Democracy? Think Again
Posted: November 3rd, 2008 | Author: Jon | Filed under: Politics | Tags: canadian, election, election 2008, electoral dysfunction, fairvote.ca, first past the post, Politics, referendum, reform, royal canadian air farce | 9 Comments »This evening, a friend linked me to a post on Jason Hanley’s excellent blog. A graduate of both the University of Waterloo and of Wilfrid Laurier University, Hanley wrote this post regarding the results of the Canadian federal election a couple of weeks ago.
As Ontario voters will know, during the last provincial election, we held a referendum to decide whether or not to replace the existing first past the post voting system that exists in Ontario. Unfortunately, the process was poorly advertised, the question was horribly worded, the conditions for the referendum to pass were too strict, and at the time of the election, most people didn’t understand the issues enough to affect a change to our current system.
The following chart, taken from Hanley’s post, clearly shows the need for a new electoral system in Canada:
Canadian Federal Election Results 2008
The implications of these election results are clearly summarized into a number of alarming points:
- Only 58% of Canadians actually voted
- The number of seats received by each party versus the number of seats deserved by each party according to a proportional (fair) voting system is wildly skewed
- In particular, the Green party received no seats at all, while the Bloc Quebecois received a ridiculously disproportionate 16% of all seats.
It seems clear to me that our system is beyond broken. Of all the democratic countries in the world, only Britain, the United States, and Ourselves continue to use this outdated electorate model. Besides the non-proportional results that our system gives, its other problems can be easily summarized:
- In order to get elected, parties have to maintain not only a strong support base, but one with a small geographic distribution. This means that parties like the Greens, who received 21% of popular support cannot get a single seat, because they don’t have enough voters in any single riding to win.
- In theory, the system is designed for a election with only two parties, as in the United States. In that case, the winner of each riding needs 50% +1 popular votes to win, and a clear majority results in every election. However, with 4 parties in a riding, the number to win drops to 25% +1, meaning that the vast number of votes are essentially unrecognized, and minority governments are common.
- Because of their clustered geographic support, the Bloc Quebecois (a separatist party running in a federal election with no representatives outside of the province of Quebec) regularily win the majority of seats in Quebec, and hold a strong presence in the house due to the high population density in that province. This is nothing short of an absurdity, as they do not represent the wishes of any Canadian not born and raised within Quebec.
- Although there are no studies (that I’ve seen) to support this conjecture, I would hazard a guess that the vast number of Canadians didn’t bother to vote because they saw no clear leader in any of the election preceedings. The entire thing was marginally successful power grab by Stephen Harpers’ government, at a time when the Liberal party was perceived to be too weak to prevent an easy majority win by the Conservatives.
Ladies and Gentlemen, this ‘democracy’ that we live in is merely a sham. If you prefer not to look behind the curtain, continue as you were and allow your ‘government’ to dictate to you how they will run your country. But if you’d rather to wag the tail, head over to fairvote.ca to learn more about the possibilities of electoral reform in Canada, and why it is desperately needed.
I leave you with one of the best skits that the members of the Royal Canadian Air Farce have created in many moons.
Enjoy,
Jon.
I just wanted to point out one quick flaw in your reasoning about first past the post; 25%+1 is certainly not the rule for gaining a seat. With more than two parties, the rule breaks down into simply “whoever wins the most votes”. Typically the winning party has a percentage in the high thirties, the second place in the low thirties, the third in the mid-teens, and then a smattering of others make up the rest.
As broken as a first past the post system is, unfortunately it’s the one we tacitly accept by being Canadian citizens; the current government is legitimate, and other than examining what could be under another system, there is no curtain to look behind. In fact, the UN considers the Canadian election process one of the most honest and transparent systems in the world. Regional representation is important in a country that stretches across five time zones and incorporates everything from mountains to prairies to tundras, and this representation would be one of the first casualties to a proportional representation system.
That being said, people should be aware of the problems that a first past the post system presents, and learn how proportional representation is far better than what we have now. As good as regional accountability is in theory, the over-developed power of the cabinet and increased pressure to vote party line prevents MPs for doing much for their particular riding. And it’s true that the house would look incredibly different, were the seats distributed based on popular vote. And I disagree about your reason for people not voting; I believe that many people don’t bother voting because they are convinced that their preferred candidate won’t win, and don’t want to bother wasting their vote. PR would increase turnout.
The practical problem becomes this: how do we decide how the seats are distributed in a PR system? Most countries use a list system, where the party ranks their potential MPs and simply takes the top however-many-seats-they-win. That system simply hands more power to the party to create a machine of party doctrine-spouting members who represent no one but their party. Is this really more democratic? Personally, I find the prospect frightening.
Canada needs to find a way to incorporate real popular vote numbers in a way that doesn’t remove democracy from the equation. Mixed-member PR wasn’t a bad idea, but unfortunately, as you mentioned, it didn’t go through in Ontario. Things might have been different had people known what it actually meant. Representation through FPTP run-offs is, quite simply, the best we have at the moment. It isn’t perfect by any means; unfortunately, democracy never has been. It’s a very contradictory method of political thought, in which a majority can leave 49.9% of people disappointed. When individual freedoms are paramount, how can individual safety also be important? Where does government intervention come in– to protect rights, or uphold freedoms? Democracy has always been a precarious balance. And the only way we could have a true democracy is if every single person voted on every single policy issue that required legislation. Even this poses further problems of how informed the populous is. But, as the great Sir Winston Churchill once said, “democracy is the worst form of government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.”
I respect the balance that you bring to the argument. Your point regarding a truly proportional system not representing the wishes of all Canadians is a good point, although I think that results could be improved by simply playing with the size and population distribution of ridings.
The biggest problem that I can see in deciding on any system to use in Canada is our sheer geographic size. There are countries in which one member of each party is sent to the house from every riding, so long as they won at least 10% of the vote in that area. This is truly representative, but our size would inflate the number of MP’s to an unwieldy value.
Another solution that I’ve read about to list members is to simply rank all of the politicians who didn’t win their ridings in order of popular vote. These then become the list members for the party in question.
There are plenty of interesting approaches to the problem, with many potential solutions. UN opinion aside, I do not feel that the Canadian voting system is open or fair – You have no idea how much your vote counts for, or who will get into the house based on popular vote, and some votes do in fact count more than others, depending on your geographic location in the country.
Doesn’t your second solution assume the specific solution that was proposed in the Ontario referendum? Proportional representation doesn’t actually have ridings, unless you assume a mixed-member system– which isn’t true PR, but a hybrid.
And of course the Canadian voting system is open and fair; that’s why we have the ability to call for recounts that are true recounts. It’s quite transparent. As far as what your vote counts for, that’s simple: it counts for one vote towards the candidate of your choice winning the seat for his or her riding. Only when you judge it by the (admittedly better) criteria you wish to be true does it become undemocratic. The rules are in place; for better or worse, you need to play by them. Votes only have one value.
Addressing the voter turn-out problem: in Australia, there is a $500 fine for not voting. They get a 99% voter turn-out. It’s quite easy to solve. Unfortunately, again this produces problems; the first being uninformed voters diluting the hopefully positive direction of the informed, and a conflict with democratic values. Is it truly a right when you have no choice in the matter?
Frankly, I feel that the Australian solution is the wrong way to solve the problem. That’s an example of government mandating the solution to the problem instead of mandating that we need to solve the problem.
As far as the system being open and fair, yes, in that regard it is. Your vote does count, and we can have recounts, and it is a transparent process. However, in the context of my argument, the system is not fair, as it vastly skews the value of a vote for a party that has a strong support base in a particular riding and negates the value of a vote for a party that does not.
The prime example of this effect is the lack of seats won by the Green Party, even though they recieved quite a bit of popular support in the last election.
The fact that 7% of the vote correlates to 0 seats for the Greens, but 10% of the vote is worth 50 seats to the Bloc Quebecois is the unfairness in the system that I am talking about.
Again, the entire problem comes down to the geographic distribution of votes, and the fact that winner takes all in a riding. Surely in that light, you can agree that the system is unfair.
Again; it depends on the way you look at it. This is a case of lies, damn lies, and statistics.
The name House of Commons, and specifically the “Commons” part, doesn’t refer to social strata, contrary to popular belief. In fact, it comes from the same linguistic root as “community”. Even in the name, the House of Commons belies its purpose; a place where representatives of each community or area of the country can come together and discuss all things politic. Yes, of course if the seats were completely distributed by popular vote the Green Party would have several seats, but how many ridings had enough Green support to come anywhere near giving a Green Party candidate a mandate to represent them? Conversely, the national percentage for the Bloc may suggest lower numbers, but every one of those 50 ridings wanted a member of the Bloc Quebecois to represent them in Parliament. Those ridings are a perfect example of this system; no one in their right mind expects Duceppe to be Prime Minister, but each of those ridings wanted a Bloc representative regardless.
The distribution of seats based on a national percentage embraces the mindset that we are voting for parties, rather than representatives, but we live in a representative parliamentary democracy. I believe it is undemocratic to give seats to a person no riding has given a mandate; it is a perversion of our system. A representative wins a mandate from the riding, and they go to Ottawa to represent the riding. That’s how it works.
I’m a 50 year old Canadian who has lived in New Zealand for most of the time since 1982. I have voted in Canadian elections, both federal and provincial, the most recent being last year in Ontario. I have also voted in all New Zealand elections since 1984, including the 4 x FPP elections up to 1993 and the 4 x MMP elections from 1996. My 5th MMP election will be day after tomorrow.
There are some significant confusions in the minds of people in a FPP context contemplating a move to MMP / proportionality. One of the BIG myths is the lists full of party hacks. That simply has not happened here in New Zealand. The REALITY is that it is the safe seats under FPP that are chock full of party hacks. That is true under FPP and remains true under MMP. Yes, the party lists include many of these same people, but they would not be on the lists if they did not already hold an existing power base in a local seat. It is much harder to win a place on the list if you don’t hold a riding already. People in FPP seem to abhor party hacks as though FPP had none. My experience is the reverse. FPP is riddled with one-eyed party hacks – which is WHY we universally. dislike them so very much.
Under MMP, the major parties tend to hold almost all the local seats, so they retain their party hacks. Can’t say they don’t. But voters under MMP at least have the ability to cast their party vote for the party they support…..and vote for someone else locally if they aren’t backing the hack from their favoured party. FPP affords voters no such choice.
Under MMP, the significant minor parties tend to be made up mostly or entirely of list MPs. These people can’t afford to be “hacks”. Their voters are too fickle and have other options – options FPP doesn’t afford them.
Having observed MMP in action daily for 12 years, I’d say if you want to get rid of party hacks, then get rid of those local seats and the FPP system that lets party hacks hold them term after term.
The much stronger “market forces” MMP sets in operation see parties react in different ways. For example, the Green Party in New Zealand has evolved a deeplpy democratic culture. Every member in good standing in the party for at least 6 months is able to vote for (inclusion and ranking) EVERY list candidate on the party list. Every party member gets to vote on who the male and female party leaders will be be. Every party member is able to have input to policy committees and processes. At the other end of the scale is the conservative National party. They do not like MMP. They hate it. It means people they do not like and do not approve are able to win seats. The Naitonal Party isn’t democratic internally. Party members – at best – get to chose only their local candidate (the real party hacks). Partymembers have no say over the list or its ranking. Party HQ does all that. Party HQ also gets to pick up to 5 people to be placed anywhere on the list that Party HQ wants. Party members have no say over who the party leader is. The National Party – having chosen to behave behave so undemocratically – then blames MMP for this…..despite them having done it this way under FPP as well. They ignore the democratic Green model. Their party isn’t about internal democracy – or external democracy. They yearn for a return to FPP so they can once again dictate to others with a majority of seats unjustified by voter support.
That sounds harsh, but that is how it is. The people who mostly loudly proclaim MMP a danger to democracy are the people who – presently – practice it the least. I’ve been a “$3 Tory” in Ontario. I know how poor their internal democracy is.
If anything, MMP goes a long way to kerbing these abuses by giving voters the simple power to cast a meaningful vote for someone else. In at least half the local seats under FPP, that is not a power they presently have.
MMP is by far the better system. Sure the local seats are still full of party hacks, so you could get rid of them go completely to a list system where candidates are selected and ranked by democratic votes of party members. That would be a HUGE improvement over what happens under FPP today.
Last year, the Vote for MMP campaign won commitments from every party in Ontario to adopt democratic candidates selection processes. What a shame they don’t go ahead and do that anyway without MMP.
Steve, that was an incredibly insightful post. I’ve looked at New Zealand’s system before, and while obviously I couldn’t know it as well as you do, I’ve always had a really good feeling that it was the better way of doing things.
The key there, however, is that it’s MMPR, not pure PR, as Jon seemed to be advocating. Pure PR is nothing but lists; an undemocratic method in a representational system. I voted for MMPR in the Ontario referendum; I truly feel that it’s a better election system. Perhaps what I was trying to say was lost at some point; one, that pure PR isn’t the solution to the perceived problem, and two, that regional representation is an important part of a parliament of a nation as geographically diverse as Canada.
Again, thanks for the look into practical MMPR. I found it extremely interesting.
I’d also like to lend my support to your thoughtful dissemination of a practical, working MMPR system. It sounds like something that I could get entirely behind were it implemented here in Canada. Thanks for commenting Steve.