>The nations that have stronger political parties on the left than
>the USA generally use a party list voting system, simplifying
>choices for voters and facilitating working-class participation in
>electoral politics:
>
><blockquote>Party List Systems
>
>How the System Works:
>
>There are many variations of party list voting, but the most basic
>form is the closed party list system. The system is quite simple;
>rather than voting in a single-member constituency for a specific
>candidate, electors vote for a party in a multi-member constituency,
>or sometimes a whole country.
>
>Each party's list of candidates, ranked according to the party's
>preference, is published on the ballot paper. All the votes are
>counted and each party receives seats in the constituency in the
>same proportion as the votes it won in that constituency.
>
>A quota is calculated for the constituency -- the number of votes
>required to win one seat. Those who become the party's MPs, will be
>those placed highest in the party's list of candidates. Voters
>simply vote for the party, they have no say as to which candidates
>are elected.
>
>An open party list system is one that allows the voter to vote
>either for the list as published or to vote for an individual
>candidate, wherever that candidate appears on the party's list. The
>possible effect of this is to alter the order in which candidates
>have been placed on the list, and therefore the list of successful
>candidates, while still registering support for the voter's
>preferred party. Seats are allocated according to the number of
>quotas won.
>
>The system is used:
>in most countries in continental Europe, South Africa, Israel and
>Russia, and was used in Britain for the 1999 European Election
>(Northern Ireland will retain STV).
>
>Arguments used in favour:
>
>* The strength of such systems are that they guarantee a high degree
>of party proportionality. If a party receives 32% of the vote, then
>it will get 32% of the seats in parliament. Every vote has the same
>value.
>* The system is also very simple for voters, who have only to make
>one choice for a party out of a small selection.
You should not be advocating this kind of system. Yes, it is simple for voters, but that is the only plus. The Victorian State of Australia appears to have just elected a right-wing Christian fundamentalist to hold the balance of power in the Senate because of this practice of allowing the political parties to control preferences.
In the Australian Senate elections, voters have a choice, simply place a "1" in the party square on the ballot paper, or number every square for individual candidates. (They don't have the choice of preferentially numbering every party according to choice.) if the voter trusts the party to allocate his preferences, he usually doesn't even know where they are going.
Thus, a few days ago, an unknown right wing Christian who got only 1.9% of the vote, but was preferenced by every other party except the Greens, will probably get in. It would not have happened if a system was used where voters are required to decide for themselves how to allocate preferences, such as the Hare-Clarke proportional representation system used to elect the Tasmanian and Australian Capital territory governments.
Here's an article explaining what can happen when party lists are allowed to poison democracy:
http://theage.com.au/articles/2004/10/10/1097406425742.html
How party preferences picked Family First By Tim Colebatch October 11, 2004
How can Steve Fielding of Family First win one of Victoria's Senate seats with just 45,260 votes?
In short, because virtually every other party - including Labor and the Democrats - preferred Family First to the Greens and practically every other party.
STEP 1 1st preferences
Liberal/NP 1,048,172
ALP 873,649
Greens 205,920
Family First 45,204
Democrats 44,099
DLP 44,084
Liberals for Forests 41,289
and many smaller parties with a few thousand votes.
The first five seats are won by the Coalition's Michael Ronaldson, Julian McGauran, and Judith Troeth, and Labor's Kim Carr and Steve Conroy. Each of them uses up a quota (339,925 votes) and the remaining votes end up with the next candidates on their list.
The board now shows
Risstrom (Greens) 205,920
*Collins (ALP) 193,799
Fielding (Family First) 45,204
Healy (Democrats) 44,099
Mulholland (DLP) 44,084
Clancy (Lib-Forests) 41,289
de Marchi (Lib) 28,397
and a lot of candidates with fewer votes. It looks like a clear battle between Greens and Labor. But then . . .
STEP 2 Minor parties are eliminated from the bottom, and their preferences distributed.
Now Family First starts to accelerate away from the other micro-parties. It seems almost everyone wants to give them preferences: Meg Lees' group, the Christian Democrats (Fred Nile group), the Aged and Disability Pensioners' Party, the Non-Custodial Parents Party, One Nation, Liberals for Forests.
By the time we get to the final five, the board looks like this:
Greens 229,834
ALP 203,803
Family First 125,694
DLP 72,481
Democrats 49,562
STEP 3 Democrats eliminated. Their preferences go to Family First rather than Greens. Bad luck for Democrat voters who prefer the Greens.
STEP 4 DLP eliminated. Its preferences also go to Family First, along with the Liberal preferences that went via the DLP. The board now reads:
Family First 242,274
Greens 234,697
ALP 201,803
STEP 5 And now the big one. ALP eliminated. And it turns out that Labor too would prefer Family First to win the seat than the Greens.
Family First 436,500
Greens 234,697
Only one in 10 of these voters actually voted for Family First. But the other parties voted for it, and that - and above all, Labor's choice - decided the seat.
* Sitting member