On January 15th we were joined by Byron Weber to talk about Electoral Reform and Proportional Representation.
Byron is an American by birth but a Canadian by choice currently working at the UW in Computer Science. Electoral Reform has become his hobby as proportional representation is generally not the system used to elect representatives in much of North America. An example of some disproportionate results we’ve had include the Canadian Federal elections of 2011 and 2015 where the winning party obtained 40% of the votes yet captured approximately 54% of the seats. A more striking example is in 1987 in New Brunswick provincial election where the winning party obtained 60% of the votes yet captured 100% of the seats. The result of the “winner take all” system that we use often gives the winning party more power than they deserve. The symptoms of the first past the post system (which is a form of winner take all) is:
- Severe under-representation of women, communities of color, third parties, young people, and major party backers stuck in areas where another party dominates.
- Since many areas are dominated by a single political viewpoint, winner-take-all voting systems will often result in no-choice elections where one party has a permanent monopoly on power, and the winner is effectively predetermined. In the United States, two in five state legislative races go uncontested as a result, and nearly 99% of congressional incumbents win reelection by large margins.
- High percentages of “wasted votes” (that is, votes cast for candidates who do not win).
- Undervoting.
- Decreased voter turnout.
- Divisive campaigns that fail to address challenging issues and ignore entire constituencies.
- The opportunity for gerrymandering (which is a current issue in the US) where voting district lines are redrawn to increase the possibility of a political victory.
Many of the issues above would be addressed by proportional representation as a new system would give every citizen’s vote an equal value and give governments a mandate that more accurately reflects the political will of the people. It seems that a significant number of countries with the highest living standards use Proportionate Representation. Canada and the US seem to be the anomalies in still using winner take all systems. Benefits of proportionate representation include:
- Fairness
- everyone has a vote
- every vote matters
- potential for higher voter turnout
- increased gender and cultural diversity
- encourage collaboration
- arguably better government
- less polarization (picture the US with the current situation with the Democrats vs Republicans)
- less policy lurch (as seen currently when a new government throws out the policy of the previous)
- avoids possible dictators (Hmm…Trump anyone??)
- better decisions (nuff said)
- better outcomes
- stricter environmental controls
- lower income inequality
- better health outcomes
- finance-lower debt, smaller deficits, larger surpluses
- better growth
- lower tariffs and taxes
For further information on this topic, refer to any of the following websites: