The other problem is that if you take the same route Queensland went down and abolished the Upper House (resulting in a unicameral legislature) you can end up with a situation (or, in QLD’s case, the last forty years or so ;)) where the Opposition has absolutely no power at all and the Premier can do more or less whatever they like.
Because it’s proportional, you can end up with minority (politically, not ethnically- think of them as “fringe”) parties holding the balance of power in a coalition government. The party might only get one or two seats (ie not many people voted for them), but they’ve got entirely too much power because they end up as kingmakers and can more or less hold the government to ransom. Say they get 8% of the votes, that means 92% of the population didn’t vote for them. So why should they be in a position to force those 92% to accept something they don’t want because of backroom political deals?
Tasmania is an island state of very little significance to most of the rest of Australia (Sorry Bytes!) beyond having lovely scenery and a chocolate factory there. The entire population is only 500,000 or so and basically they shouldn’t be expecting the other 21.8 million people in the country to cater exclusively to their desires. Not that they do; it was just an example.
The point Noel was making (as I understand it) is that the potential problem with representation without proper checks and balances is that Federal MPs from out of the way and largely insignificant (politically and perhaps even culturally) places like Tasmania can end up blocking important legislation for various silly reasons (as the former SA Attorney General was doing for years with an R18+ rating for computer games).
I see your point, and I don’t think it makes sense to have a party with one or two seats act as a kingmaker in this way. But there is an argument that steps in this direction do help to prevent against the “tyranny of the majority”; that to an extent it can be a good thing for small but significant minorities, particularly when they are of a different ethnicity, to have influence beyond their proportional size, to prevent them getting ignored and trodden down by the majorities and the centers of power. That’s why the US Senate has 2 senators from each state regardless of population, for instance.
Exactly as per my example. The superficially attractive idea is that proportional voting gives everyone’s vote equal value.
The practical problem is that this ignores the reality of the present party system.
If Party A gets 49% of the vote and party B gets 48%, then why should Party C, which got 3% and so should be ignored, get such disproportionate leverage as to essentially run the government? If it doesn’t like what A does, it forces B to come begging. And any major party has to make ridiculous concessions to C (including allowing C to piggyback its program off whichever one it blackmails) to stay in office. This gives a party with negligible support stupid levels of power.
And Brian Harridinedid indeed essentially hold the balance of power in the Australian Senate for a significant period, getting concessions for his deeply socially conservative program (for which most Australians would not have voted) in exchange for the government being allowed to get anything through. Yet he got something like 24,000 primary votes in a State with a population of half a million, in a country with a population of over 20 million.
The problem is powerfully illustrated by the ballot forms. Reps electoral ballot forms have maybe 4 or 5 candidates. Usually it is more like 2 or 3.
Senate forms are the size of a couple of table napkins and have dozens of candidates, most of whom are single issue party candidates. The Victorian Senate ballot paper for 1996 had 45 candidates on it, and I am sure I have seen more in more recent times. Most of them are single issue candidates or loonies trying to leverage themselves into a position where they can get in and then be able to force a balance of power negotiation.
I accept without hesitation the idea that there should not be a tyrrany of the majority. What I object to even more, however, is a tyrrany of a minority.
But the Australian Senate was modelled on the US one in many respects - each state gets 10 senators (because we have so few states by comparison with the US). The consequence of this is that when you get down to number 10, there is a serious possibility that fringe candidates will get in. With only two Senators per state as in the US, it is almost impossible for fringe candidates to get a leg in. This is an example of the need for care in modelling your system. Notwithstanding following the apparently successful model of the US Senate, subtle and seemingly insignificant differences in application (number of senators per state, voting system) have resulted in quite different outcomes.
The problem of tyranny of the majority is potentially real. The answer, I think, is to have large “Broad Church” parties rather than separate single issue parties. People with single issues don’t have to abandon having a voice, but they have to fit themselves within a framework that forces rational negotiation from a position within their party of choice that better reflects the true support their ideas have.
One of the fundamental differences is the amount of political power that rests outside of the US federal government. Each state has its own legislative, executive, and judicial branches. Each state levies its own taxes, writes its own laws, runs its own court systems, etc. County and city governments can also wield considerable influence in areas with large populations.
The conflict between state and federal interests is a hallmark of American politics, as witnessed by the recent anti-immigrant legislation that has been passed in Arizona. Each state has different laws on hot button issues like gun possession, abortion, and marriage. Rampant corruption has plagued the state governments in New York and Illinois, and states compete fiercely with each other to lure businesses from one to another.
Does the UK have these same issues of a mutli-level government?
A minority is a minority. I don’t care whether the minority is the IWW, the Illinois Nazi Party or the People’s Front of Judea for present purposes. Either can be elevated to a position of disproportionate strength by mere statistical artefacts.
And ditto for me not wanting to be in charge of a country.
The difficulty with this is you end up with voters saying, “Well, I agree with the Silly Party’s plans to remove speed limits on bush or outback roads, but I disagree with their plans to increase fuel excise by 35% and require everyone to own at least one owl.” So whilst I see where you’re coming from and agree in theory, I just don’t think it would work in practice, unfortunately.
I agree with you. The point I was making is that some political minorities really should be made to STFU and others do have valid points that might deserve slightly more consideration than voter returns might otherwise suggest. So when we talk about “Tyranny of the Majority”, I’m saying it’s not automatically a bad thing if the minority being “tyrannised” are the Nazi Kitten Haters Party, for example.
Oh, I want to be in charge. But it’s probably for the best that I’m not.
The composition of the Australian Federal Senate is a function of both the election system and the size of the chamber. Prior to 1984 representation of minor parties was limited.
However in 1984 there was a decision to increase to size of the Senate from 10 Senators per state to 12, meaning at any half senate election there are 6 positions rather than 5. As a consequence for one of the major parties to get a majority of 4 senators per state requires a rarely attained 58%+ vote. Consequently each state returns either 3:3 Lib:Lab or 3:2 with 1 minor party.
Prior to 1984 the state results were almost always 3:2 with (almost) no minor parties using exactly the same voting system.
Six senators per half senate election provides the highest represention of minor parties. A full senate election (12) almost assures minor parties of being wiped out. With seven senators major party magorities would be possible, at nine magor parties would usually have a majority.
I fail to see what is undemocratic about the OP’s points 1, 2 and 3. Point 4 is more contentious, and apparently they are going to change to fixed terms somehow, but some argue that that will lead to US-style marathon campaign seasons, because a fixed date will allow the parties’ campaign teams more control over planning and budgets, or something. Not sure I quite follow the logic of that, but it is certainly a blessing that we only have five weeks of full-on campaigning (albeit with a gradual increase in posturing in the year or so before an election).
It’s a representative democracy. We elect MPs, largely although by no means exclusively on party lines, and then let them get on with running the country.
As others have said, it’s difficult to make meaningful comparisons between the Westminster system and the US one. One major difference is that ours is almost a unicameral system, the House of Lords being so weak. And maybe it’s because I’m British but frankly I’ve never seen the point of bicameral systems. We elect one house of parliament - why do we need another bunch of people sitting around arguing about the same bills that the Commons has already debated?
I think as the other posters pointed out, when you compare the US and UK you can easily see the differences in a unitary and federal system. The fact states like Wyoming and Montana have as much political clout as New York and California (in the Senate) account for the over-repesentation of agriculture and mining interests in the nation.
Also remember the will of the people isn’t always a good thing. Usually but not always, for example if the majority want to supress a minority group.
In both systems we can find a lot of waste and needless money being spent.
I’m also sorry for any thread hijacking here, but I cannot let this stand. It is your comments which show bias. Recall that Thaksin’s very first selection as Prime Minister was corrupt. As a government franchisee he was ineligible under the brand-new constitution but got a waiver via a split decision of a court, with some of the judges later admitting they’d been under severe pressure. He went on to commit numerous frauds and felonies.
True, I suppose, if buying votes is considered “free and fair.” Do you deny that most rural Thai elections essentially go to the highest bidder?
Wow!! I really wonder how familiar you are with Thai politics, or with Thaksin’s nature.
Yep. England would have elected a majority conservative government. In Scotland the Tories came either fourth or fifth. Scotland and Wales have far more political power per capita than England.
A report, cited here, by the independent Asian Barometer Project Office found that the writing of the 1997 Constitution was corrupt and undemocratic. They concluded it was written by the “elite” in Bangkok; one of the provisions it contained for instance was that MPs were now legally required to have Bachelor’s degrees from a university, effectively ruling out any rural representatives.
The same report concluded that the 2001 elections were the “most open, corruption-free elections in recent Thai history.” If you’re saying that is false and that Thaksin not only bought votes, but bought a landslide’s worth of votes, you need to provide evidence for that.
Not very familiar. If you’d like to enlighten me with some evidence to support your claims, I’d be happy to learn more, because the evidence that I have seen doesn’t support what you’re saying. I find these claims, supported by the wealthy and business interests in Bangkok - that rural people are not educated enough to vote; that their votes must have been ‘bought’ if they didn’t go the right way; that any party they support should be banned from participating in future elections - very pernicious.
The whole proportional thing is a mixed bag but generally a good think IMHO. One problem with a pure proportional system is that you don’t have a locally elected representative. I think that is a bit of a problem with the elections in Iraq.
In New Zealand we have a Mixed Member Proportional system which gives us a bit of both worlds. Half the seats in the house are locally elected MPs and half are “list MPs” because they are not directly elected but are picked from the list of names each party publishes before the election. A party gets the number of list MPs required so that the party has the correct total number of MPs based on their proportion of the popular vote. In the unlikely event that a party gets more locally elected MPs than their proportional vote entitles them to then parliament has an “overhang” with more MPs than usual. A party needs 5% of the popular vote or one elected member before their proportionality entitlement kicks in. That’s an attempt to avoid the chance of a very small party holding the balance of power and effectively holding the country to ransom.
I think there will be a referendum soon to decide if we want to keep MMP after 20 years of trying it or go back to FPP. No system is perfect but I hope we stay with MMP. We’ve had our problems but I don’t think it’s been too bad.
People were worried that the parties in the UK negotiated for a few days before forming a government. In NZ, after our first MMP election, they negotiated for 8 weeks! Luckily that hasn’t been repeated.
I don’t think the US has any real safeguards against a small group or one person holding the balance of power in congress. It just hasn’t really happened in a significant way. What if congress was split almost evenly and one or two independents effectively held the balance of power? Hasn’t Joe Lieberman come close to that in some situations in the senate?
Happens the whole time. I mean, almost daily, and especially on big issues. If you just take the health-care reform bill as one example, absent Republican support the Democrats had 60 senators and needed every one of them to vote their way. And that leverage was how Ben Nelson got his “Cornhusker Kickbacker”, how Mary Landrieu got the “Louisiana Purchase” and how Bill Nelson won exemptions for Florida counties. Harry Reid was incandescent when Joe Lieberman insisted on stripping out the provision to allow people over 55 to sign up to Medicare, despite having supported it before, on pain of voting against the bill.
It’s also one of the reasons some conservatives like David Frum have criticized the Republican strategy of outright, point-black refusal to negotiate unless the Democrats “started over”. He argues that if a handful of the more moderate Republicans had been willing to negotiate in good faith, they could have won some serious concessions. Obama himself offered them major tort reform, a a long-time conservative goal, and they could probably have ended or pared back the tax exclusion for employer-provided plans. As you point out, a small minority of senators could have wielded some serious power by virtue of making up the balance. As it was their strategy meant they didn’t get those concessions, and then lost the final vote anyway.
Give us a chance! We are new to this whole coalition thing. We are accustomed to instant change of government, with the new PM and other ministers taking office the day after the election. I have a feeling that, in the long run, we are going to have to get used to negotiated changes of government.
I live in rural Thailand. I don’t want to generalize what I see to every province, but at least in the four subdistricts (ca 40 villages) in my immediate area, villagers are definitely paid: often in local elections, almost always in Parliamentary elections. No, I won’t show a URL (you may Google blogs if you wish for similar comments by other rural residents); this is what I’ve learned with my own eyes and ears. Rates are 200-300 baht per vote ($6 or 9) and/or candidate buying rounds of beer, etc. It’s common knowledge that banks need to order extra banknotes before elections, and robbery risk is said to rise. A few years ago, in neighboring village a hua khanaen was murdered, apparently because he kept a candidate’s money instead of distributing it to voters. A hua khanaen (literally “head of votes”, canvasser) can range to small-scale: two of my wife’s relatives have told me of their own experiences signing up voters and finally distributing the money. Parliamentary candidates prefer to buy entire villages; it make verification easier – individual ballots are secret (though not always), but village results are open. Vote buying is technically illegal, and re-elections are sometimes ordered. I recall a large party about the time of such a re-election where the disqualified winner (who was not barred from the re-election) was distributing election cards (itself illegal) and hesitated when she saw me.
In addition to buying individual votes, it is well-known that the popular candidates and M.P.'s may themselves be “up for sale” and/or from organized crime families. Political parties, with the exception of the Democrat Party, tend to be controlled by strong men, so the only “party platforms” will be enriching a specific region, or specific crime family.
Your comments, The Great Philosopher, suggest you didn’t know this. Reporting may not be very good (I’ve seen significant errors by NYT’s Seth Mydans, and he just reports Bangkok), and I see foreign press all-too-often trying to oversimplify this as “populists versus elite.” I do admit that, despite flagrant perfidies, Thaksin is popular among rural voters. I’ve asked 20 or so locals why they support Thaksin and the almost-invariant reason is for his War on Drugs (specifically methamphetamine). Ironically he was condemned by foreign media for his War on Drugs since it involved extrajuridicial executions.
Your comments about the 1997 Constitution are interesting. I agree it was a most unfortunate document, but it was widely (foolishly I think) supported by professors and students, and the general population “went along for the ride.” I disagreed with the degree requirement, but more serious were provisions to strengthen parties. (Out of touch with reality since strong (and strongman-controlled) parties were the problem.)
I skimmed the article but failed to see the specific allegation that Bangkok “elite” had rigged the Constitution for their gain. A big problem with the Constitution was maintaining strong parties (e.g., M.P. kicked out of his party loses seat in Parliament); this helped the regional (rural) parties, not Bangkok’s more liberal parties.
Page 7 of that document, which summarizes the 1991-1992 period (P.M.'s = Chatichai, Anand, (Narong), Suchinda), is quite misleading. It fails to mention that Chatichai’s administration was generally seen as extremely corrupt, while Anand’s was among the most impartial and commendable ever. And the paper ignores that Suchinda assumed power only after the “fair and free” 1992 elections had led to a Parliamentary coalition which selected alleged drug-dealer Narong – unacceptable to U.S.A.! (That the paper completely ignores Narong’s “democratic” selection as well as Chatichai’s “Buffet government” corruption makes one very doubtful about the paper.)
