Majority, Proportional and other Electoral Systems. An Overview

February 2016, Dr. Werner T. Bauer, 16 Pages

In many democratic countries there is latent dissatisfaction with the prevailing electoral system and proposals for its reform are made. Countries with majority electoral systems want to see a better representation of all political forces. On the other hand, when faced with the many parties in parliament, countries with proportional electoral systems want to improve the capacity to govern. The present summary provides an overview of the most common electoral systems as well as the different ways votes are counted. The proposals for “minority-friendly majority voting rights” in Austria are also discussed. These and other methods of voting, counting, and weighting, such as cumulating, panachage, or crossing out candidates usually follow two competing goals. On the one hand, the goal is to consider the nuanced opinions of the people more, and, on the other, to more easily achieve majority coalitions.

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