concept of “electoral formula” is synonymous in this case. In this tutorial we will mainly consider the electoral system in the narrow sense.

The classifications of electoral systems are diverse. However, in most cases, there are two main types:

– majority;

– proportional.

There are also mixed electoral systems, combining elements of the first two.

Majority electoral system is the first electoral system, widely used in the industrialized countries at the time of the approval of universal suffrage. The majority system is of three types, depending on what the majority of votes for election law requires:

– relative majority system (the winning candidate must receive 50 % of the votes plus at least 1 vote);

– qualified majority system (in this case a seat in parliament is passed to a candidate with the 2/3 or 3/4 of the total votes cast).

This system is currently used in the formation of the legislative bodies in the UK, Japan, the USA, Canada, New Zealand and India.

The majority system has a number of positive features:

1) It contributes to strong direct links between the members of parliament and voters. The MP knows his electoral district, concerns and interests of its residents. The voters have a fairly complete picture of the candidate, his political views, behaviour, character traits, and can focus not only on his party affiliation. In addition, the right to recall their district deputy allows voters to effectively monitor the work of the person, to represent their interests in parliament.

2) When the majority system in the elections can take part and win together with representatives of major political parties, representatives of small parties and even non-party independents.

3) The representatives selected through single-mandate majority districts shall receive a greater degree of independence from political parties and party leaders, since they are mandated directly by voters.

4) The majority system, strengthening the position of the most powerful political movement, creates conditions for the emergence of a stable balance of power in the legislature, contributing to the displacement of the parliamentary structures of small and medium-influenced parties. The strong position of the leading party in Parliament allows forming a stable government, capable to carry out an effective and coherent policy.

It is impossible, however, not to mention the serious shortcomings of the majority system:

1) The system may not always reflect the real balance of social and political forces in the country. Representation of the most powerful party in the parliament is higher than the actual percentage of voters, which support them, and many influential political parties and organizations are displaced outside parliament, which leads to activation of the extra-parliamentary methods of political struggle. Thus, the possibility is blocked by a political consensus as a major factor of stability in the society.

2) The majority electoral system creates an opportunity for dominance of private interests to the detriment of the national in the behaviour of political actors. Thus, the value of parliament and the government as a national, national authority is weakened.

3) Often candidates from different minorities are not represented in parliament. Especially dangerous is the fact that the actions of unrepresented minorities in parliament can be very damaging to the political system as a whole.

4) In spite of his sympathy, voters sometimes are forced to vote for the most appropriate candidate of those who, in their opinion, have a great chance to win, that their voice is not gone in vain.

5) The majority system creates favourable conditions for the manipulation of the political will of the voters using “gerrymandering” i.e., arbitrary demarcation of constituencies for the purpose of artificial change in the balance of political forces in them, and, as a consequence, on the whole territory of the elections. “Gerrymandering” got its name from Elbridge Gerry, who was a governor of Massachusetts in 1810–1812 and applied the most bizarre constituencies shearing to defeat their opponents.

This method is used extensively in the United States to reduce the role of black voters: districts were divided in such a way so that areas with a predominance of black people were added to the areas with the white population.

6) Finally, the majority electoral system often leads to the emergence of two-party system in the state.

Proportional electoral system is based on the fact that the mandates are distributed between the parties according to the number of votes cast for each of them. In the past, the left parties opposed the proportional electoral system as a more democratic majority. The proportional system has the following variations:

– proportional system at the national level, where the constituencies are not singled out, and the voters vote for a political party in the whole country;

– the proportional system in multi-member districts where voters vote for the party’s representatives district-wide, with the seats in parliament allocated depending on the influence of the party in the district.

– the proportional system is applied to elections of the whole parliament in Denmark, Luxembourg, Israel, the Netherlands, Latvia.

– this electoral system has a number of obvious advantages:

1) It provides a fair representation of political forces at the parliamentary level. As a result, the adoption of parliamentary decisions the interests of certain social and political groups are taken into account to a greater extent. Very different groups of voters can provide positions for their representatives.

2) The proportional system, revealing the diversity of the political palette helps to create efficient backward linkages between civil society and the state, encourages the development of pluralism in the political system.

3) Voters tend to vote for candidates that are close to their own position, rather than candidates who are more likely to be elected.

4) The proportional electoral system with open lists allows voters to choose a candidate and a political party.

5) The proportional system with low entry barriers allows more adequate reflecting the whole spectrum of the country’s parliamentary political parties according to their real impact on the masses.

However, a list of the disadvantages of the proportional system is also impressive:

1) The proportional system weakens the link between the voters and MPs, as the vote is for party, not for specific individuals.

2) The lists of candidates are compiled mostly though administrative-bureaucratic paths, which increases the dependence of candidates on the party and administrative structures. Hence, there is a possibility of bureaucratic decisions, and fraud. (One such fraud is, for example, “locomotive technology”, when during election campaigns, in order to attract voters, the popular personalities are put in the head of the electoral list, and then abandon their mandates, resulting in passing parliament seats to no one famous).

3) Under the proportional system there may be a risk of a parliament with fragmented political forces. To avoid this, the lower limit is determined to limit the representation of small parties – the electoral meter as defined by law.

4) Often it is more complicated to achieve the government’s majority in this system than in a purely majoritarian system. The absence of the dominant political party makes the inevitable emergence of a coalition of parties, their political programs are eclectic and uncertain since they are based on compromise with different target setting. Since such compromises are fragile, the actions of the governments end to be inconsistent and contradictory; a lot of time is spent by governments on coordination of decisions between the members of the coalition, because the ideology of the parties of the coalition can seriously vary. Such coalitions can easily fall apart, so that parliamentary instability occurs.

To overcome the shortcomings of the majoritarian and proportional electoral systems there are all sorts of mixed electoral systems.

In the mixed electoral systems there are used different combinations of majoritarian and proportional methods of determining the results of voting, in order to benefit from the advantages and disadvantages of electoral formulas used.

The first of the mixed system has been used in Germany in the elections to the Landtag of Württemberg, in Denmark – since 1915. Mixed electoral systems are used in the authorities election of different levels in Western and Eastern European countries (Germany, the UK, France, Italy, Andorra, Russia, Ukraine, Hungary, Croatia, Lithuania, Albania), Asia (Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, Philippines, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia), Oceania (New Zealand), and North and South America (Mexico, Panama, Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador), Africa (Cameroon, Chad, Guinea, Nigeria, Senegal, Tanzania). These systems are characterized by high heterogeneity, and they can be classified on various grounds.

 

9.3 The effectiveness of elections

The effectiveness of the election depends on a number of economic, social, legal, cultural and moral terms:

– In the economic area – the development of property relations that involve market mechanisms and entrepreneurial freedom. A person with a property, has something to lose and something to defend, his way of being is radically different from that of Gorky tramp. The presence of economic interests requires appropriate political mechanisms for their articulation and protection. The elections are one of the mechanisms of this kind, with which you can safely remove the leaders that do not provide conditions for realization of material interests of the majority of voters.

– Among the social factors of effective electoral mechanism, an economically wealthy middle class should be put in the first place, ensuring social stability. The constancy of the majority population living on its territory, the strength of public institutions and generally accepted social values also provide a stable social order.

– Among political conditions necessary for the effectiveness of democratic elections, along with the democratic traditions, the existence of a strong civil society with the existing structured institutions should be noted: the development of a multiparty system, a well-established legal framework, state independent of the media.

– Legal conditions for democratic elections, as a rule, are defined in the main document of the state – the Constitution.

– The principle of universality means that all residents are entitled to an active electoral right (i.e. the right to participate in elections as a voter) and passive voting right (i.e. the right to be elected). However, there are exceptions, which are defined by a number of qualifications – they are fixed in the laws of different countries.

Census can be:

– voting age, limiting voters by the age of majority and the age of candidates with a higher level;

– qualification of disability, limiting the right to vote of mentally ill citizens.

– moral, which restricts the rights or completely excludes from participation in elections of persons detained under a court sentence in prison.

In some countries (which are not always democratic) there also exist:

– property qualification, excluding people, whose property or income is below a certain value from participation in elections;

– literacy qualification, requiring a certain level of education;

– gender qualification – a limit of the voting rights on grounds of gender.

Also, in legislation, as a rule, there are grounds for depriving an individual of citizenship.

In modern society there is also such a phenomenon as absenteeism – unwillingness to participate in elections, indifference to nominated candidates or parties participating in the competition. There are several reasons for absenteeism: alienation from political power, rejection of this power, disappointment of voters in their ability to influence political life, but also high level of life stability, voter confidence that his interests will be protected in any case. In some countries (Australia, Belgium, Greece, Italy) various methods of combating absenteeism are used, for example, forced voting, which uses measures of moral (publicity) and material (monetary fine) coercion. The indicators of participation in elections in these countries are quite high, 20-30 % higher than in countries where such measures are not applied.

A special form of political participation of citizens is a referendum, sometimes called a plebiscite. The referendum is a form of direct democracy, a special type of nationwide vote, the object of which is not one or another candidate, but an important issue on which the authorities consider it necessary to clarify the opinion of the population of the country. This may be thea question of the state territory or its independence, the question of the form of government, etc.