Any other democracy in which outnumbered party gets as much majority power as the GOP?

Politics & Elections
1

The GOP is in many ways an outnumbered party, yet wields a disproportionately favorable amount of power, due to the electoral systems of the United States: The Electoral College, gerrymandering, and the way the Senate is structured (every state gets two Senators regardless of population).

For example:
[ul]
[li]Democratic candidates in the Senate got well over 20 million more votes than their Republican Senate counterparts, yet it is the GOP that has a Senate majority today.[/li]
[li]The Republican Party has, in the span of 16 years, won two recent presidential elections in which it lost the popular vote but won the Electoral College (Bush in 2000, Trump in 2016).[/li]
[li]The Democratic Party has won the popular vote in six out of the last seven presidential elections.[/li]
[li]There are 15 sparsely populated, rural Republican states, mostly in the Great Plains region, that add up to a smaller total population, combined, than liberal California’s population alone by itself, yet wield 30 Senate seats to California’s mere 2. (Not every senator from those aforementioned red states is a Republican, though.)[/li]
[li]With three electoral votes, Wyoming packs much bigger Electoral College punch, per capita, than California with its fifty-five electoral votes, given that California’s population is 67 times larger than Wyoming’s. This means that, proportionally, a Wyoming voter’s vote is nearly four times more impactful in a presidential election than a Californian voter’s.[/li]
[li]In last year’s presidential election, Trump won 306 electoral votes with 62.9 million popular votes, meaning he won roughly **206,000 popular votes per Trump elector. **Hillary won 232 electoral votes with 65.8 million popular votes, meaning she won roughly **284,000 popular votes per Hillary elector. **In other words, Hillary had to win far more popular votes per elector.[/li]
[li]In fact, as has been mentioned, the Democratic Party is at its lowest power ebb in nearly a century, with the Republican Party holding the White House, a majority in the Senate, a majority in the House, a majority of governorships, a majority of state legislatures, and, if Ruth Bader Ginsburg is replaced by a Trump nominee, quite possibly a conservative majority in the Supreme Court as well.[/li][/ul]

(The obvious solution for the Democratic Party, of course, would be to get some of its voters to relocate from urban cities to rural regions, but good luck trying to persuade liberals in San Francisco to move to rural Idaho.)
So what I’m wondering is – is there any other democracy today that allows a “minority” party to wield majority power to the extent that the Republican Party does at the moment? The GOP has maximized its power, and electoral wins, to nearly the maximum possible extent that a minority party can possibly do so (“minority” being defined as, having fewer voters/members/supporters.) Is there any democratic system in the world at the moment that lets a minority “game” it this well?

2

The United States is a constitutional federal republic; this is a distinction you seem to not be aware of - probably it’s a distinction many people are not aware of. Of course YMMV as to haw relevant it is to the heart of the sentiments you are expressing.

3

Sure. In the parliamentary system, especially in Canada since we (in modern times) have never accepted federal coalition governments, the winning party can govern with something like a 40% vote count, and that’s with a majority government.

If you include minority governments, the ruling party could probably get by with arount 30% of the popular vote.

In most Westminster parliamentary systems the losing parties can form a coalition and override the winning party to form a government. We don’t typically do that anymore in Canada, so 30% of the votes can get you in. But you need support of the other parties on confidence bills, like budgets. (Sounds a bit like the Dennis scene from “The Holy Grail”, I know.

4

I don’t accept your premise. Go look at the source data for your first bullet point. They are only counting winning votes. So, Diane Feinstein gets all 7M (or so) votes she won in CA, but they just throw away the 4M votes that her Republican rival got. Those don’t get counted at all.

If you look at the House or Representatives, you’ll see that Republicans got more votes the last two elections, and Democrats got more before that (IIRC).

And please just stop with the nonsense about the popular vote for president. No one campaigns to win the popular vote (except maybe Hillary, and see what good that did her). JUST STOP IT. It’s not a meaningful statistic.

5

The U.S. can be accurately described in many different ways. If you mean to say that it is a “constitutional federal republic” and therefore not a democracy, you’re just plain wrong. The U.S. is the dictionary definition of a democracy. It is what people point to when they say the word. Democracy has gained that status by the fact of America’s existence these past 228 years. If the U.S. is not a democracy then no nation state is. Where does that get you?

6

That seems like a pretty uncharitable way to read his post. I can’t see anything that would imply he doesn’t think the US is a democracy. You should be aware, though, that there are quite a few posters here who routinely, explicitly claim that the US is not a democracy. They tend not to be those who show an appreciation for federalism.

7

Like I said, YMMV on this distinction - I’m not sure how there could be any lack of clarity on what I posted that would lead you to respond with this type of questioning. I mean, it should go without saying that if the OP wants to make comparisons between countries in terms of how diffuse and or representative power is throughout various modern societies then some distinction should be made between the various forms of government that fall under the label of “democracy” and perhaps distinguish this from some sort of idealized version of democracy that may exist in the minds of various people in the discussion.

In reality, I see the poster lamenting the fact that the power of the will of the people becomes irrelevant given the circumstances outlined in the OP. Where I see relevance in the fact that the US is a constitutional federal republic is that power is quite diffuse in this system such that on a local level the citizenry can determine for themselves what they want - for example I can legally hire a prostitute in Nevada, or for that matter, I can legally be a prostitute if it’s what I’m into. This, however could lead to a debate rehashing everything outlined in the federalist papers etc. or what have you.

So, more to the point, I think that it is important to keep all this in mind when comparing how much power the will of the people has in one country vs. another.

8

The OP used “democracy” in the thread title and body of the post. Mr. Nylock said the U.S. was something else, “a distinction you seem to not be aware of”. I don’t understand how you could not read it as contradicting the OP. Why bother to make that post otherwise?

As for your earlier post, I agree that the link is the OP is bad statistics. However, it remains true that Democrats got more votes than Republicans for Senate seats.

It is also true that the Republicans got the majority of votes for the House, but they won 57% of the seats with 52% of the votes.

The variance between percentage of votes and percentage of seats is not mere happenstance. It’s the result of our unusual system, due to the way Senators represent states and not people and to gerrymandering in the House. The ability to win the presidency with fewer popular votes is due to the unique Electoral College. It’s certainly legitimate to ask whether other democracies have anything comparable.

9

Dismissing claims of America not being democratic or representative by saying that the American political system is not designed to be democratic or representative is a tautology. You are repeating what the OP said in the first place in the process of dismissing it. We know that the political system is not designed to be democratic or representative; that is the nature of the original criticism.

10

Ah, now I see what was unclear. If I had stated things more clearly I would have referred to it as a specific form of democracy - but I think my follow up post adds enough clarity to the reasons for making that distinction.

11

But it’s unclear why that’s a meaningful statistic since only 1/3 of the Senate is up for vote in any 2-year cycle.

And yet the Democrats gained seats in the House even though they got fewer total votes. So what? Does that mean the Democrats wield more power than they “should”?

There is nothing “unusual” about a federal system. Whenever sovereign entities join together, something like a federal system is normal. Look at the EU, for example, or the UN. Votes are not allotted in strict proportion to population. What small state would join a system that was so proportioned?

12

I’m not sure why I didn’t see that second post. I had some bizarre problems in getting the links to work that took forever to clear up so I probably just hit submit when they finally worked without rechecking.

Distinguishing the many types of systems used by real world countries is useful, but would be more useful if you explained the differences with reference to actual examples. I mean, there is nothing “unusual” about a federal system.

Well, then. Why not explain the specific similarities and differences to an OP asking specifically for examples?

13

Please see the first sentence in my first post in this thread. I know it’s common practice here to accept any OP at face value and then commence debate. I don’t adhere to that practice.

14

You’re thinking like an American–assuming that there are only two parties.So only one party can win 51% or more of the votes, and the other must be the loser. Then you ask if there are other countries where the loser actually wins , ie. “games” the system and controls the government.

Many of the democracies in the world are not two-party systems–they are multi-party systems.
There is no winner ,and no loser. (As defined in America, i.e the winner gets 51% of the vote)

In these countries, all the parties are “losers”.
Because none of the parties ever tries to, or expects to ,win 51%.
After the election is over, there may be 4 or 5 parties , each with about 20% of the votes.
So they engage in nasty political bargaining, to form a coalition of politicians who hate each other, but have no choice but to compromise with each other.

One group says “You want our party to support your crazy laws about unemployment benefits?..okay, we’ll do that if you pubilcly commit to support our ideas about increasing the military budget”. Another party says “You want us to support your stupid ideas about spending massive amounts on the environment and green energy?–okay, we’ll do that if you promise to vote for our suggestion to cut money from health care”.
The result is a sort of controlled chaos, where every party is in the minority, but has the ultiimate power—it can veto some aspects of national policy, eventhough it only has the support of 20% of the voters .

15

See post 3.

Sent from my XT1635-02 using Tapatalk

16

I don’t think anyone (or many people at least) would define “winning” and “losing” that way. Most people would say the winner was the one with the MOST votes, not 51% of the vote.

There may be rare examples in multiparty democracies of parties losing (as in finishing with less votes than the winning party) and still managing form governments that don’t include the winning party, but it is definitely not the norm. The situation in 2000 and 2016 in the US, where this happened, would be considered very strange and undemocratic in any country I’ve had experience of outside the US.

17

[quote=“Velocity, post:1, topic:787563”]

[li]Democratic candidates in the Senate got well over 20 million more votes than their Republican Senate counterparts, yet it is the GOP that has a Senate majority today.[/li][/quote]

This point would pack more of a punch if there had been a Republican on the ballot in the largest state.

18

This is true, but I don’t think it’s relevant to recent Republican successes. Trump won because he racked up tiny pluralities in a few big states. Hillary actually won quite a few small states, and indeed she won a (slim) majority of the aggregated electoral votes of the 10 smallest states.

19

We’ve certainly had times in the UK where the vagaries of demographics and electoral boundaries have meant that the “winning” party actually got fewer votes overall than the “losing” party (1951). Re-arranging boundaries, however impartially done, never keeps up with demographic change so tends by inertia to benefit one or another party (currently, it is reckoned, Labour by about 20 seats).

But re-arranging boundaries, and appointing judges, aren’t things a winning party can just up and do as it likes to suit its own interests. The assumption is that overtly trying to nobble the game that way would be punished by the electorate.

20

hmmm…in my first comment, I told the OP that he was thinking like an American.
Now, I’m going to tell you that you are thinking like a European. :slight_smile:

My point is that, just as the OP’s question only makes sense in America, your answer only makes sense in Europe.
You casually refer to a concept that simply doesnt exist in America: a governmet that “includes” the winning party.
In America, the government never “includes” any other party. The government IS the party which won .
And the other party simply is not in the government. It remains in the opposition until the next election.

In European coaltions, the other parties still have a lot of power, because the winning party needs them to complete the 51% it needs to pass a law.
In America, the winning party already has 51%, so it can pass laws without the minority party.