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Does each voter have a particular representative they can express their opinion to? As I see it, calls from constituents is an influence on politicians because

Does each voter have a particular representative they can express their opinion to? As I see it, calls from constituents is an influence on politicians because they know these are the people who they depend on. I don't know how it works in Germany so maybe there's a provision for this. Also, the unintended consequence of such an electoral system is that it encourages extreme views, rather than moving towards the centre. Of course gerrymandered districts have the same effect, but centrism is worth striving for, I think. It ensures that a majority of people have a candidate who isn't far from their own views. You can see how proportional representation would help parties like the UKIP do far better than they otherwise would have, which is not necessarily in the best interests of the nation.

rayiner 9y ago
> You can see how proportional representation would help parties like the UKIP do far better than they otherwise would have, which is not necessarily in the best interests of the nation. In the long run, what's in the best interests of the nation is for the government to fairly represent as much of the electorate as possible, not a fictional "middle ground."
- nindalf 9y ago
  I agree with you in principle. But I also think in this particular case the UK has benefited from the UKIPs absence from Parliament.
breatheoften 9y ago
I had to look up the details -- Germany actually uses a mixed proportional system. Each person votes for their preferred candidate in a local race and for their preferred party. Half the total seats are filled by the winner of the local races -- and the remaining half are allocated in proportion to the party votes in order of a pre-determined list of candidates produced by each party. For some parties -- the order of the candidates on the party list is voted on, for others the list order is decided by some central power broker. I guess this means the local races could still be gerrymandered -- however with more total parties I think gerrymandering might be harder to preserve in general ...
- detaro 9y ago
  > Half the total seats are filled by the winner of the local races That's not quite true. The seats are distributed by party votes, but if a party wins more local races than it would get seats from the party votes, the size of parliament is scaled up, preserving the ratios until the party has seats for all their local winners. (Which is why the current Bundestag has 631 seats, despite the "base size" being indeed 598, twice the number of districts. And yes, that growth could go pretty high if things go badly, which is why I wouldn't be surprised if the algorithm was changed again). There is also a distribution between states, which makes the entire thing even more complicated. An older model did not scale up with preserved ratios, but just added the "overhang" of local winners on top, which could cause bad effects where votes had negative value. But the base number of seats also was distributed according to the ratio of the second votes. Who gets the seats for a party from that state prefers the local winners, and then follows the local candidate list.
anarazel 9y ago
> Does each voter have a particular representative they can express their opinion to? As I see it, calls from constituents is an influence on politicians because they know these are the people who they depend on. I don't know how it works in Germany so maybe there's a provision for this. Yes. On a federal level everyone has two votes, the first is for a candidate, the second is for a party. The direct vote is for roughly equal sized districts, the second for a party. Normally half of the seats are allocated by first, half by second vote. If the directly elected seats yield a significantly enough party-line difference across a state (Germany is federally organized), additional indirectly elected seats are added to make up for the difference.
jopsen 9y ago
If the person you voted for isn't elected to Congress, and you have a "representative" from then other party... Do you then have a representative who will listen to you? In the mixed systems like the German (well, most Western democracies) your vote helped elect someone from a party you choose.. even if it's not the person you personally voted for.

rayiner 9y ago

> You can see how proportional representation would help parties like the UKIP do far better than they otherwise would have, which is not necessarily in the best interests of the nation. In the long run, what's in the best interests of the nation is for the government to fairly represent as much of the electorate as possible, not a fictional "middle ground."

nindalf 9y ago
I agree with you in principle. But I also think in this particular case the UK has benefited from the UKIPs absence from Parliament.

breatheoften 9y ago

I had to look up the details -- Germany actually uses a mixed proportional system. Each person votes for their preferred candidate in a local race and for their preferred party. Half the total seats are filled by the winner of the local races -- and the remaining half are allocated in proportion to the party votes in order of a pre-determined list of candidates produced by each party. For some parties -- the order of the candidates on the party list is voted on, for others the list order is decided by some central power broker. I guess this means the local races could still be gerrymandered -- however with more total parties I think gerrymandering might be harder to preserve in general ...

detaro 9y ago
> Half the total seats are filled by the winner of the local races That's not quite true. The seats are distributed by party votes, but if a party wins more local races than it would get seats from the party votes, the size of parliament is scaled up, preserving the ratios until the party has seats for all their local winners. (Which is why the current Bundestag has 631 seats, despite the "base size" being indeed 598, twice the number of districts. And yes, that growth could go pretty high if things go badly, which is why I wouldn't be surprised if the algorithm was changed again). There is also a distribution between states, which makes the entire thing even more complicated. An older model did not scale up with preserved ratios, but just added the "overhang" of local winners on top, which could cause bad effects where votes had negative value. But the base number of seats also was distributed according to the ratio of the second votes. Who gets the seats for a party from that state prefers the local winners, and then follows the local candidate list.

anarazel 9y ago

> Does each voter have a particular representative they can express their opinion to? As I see it, calls from constituents is an influence on politicians because they know these are the people who they depend on. I don't know how it works in Germany so maybe there's a provision for this. Yes. On a federal level everyone has two votes, the first is for a candidate, the second is for a party. The direct vote is for roughly equal sized districts, the second for a party. Normally half of the seats are allocated by first, half by second vote. If the directly elected seats yield a significantly enough party-line difference across a state (Germany is federally organized), additional indirectly elected seats are added to make up for the difference.

jopsen 9y ago

If the person you voted for isn't elected to Congress, and you have a "representative" from then other party... Do you then have a representative who will listen to you? In the mixed systems like the German (well, most Western democracies) your vote helped elect someone from a party you choose.. even if it's not the person you personally voted for.