Talk:Proportional representation

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I believe this definition is more accurate/common, but correct me if I'm wrong. I've left the old version at the bottom of this page for comparison. --DanKeshet

Old Version

An election system where competing factions share seats in an assembly according to the proportion of votes they received. The number of seats they each receive determines the number of votes they get when voting on decisions. This is the most common method for electing legislative assemblies or parliaments in modern democracies.

=== Single transferable vote in a multi-member constituency ===

Is this really the system used in Australia's Senate? State Senate elections are for either 6 or 12 candidates so the first sentence doesn't apply. Or does it apply to one of the States? Fat Red 06:19, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

I removed the following as I deemed it disturbing to the flow of the article -- 213.231.204.211 17:15, 11 Jan 2004 (UTC)

For example, the electoral system used to elect the Romanian Chamber of Deputies also includes an additional 15 single member seats elected from at large constituencies, each of which represents one of 15 ethnic minority groups too small in number and too dispersed to win representation in parliament under the other electoral mechanism. (See the article, "Seat/Vote Proportionality in Romanian and Spanish Parliamentary Elections," by John Hickman and Chris Little in the Journal of Southern Europe and the Balkans, Volume 2, Number 2, 2000, pp. 197-212.)

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Unluckily, the only anglo-american major nation who has implemented something barely called PR is New Zealand. However, the debate in UK, especially Wales and Scotland (which have already made local improvements and implementations) is fairly old.

British Columbia, Canada represents the latest struggle to achive some level of PR after centuries of two-party, single-seat, winner-takes-all, First-Past-the-Post (FTPT) struggles:

http://www.citizensassembly.bc.ca

the 30-50 hours of lectures can be considered a good example of the learning prosess for typical FPTP citizens of one of the three major, remaining non-PR nations.

http://www.citizensassembly.bc.ca/public/learning_resources/learning_materials/av

- If you'd like to watch — or listen to — the Assembly's learning phase presentations, visit the Audio and Video link on the left.

To accompany these resources, we also offer other educational material of interest. We have some educational "fact sheets" that are easy to read. Our Other Links page is worth a visit, as it has links to numerous sites that cover electoral reform issues. Students and Educators will be interested in our Educational Resources pages. And, of course, we have info on the BC-STV electoral system that the Assembly decided to recommend for B.C. -


- Dear Anon, New Zealand's system is PR. It is a proportional allocation of seats with two-tiers. Furthermore don't classify NZ as 'Anglo-American' a.) we have no historic links to the US b.) we also have a significant Maori population --Gregstephens 22:59, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)


  • The language seems overly complex for such a non-technical subject. for instance, what does this mean?
  • The bloc [vote] can result in "super-majoritarian" results in which, in addition to the normal disproportionality of single-member majoritarian systems, geographical variations that could create majority-minority districts become subsumed into the larger districts.
I am not asking for the meaning of "to subsume"
  • What is all that talking about districts? The simplest proportional represesentative system is one in which the number of single votes is counted - using districts as administrative counting facilities only - x% of votes should be represented by x% of the available seats.
  • districts are a means to cripple the proportionality - as the article states repeatedly.
  • I will attempt to clean the article up somewhat, but some Native Speaker might want to tackle simplifying the longer and convoluted sentences.

--Zanaq 5 July 2005 19:26 (UTC)

[edit] Improvements Needed: Simplify and Add countries and examples

1. As other posters have noted this is way too obfuscated, please use simpler language.

2. We also need a list of countries using this method. ie Iraq, Germany et al

3. Examples of proportional voting in action. --Capsela 16:47, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Also, are all the references to English necessary? Are English-speaking nations the only major exception to a PR world? Neutral world-view and all. Kinst 00:02, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Removed template

Why was the politics template removed? This is a voting, democracy & politics related articles isn't it? C mon 18:52, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] I am removing the New Zealand section

It is too odd to just have one country listed, and none others. --Midnighttonight 04:29, 28 May 2006 (UTC) Here is the text if people want to re-add it:

==New Zealand== [[New Zealand]] has a system of proportional representation[http://www.nzes.org/exec/show/1996]. The United Nations Economic and Social Commission reported on New Zealand [http://www.unescap.org/huset/women/reports/index.htm] that parliamentary elections "were held under a single member constituency First Past the Post system, i.e. single-seat district elections, until 1996 when following widespread dissatisfaction with the fairness of this electoral system and with political parties in general, a system of proportional representation — Mixed Member Proportional — was introduced. Under this system voters have two votes, one for an electorate MP and one for a party. There are 120 seats in New Zealand's parliament. After the 1999 general election 61 were electorate seats, 6 Maori seats and 53 party seats." Especially the jump of female representatives elected percentage-wise was stark (jump from 21% to 30% in one election). --Midnighttonight 04:31, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

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