VoiceInTheWilderness
Well-known member
- Location
- Vancouver, more or less
- Pronouns
- he/him
It's election season, so I've decided to pull the trigger on a project I've contemplated for some time.
Thandean Representation (I know no better name) was devised by Thande as a behind-the-scenes reform to bloc vote, which also addresses some of the problems I (and he) have with the modern election process. In modern elections (in the UK, from 1950) the country is divided into single-member districts, and in each the candidate receiving the most votes wins. This holds true even if that candidate receives fewer than 3 out of every 10 votes – 2 MPs currently sitting “won” their seats this way. More broadly, there may be communities divided into multiple ridings, where one party can sweep every riding on a minority of votes, and there was clearly sufficient opposition across the community to make the sweep seem inequitable. On the other hand I take several exceptions to conventional proportional-representation systems, especially the weak or nonexistent links communities have to any particular representative.
Thandean Representation works thusly (quoted from the original):
To give us something to discuss, I've gone through the existing federal riding map and joined the ridings into groups of (usually) three. Extremely rural ridings (e.g. Kenora or Labrador) remain single, and where the numbers didn't add up to neat threes I created a few two-seaters (e.g. Cape Breton Island or Vancouver's North Shore) and four seaters (e.g. Prince Edward Island or Laval). This approach has a number of problems: varying electorate sizes, an only occasional correlation to natural communities, voters could only vote for candidates that stood in their own riding, and so on. Realistically, the Electoral Boundaries Commission would draw fresh and rational boundaries across the country. Still, it's more interesting than nothing, and exposes some trends that bubbled away beneath the surface.
It is to my great regret that the 2011 election was fought on a different map, because comparing the swing to 2015 would have been enormously interesting.
Thandean Representation (I know no better name) was devised by Thande as a behind-the-scenes reform to bloc vote, which also addresses some of the problems I (and he) have with the modern election process. In modern elections (in the UK, from 1950) the country is divided into single-member districts, and in each the candidate receiving the most votes wins. This holds true even if that candidate receives fewer than 3 out of every 10 votes – 2 MPs currently sitting “won” their seats this way. More broadly, there may be communities divided into multiple ridings, where one party can sweep every riding on a minority of votes, and there was clearly sufficient opposition across the community to make the sweep seem inequitable. On the other hand I take several exceptions to conventional proportional-representation systems, especially the weak or nonexistent links communities have to any particular representative.
Thandean Representation works thusly (quoted from the original):
Thande said:Get a constituency/district/ward that elects three members; it might be an existing OTL one that does this under bloc vote. Ideally all constituencies should elect three members, with VERY rare exceptions allowed for specific circumstances like isolated islands. Just as under bloc vote, every voter gets three votes which they can cast accordingly for any of the candidates regardless of party--usually every party should stand three candidates, and for reasons explained later minor or independent candidates should probably have a full slate of three even if the other two are paper candidates.
VoiceInTheWilderness note: This may be my Canadian-ness talking, but I favour giving each voter one vote, not three. In the Canadian case we're doing a reform of first-past-the-post, not bloc vote. Also, in that light, it is less important for an independent to stand paper allies, as there's no risk that their supporters will cast other votes for other parties, elevating rivals above them.
Once the votes are counted, calculate percentages under one of two methods--this is the main difference between the two variants of Thandean Representation which will be discussed here.
THANDEREP-ALLVOTE counts all of the votes cast for all candidates of a party to produce a total party vote and then sums all the party votes for a turnout figure, dividing the first by the second to calculate a percentage vote for that party.
THANDEREP-TOPVOTE only counts the votes cast for the leading candidate of each party, then sums these for a turnout figure and derives a percentage by the same way.
VoiceInTheWilderness note: I will only produce results for ALLVOTE in this project.
This is the only difference between the two methods. ALLVOTE clearly discriminates against parties/independents with only one candidate, whereas TOPVOTE allows a fairer hearing. ALLVOTE is generally better for parties that can command some level of support across a wider area, while TOPVOTE rewards those who can command particularly strong support in a small area.
Regardless of the method used, the three seats are then filled up accordingly:
The party with the highest percentage gets the first seat. Its percentage is then divided in two.
The party with the highest percentage now gets the second seat. This might be the second placed party from the start, or it might be the first party again if it has more than twice as many votes as the second. If it is the second, that party's percentage is now divided in two. if it is the first again, its STARTING percentage is divided in three.
The party with the highest percentage after these changes gets the final seat. It could be the third placed party from the start, or it could be the first party again.
Another way of looking at this in party-list PR (thanks to Owen for suggesting this) is that a vote for a party constitutes a full vote for the first candidate, 1/2 a vote for the second, 1/3 for the third. But this isn't party-list PR and the candidates aren't ranked from the start, so who decides which of the party's three candidates gets to take a seat first? The answer is the voters. Whichever candidate got the highest individual votes to start with is the top candidate, whichever got the second highest is the second candidate, etc. Therefore, the individual who tops the poll is always guaranteed a seat.
*****
This method returns results that look 'more reasonable' to my gut feeling.
If a party gets 71% of the vote across a 3-member constituency it seems reasonable for it to have all three seats with that overwhelming vote.
If a party gets only 49% and another party gets 35%, then it seems reasonable for the first party to get the first and third seats (rewarded for coming top) but the second party to get the second so its sizeable support base is represented.
If a party gets only 49% but the opposition splits between loads of parties with only ~10% each, then it seems reasonable for the first party to get all three seats because although it did not win a majority, there is no coherent, united strand of opposition that deserves representation in its own right, and it would be arbitrary to pick the opposition party that gets 12% rather than the ones who got 11%, 10%, 9%, 9%.
If the top three parties get 35%, 33%, 29% then it seems reasonable for all three to take a seat, because only a small nudge of the votes would be necessary to change this order and the leading party did not get much of a stand-out mandate worthy of additional representation.
Now these are just my gut feelings and you may well disagree, but these are the assumptions I put into this voting system.
To give us something to discuss, I've gone through the existing federal riding map and joined the ridings into groups of (usually) three. Extremely rural ridings (e.g. Kenora or Labrador) remain single, and where the numbers didn't add up to neat threes I created a few two-seaters (e.g. Cape Breton Island or Vancouver's North Shore) and four seaters (e.g. Prince Edward Island or Laval). This approach has a number of problems: varying electorate sizes, an only occasional correlation to natural communities, voters could only vote for candidates that stood in their own riding, and so on. Realistically, the Electoral Boundaries Commission would draw fresh and rational boundaries across the country. Still, it's more interesting than nothing, and exposes some trends that bubbled away beneath the surface.
It is to my great regret that the 2011 election was fought on a different map, because comparing the swing to 2015 would have been enormously interesting.