About American Elections

[Cohen]

Besides, england has 4-6 political parties, not 2!

 

Although there hasn't been a non Conservative or Labour Government since 1916 with the demise of the Liberals. Although there are several parties only two of them have ever gained power for almost a century now, at the Westminster level Britain is essentially a two party state. The other smaller parties such as the Liberal Democrats, Plaid Cymru, Scottish Nationalist Party, Green Party, United Kingdom Independence Party etc have only had any real success in institutions which use a proportional representation electoral system such as the European or Scottish elections. Majoritarian electoral systems such as First Past The Post will ultimately become two party as for any party to be successfull they must first become a large party, to become a large party they must become successfull, hence the catch. PR systems encourage smaller parties and give a more accurate reflection of distribution of results, hence by their very nature are more democratic. France I believe uses a hybrid system rather then pure PR.

 

Surely if a nation has an established sense of identity within it's borders then a democratic system can function.

 

Indeed, but just think how America is split into so many categories. First you have ethnic and cultural splits, I'm not even going to bother listing how many different ethnicities there are in America but their backgrounds (parents, culture, public regard etc) will most certainly have an influence on their ideologies. Then there are religious differences, Methodists, Mormons, Presbytarians, Evangalists, Catholics, non-denoms and that's just the Christians! Factor in then Budhists, Jews, Muslims, then agnostics and athiests. Can all of those defining traits be summed up in either Bush or Kerry? At best the majority opposites can be represented. Having to pick a candidate who simply "as close as you can get" to ones own political beliefs is not democratic in the least. To cite an example, the Catholic vote. For a devout Catholic Kerry immediately represents opposition due to his acceptance of abortion and other life issues, Which leaves Bush, an advocate of the free market (a concept heavily criticised by the Church for it causing companies to regard profit and capital with more importance then human welfare) and responsible for slashing welfare budgets which can be argued acts as a catalyst for the social causes of abortion. Were a Catholic presented with Bush and Kerry then neither candidate would truly represent their ideologies, although in all liklihood would probably vote for Bush as a concession. I would hardly call America a country united under one identity and so the democratic process suffers.

[Phi for All]

BTW, I'm -10, -10

Gasp! You're the AntiBush!

 

 

Btw, Dennis Kucinich called, are you free to be his Vice President? He thinks you'll help balance out his conservative, authoritarian tendencies!

[JaKiri]

I was -4, -4, but I can't remember if that was answering what the questions actually mean or what they were supposed to mean. The test isn't well written by any stretch of the imagination.

[[Tycho?]]

I believe Canada is a good country because anyone can make a party with just 100 signatures and a few thousand dollars very nice system.

 

 

Ehhh, Canada's system is ok (I live there) but its not that great. I think Canada should have more political parties as well, so a party can never get a majority government, and must always ally themsevles with another party to maintain power. I would also like proportional representation. A system like Germany's, or Isreal's is pretty good.

 

Oh yeah, and I think the US system can barely be called a democracy at all, considering that the two main choices are nearly exactly the same.

 

 

 

edit: well I took the quiz (again) i got

Economic Left/Right: -6.50

Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -6.31

 

On the graph, pretty much where I was last time I took it.

[bloodhound]

u lot are more extreme liberals than me.!!

I won't Torelate this

[Sayonara]

Torelate?

[bloodhound]

zoidbergs dyslexic. didnt u know?

[Aardvark]

As a matter of interest Cohen, Kerry is a devout Catholic.

 

Also i don't think a nation needs to be completley homogenous for a democracy to function, and i think the USA has a pretty strong sense of identity, ethnic backgrounds notwithstanding) a diversity of viewpoints makes for a healthy political process. It's when a country is limited in different viewpoints that the dangers of excessive conformity and political sterility arise.

 

Even in a two party system, the parties have to at least recognize the existence of varing viewpoints and modify policies and ideas accordingly. It's not perfect but whats the alternative? Homogenous little states frightened of diversity?

[Cohen]

As a matter of interest Cohen, Kerry is a devout Catholic.

 

I'm well aware that he is a Catholic, but a devout one? If my understanding of Catholic theology and the definition of devout is correct then how can somebody proclaim to be Catholic and pro-abortion? It does strike me that a devout Catholic would pay heed to the most vocal protests of his own religion!

 

Even in a two party system, the parties have to at least recognize the existence of varing viewpoints and modify policies and ideas accordingly.

 

As long as they have a majority then in practise they won't.

 

i don't think a nation needs to be completley homogenous for a democracy to function

 

For democracy no, however for a democracy based on a majoritarian electoral system then yes, it would have to be. Otherwise it would become an oligarchy (which just as point of interest is closer to what the US and UK systems are). Remember democracy is governance by the people, as in the entire people. Ruling of the few is an oligarchy. Let's say we have a hypothetical country using FPTP where the only condition to win Government is to have a majority of the vote. It would be possible for a party to win with say only 30% of the vote. This is not democratic as only that 30% are being represented, the other 70% are separated by divisions amongst other parties. Even if these other parties were to form a coalition to form a majority of the vote then they would have to dilute their policies to suit the vague consensus, hence reducing representation.

 

It's when a country is limited in different viewpoints that the dangers of excessive conformity and political sterility arise.

 

This is also true.

 

It's not perfect but whats the alternative?

 

Then a two party state? One with an electoral system based on proportional representation rather then a majoritarian based system, although still not pure democracy it gives much greater representation of the people so in terms of degrees of democracy it is better. If a state is to have a diverse mix of viewpoints and cultures within it's borders it must adopt a system that is capable of representing them rather then the two biggest contestants.

[aeroguy]

We have seven parties in our parliament, and five of those have formed the government at various times in the past. There's one left-wing socialist party, one centre-left-wing socialist party (the largest of the seven) one green centre-left party, one christian conservative right-wing party, one liberal right-wing party, one green centre-right-wing party and one conservative right-wing party (second largest).

 

Anyone over 18 can register a party, and there's no fee or any other requirement involved. I'm pretty sure you only have to have a legal permanent residence in the country. Citizenship is most likely not required.

I believe we have around 1800 registered parties at the moment. And I'd say 99% of them are one-member parties...

 

Not only do we have a system where different parties fairly easily can gain power, we also have a huge diversity. The two main US parties would both be far to the right of our most conservative party, though, and would both end up quite close together on an absolute, global political scale.

 

Another thing to factor in is that although some of the smaller parties only make it into parliament, they still have a powerful position, often as a balance when votes are tied between the left and the right, or along any other political dividing line.

They also get seats in various commitees.

Both the number of seats in the parliament and the commitees are handed out relative to the percentage of the total votes the party got in the general election.

The threshold to get in is 4% of the votes.

 

And politicians are not elected as individuals. You vote for a party, although you have the option to "bump" a candidate up by ticking a box next to his or her name on the ballot. Also, most politicans here come from "normal" backgrounds. Teachers are in a clear majority, followed (in no particular order) by lawyers, social workers, medical staff, and farmers. A growing number have never had more than odd jobs for a few years. These are generally the younger (<25 years or so) of the members.

There are 349 seats in total. The number was 350 until there was a 175-175 tie once, and they had to change it...

 

Our system works well, in my opinion, but if I could change things, I'd triple the number of seats and lower the entry threshold to 1% or so.

I'd also allow two votes per person, so that smaller special-interest parties had a chance. Such a system could be made to work, and would increase diversity.

It would, I regret to say, allow a racist party to enter, but I am a firm advocate of freedom of speech, so I'd allow it without the slightest hesitation.

 

Anyway, that's my rant for now.

Nice first post, eh?

[Aardvark]

Don't believe that proportional representation is automatically more democratic or representative. In PR systems small parties can wield disproportionate influnence, especialy when they hold the balance of power.

 

For example, look at Israel. A PR system allows marginal exttemist religious parties to hold governments to ransom and to force the government to follow a harder, more extremist line than it otherwise would.

 

Even Catholics are allowed the freedom of conscience, the Pope may be a hardliner but the days of the Inquistion are over.

 

Democracy is not solely direct rule by the people, representative democracy is a valid variatation( the systsem used in the UK). Oligarchy is when a few rule and hold all power in their hands. In a representative democracy regular elections mean than they rule at the sufferance of the people.

 

Perhaps we are all missing the point. In the UK at least, it seems that more and more power is accuring in the hands of unknow, unaccountable bureacractic bodies, more laws rules and regulations are introduced by European committees and Quangoes ( quasis autonomous non-governmental organisations) than by our elected government. We argue about the fig leaf of elected government whilst our liberties are eroded away under our noses.

[aeroguy]

The fewer parties you have in a such a system, the more power a small party can wield. But here, they only have a major influence when it comes to special-interest questions.

[Aardvark]

If a small party held the balance of power in your country what would stop it wielding disproportionate influence?

[aeroguy]

But they only hold the balance of power in a few questions.

Most of the time, there simply is no divide they can straddle.

Again, the more parties you have in the parliament, the less of an effect the small parties have, because agreement on various issues don't tend to follow party lines, so you rarely have the left-right (for example) split.

In other questions, you might have a three- or four-way split even.

[Aardvark]

That may be the case in Sweden, but in Israel the same set up leads to the opposite result with the same parties having great influence.

 

Perhaps it's because in Sweden there are no important issues for the politicians to worry about, as opposed to the very serious matters that the Israeli government deals with. In peaceful, secure prosperous nations not facing any challenges PR might result in moderate government, but faced with any sort of real problem or divide i can't see it working.

 

Having 3 or 4 way splits seems like an ideal way of having deadlocked government unable to ever actually make an important decisions.

[Sayonara]

I presume by "important" you mean "explosive"?

[Aardvark]

Apache helicopter and detonating bus type explosive, yes.

 

I think it's fair to define that as pretty important to the people hearing the loud bangs.

[Sayonara]

True, but I doubt the people in Sweden hear the bangs and start reflecting on how hum-drum their lives are.

[Aardvark]

They don't need to reflect on how hum-drum their live are.

 

They just are, whats the biggest worry facing Swedish politics? The need to instill some rivalery with the Danish football team? A need to maintain a constant supply of birch twigs for the saunas?

 

Major topics for confrontation amongst the politicians i'm sure.

[Phi for All]

Thank you, aeroguy, for your thoughts on proportional representation in Sweden. I hope you won't let a few ignorant, trolling remarks about the politics of your entire country disuade you from posting again. I think Aardvark likes to sweep the chess pieces off the board with a swipe of his hand when his defense goes awry.

[Aardvark]

Sad that some people can't see a joke that's about as obvious as a 10 ton elephant.

[aeroguy]

Elephants get that heavy?

 

I'm all right, but thanks for the concern Phi!

[Aardvark]

Genetically modified ones might.

 

Humour aside, my point is that such a prosperous and well ordered society as Sweden will not face the same stresses as a society like Israel. That makes the difference in political processes interesting when they have a similiar political constutition.

[jgerlica]

This pretty much sums up my feelings on the pending election: