Benefits of PR The practical benefits of fairer representation are sometimes difficult to find. We don't know why governments make the decision they do, and governments usually take all the credit they can, giving as little to the opposition whose election was made possible under fairer elections systems.
Some benefits expected from PR,
as shown in PR elections held elsewhere in the world:
- increased women representatives
- no artificial regionalism caused by a party being (accidentally-on-purpose) shut out of all the seats of a province or a region. This can lead to the federal cabinet not having members from a region or a province due to the governing party itself being shut out of a province or region. (Such is the case today - the Liberal federal cabinet does not have any members from Alberta/SK simply because there were no Liberal MPs elected there.)
- no false-majority elections. This may be the election of a wrong winner (the success of a less-overall-preferred party).
False majorities not only give power to a party that does not have majority support - it also does not give it to a coalition made up of parties that have majority support.
If a minority government was elected, the party that wants to rule has to find support among the other parties. Such a coalition (or functional arrangement between parties), would create conditions where a majority of voters are represented by the parties that have power, that is, if a majority of voters elect a majority of the seats.
Only six times in history of Canada has a majority of voters elected a majority government. Most of our elections have produced false-majority governments, ruling parties who received less than a majority of the votes but take a majority of the seats.
before 1921
one minority government
nine false-majority governments
three majority/majority governments
since 1921 14 minority governments
13 false-majority governments
three majority/majority governments
Total since 1867:
15 minority governments
22 false-majority governments
6 majority/majority governments.
- no wrong-winner elections, which are always elections of a less-overall-preferred party.
- increased fairness to women, regions, voters and the country overall.
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A brief catalogue of usual positive effects of PR are:
-- election of candidates of hitherto overlooked groups - labour, socialists, women and others.
-- election of more-mixed legislature lessens frequency of majority governments supported by only minority of the vote by more often electing minority governments where no one party takes all the power.
Alberta has never had a minority government (although it has had majority government elected by just a minority of the voters).
Manitoba had had minority government even before adoption of STV in part of the province in 1920. It elected minority governments many times since then, even officially forming a coalition party that often but not always took majority of the seats.
The federal government had a minority government back in the 1870s, more oftener since 1921, and very often recently, with most governments nowadays being minority governments. The leading party - to date only Liberal or Conservative - has had to placate other parties, with NDP being called on to prop up the Liberals, to stay in power as long as it did. This historically has swerved the Liberals to a more leftist interventionist position.
-- easier election of individuals who may not have been elected under FPTP, thus using
human capital that otherwise might have gone to waste for the betterment of
all of society.
-- election of hitherto-unelected parties and individuals sometimes swerves a
government's decisions, especially if opposition parties have enough seats to have
leverage and persuasive force in the legislature.
-- less easy election of extreme or ideologically strict candidates. (A candidate with un-popular views that are shared by only a minute fraction of the voters in a province is sometimes elected in a single district due to local conditions who would never be elected in a more scientific system where a definite quota is needed to win a seat.)
-- retention of qualified politicians who might under FPTP lose their seats due to their
party becoming unpopular in a small district. But in larger STV districts, if his or
her party retains support of voters equal in number to the quota, he or she might
retain the seat, ensuring the retention of that experienced politician or statesman.
-- less antagonist election contests. Elections held in multi-member districts mean
elections are not zero-sum games. This and other aspects of STV can mean
less partisanship. (see footnote)
[This goes against statement I have heard recently that elected politicians object to PR cause it means they have to compete amongst themselves for seats.
That statement is true only in some PR systems.
It would happen under MMP if the number of districts is decreased to allow the top-up members, when overall number of members stays the same.
If districts were grouped and only one seat allocated, then the politicians' fears would be realized. This happens occasionally under FPTP due to re-districting.
If MMP is brought in and top-up was provided for by adding members to the legislature, then all could still be elected.
And under some systems of PR (such as STV) there would be the same number of seats elected in a city, just fewer districts, so elected politicians could all be elected. Their fears of direct fight for more-limited resources would not be realized.)
-- mixed representation at district levels leads to more parties being represented in the
legislature
-- mixed representation at district levels leads to reduction in regionalism/
separatist sentiment, as reps of each party is elected in each region
-- mixed representation at district levels leads to all provinces being represented in all or
most of the party caucuses in the legislature, thus each region's views are
represented in the caucus discussions
-- mixed representation at district levels can mean government members elected in all cities, regions and provinces. This may lead to each province or national region being
represented in the cabinet discussions.
Ware's list
(list composed by Professor William R. Ware of the Harvard University)
About 150 years ago, Professor William R. Ware of the Harvard University lobbied for using STV for elections within the University.
He came up with 16 advantages of STV over FPTP. STV at the time was the only form of PR being considered.
Professor William R. Ware's 16 benefits of STV
1. It protects the minority from the tyranny of the majority.
2. It protects the minorities and majorities from the tyranny of the party chiefs.
3. It permits the utmost freedom of individual action. [for both voter and candidate]
4. it secures the most perfect co-operation and organization.
5. It gives every elector a representative after his own heart, whom he has actually helped to elect.
6. It gives representatives a constituency who are unanimous in his support.
7. It give the representative a certain security in the tenure of his place.
8. It affords a natural and reasonable method of rotation in office.
9. It makes for the interest of every party to put forward its best men.
10. It makes it worthwhile for good men to become candidates.
11. It is equally efficient whether one candidate is to be chosen or a dozen.
12. It is available in the filling of vacancies as well as in the general elections.
13. It is easy for the elector to cast his vote intelligently.
14. It is not difficult to count the votes with precision and promptness.
15. Hardly a ballot is ultimately thrown away.
16. Every ballot is assigned just as the voters who casts it desires." (Newman, Hare-Clark in Tasmania, p. 4-5)
These 16 advantages were reviewed by Australian STV expert Terry Newman in 1991 after a century of practical experience. His comments originally published in his book Hare-Clark in Tasmania (p. 280) are reprinted below.
I have added explanatory comments and some remarks based on the western Canadian use of STV from the 1920s to the 1950s, in square brackets.
1. It protects the minority from the tyranny of the majority.
[Such may be hinted at below in the description of the 2000 healthcare fight in Alberta. But John D. Hunt, Alberta STV campaigner of the 1920s was more accepting of majority rule - as long as it was a true majority. His mantra was "in democratic government the right of decision belongs to the majority, but the right of representation belongs to all." (Hunt, The Principles of Representative Government [1927], PAA info folders, "Politics Misc Election Notes")]
2. It protects the minorities and majorities alike from the tyranny of the party chiefs.
Distrust of party machines is less an issue now than it was a hundred years ago. Due to rotation on the ballots, once selected, the candidate does not need to fight for a good place on the ballot within the party factions.
[In Canada, having candidates' names listed in alphabetical order also precludes favouritism due to party.]
3. It permits the utmost freedom of individual action.
This is true still today and accentuated by having both candidates names and party identification, if any, on the ballot.
4. It secures the most perfect co-operation and organization.
With development of the party system in the 1900s, this has fallen by the wayside to a large degree. And with PR-STV candidate compete with other parties and with other candidates within the same party.
5. It gives every elector a representative after his own heart, whom he has actually helped to elect.
This is true although there is a weakened link between voter and representative. The voter would have to seek out among the MPs in his district the one who represents his/her interests.
6. It gives every representative a constituency who are unanimous in his support.
This may be true but it is the representative's job to find them. [That is, a representative's supporters are spread across a larger district, although separate poling results tells him or her where support is mostly clumped.]
7. It gives the representative a certain security in the tenure of his place.
This is not valid under Hare-Clark, where there is no safe seat. The rotation of candidate names on the ballot makes this even more true. [But being a sitting MLA of a party with a solid base such as the CCF, meant that Roper would be re-elected three times, thus demonstrating a somewhat secure tenure. I say somewhat because he was not successful when he ran for re-election a fourth time in 1955.
But STV did show it was more dependable than the previous FPTP or Block Voting. No Labour MLA was elected in Edmonton prior to STV. And no CCF or NDP MLA was elected in Edmonton for many years after STV was replaced by non-proportional FPTP.
In Winnipeg's case, no Communist was elected after STV was discontinued in city elections.
A Communist in Winnipeg, or a CCF in Edmonton's case, was not elected in each STV election. But they were elected often under STV. Under non-proportional voting systems, they seldom were. Without STV, no leftist MLA was elected in Edmonton prior to 1926 nor in any election between 1956 and 1981.]
8. It affords a natural and reasonable method of rotation in office.
Yes, there is high turn-over under Hare-Clark. Votes may not change parties but do change the personnel they support. High turn-over can also be achieved through legislated maximum number of consecutive terms a person may serve, such as in Costa Rica and Philippines.
9. It makes for the interest of every party to put forward its best men. [With less "accidental" elections through vote-splitting, an STV contest is more discerning and logical than FPTP.]
10. It makes it worthwhile for good men to become candidates.
[This is because of less-heated election contests, looser control by party machines in the nomination process and the election and looser control by the party machines of the elected representatives whoever they are.
Elections held in multi-member districts are not zero-sum propositions. Just because you are elected does not mean a specific other candidate cannot be. This and other aspects of STV can mean less partisanship. Less-heated election contests was noticed in 1921 (see footnote).
As well multi-winner candidates means that election contests are cleaner as far as vote-buying goes. There are so many more votes and a single vote bought thus has less weight. Winning is not just a relative matter of having more votes the others but an absolute matter of having at least a quota.
Party leaders and their machines have looser control of candidates than under FPTP. Strong-minded men and women are not necessarily spurned from receiving nomination by a party establishment. Those turned down by a party executive may in fact run anyway and have some chance to be elected, requiring only the quota of votes to be elected, and not plurality. Independents have a somewhat higher chance of being elected under Australia's Hare-Clark system.
In 1925, it was noted that STV held the promise that it "would tend to help the independent candidate who is backed by no organization but can get necessary quota by reason of personal qualification." (James, National Municipal Review (April 1916) as per Beman, Proportional Representation (1925), p. 74-81)
Set down in different political cultures, STV produces different results.
Malta has a two-party system under STV. In 55 years of use, STV has elected no independents there. STV in Ireland elects many independents. (Michael Gallagher, "The Political Consequences of the Electoral System in the Republic of Ireland," Electoral Studies 5 (1986), p. 263)
In Winnipeg Independents were elected. More on Stephen Juba and Lewis St. George Stubbs below.
However, election of Independent candidates did not happen in Alberta's STV experience. No truly independent candidates were elected under STV in Alberta. The outcome for an independent candidates loosely affiliated with a party was better but even then only one was elected under Alberta's STV. But there was only one independent candidate to get enough votes to be elected during Alberta's STV period. This was Independent Labour candidate Robert Parkyn. More on that below.
As well, STV elections, being less confrontational, may attract good men who are turned off by party combat.
11. It is equally efficient whether one candidate is to be chosen or a dozen. [No. 11 refers to use of ranked ballots in both single and multiple elections, that is, in both STV and Alternative Voting.]
Yes, true. Single preferential votes can be used to fill single seats (through Alternative Voting) or multiple candidates (filling as many as 10 seats at a time) through STV.
12. It is available in the filling of vacancies as well as in the general elections.
The results of the previous STV election can be used to fill an empty seat without the necessity of a by-elections, although STV Ireland holds by-elections to fill casual vacancies [as was the practice in Canada]. [Because STV involves thinning of the field of candidates, the second-best candidate is established in the last general election. If the person if willing to be elected, you have immediate fill-up without holding by-election.]
13. It is easy for the elector to cast his vote intelligently. Delay seems to indicate complicated process. But Is the system too complicated? [Much of delay is caused by waiting for final vote before starting to conduct vote transfers. This wait is unnecessary under FPTP.]
In Australia, the election count is delayed ten days to allow postal votes. They are needed to establish the total vote, which is needed before quota can be established. After they come in, it is just a day or two until results are out. It is said that the voter need only cast his/her vote and not have to know how the system works but this view is not wholly supported.
[Canadian jurisdictions during STV did not use mail-in ballots so vote totals were calculated within hours of the close of polling. Consequently, election results were announced within a day or two, or at most a week, with many early winners (such as those receiving quota on the First Count) being known even the night of the election.]
14. It is not difficult to count the votes with precision and promptness.
With trained staff, it is over in a day or two after mail votes are collected.
15. Hardly a ballot is ultimately thrown away.
This is true except for the problem of "exhaustion" (eliminations and vote transfers running past the voters' marked secondary preferences), rejected ballots and final eliminations where no transfer is conducted.
[In the 1948 Edmonton election, these amounted to 17 percent of the vote, including all the "exhausted" votes, some of which were cast for a winner, but not needed to elect him or her.
A benefit of STV is that a low percentage of votes is wasted - not to say that all voters will elect their first choices but that a high percentage of ballots are used to determine the winners, to elect someone preferred over others. If a voter's first choice can not be elected, maybe his second or later preference would be, and the vote would be transferred around to enable the vote, if at all possible, to help ensure that a candidate the voter does not favour is not elected.]
16. Every ballot is assigned just as the voter who casts it desires."
This is helped by candidates appointing observers and scrutineers watching for accidental errors, etc.
* [This Joe Clarke, mayor of Edmonton 1919-1920 and 1934-37, should not be confused with Joe Clark, prime minister of Canada in 1979.]
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The list of benefits Ware composed overlaps surprisingly little with my list at the start of this article. My list centred on the candidates in the elections and the election itself.
Much of the benefits Ware pointed to had to do with the consequent government. Perhaps this is due to the fact the Harvard elections Ware is looking at may have had only one district.
The benefits can be categorized into these groups:
Government;
Miscellaneous;
By-elections;
Chance of re-election;
Voting;
Electoral.
The benefits listed above can be categorized into these groups as shown below.
Following these groups is an exposition on electoral benefits in particular.
Government
1. It protects the minority from the tyranny of the majority. [In the legislature, at least to the extent that the minority has a voice. More pertinently it protects the majority of the people from being governed by a party supported by only a minority of he voters.
Under FPTP the minority of the voters often un-democratically elect a majority government, but sometimes it only elects a minority government. The election of minority government would happen more often under STV and therefore likely the valuable accomplishments that have been made by minority governments under FPTP in Canada's history would be multiplied under the more-frequent minority governments produced by pro-rep.
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Accomplishments of minority governments produced by FPTP
Even under FPTP, the leading party sometimes does not come up with a majority of the seats. Then if it hopes to continue its government, it must find support for its budget and legislation from among MPs of other parties. It may find sufficient support to stay in power from a small party that still does not give it approval of majority of voters. So even then majority rule is not produced.
But the main party finding it needs support from another party leads to bending of the party's old ways. The Liberal party i the old days often looked to labour, and farmers and more recently to the NDP to prop it up in power. And that support came with a price, the price often being the start or enlargement of social safety net programs.
In 1925, when the Liberals and Conservatives each had a crack at minority government, the government paid out overdue compensation to the depositors who had lost out when the Home Bank of Canada collapsed in 1923. Labour and farmer MPs cared mostly about the working-class depositors who had lost small deposits. Therefore the compensation - only 35 cents on the dollar of lost monies - was in effect only for deposits of less than $500. (( John Turley-Ewart, "The Bank that went Bust", Canada's History (magazine), Aug 1, 2004)
The beginning of our federal pension plan began in the late 1920s when the Liberals did not have majority of the seats and Labour and farmer MPs, including Woodsworth, Irvine and Heaps - forced the Mackenzie King to initiate the Old-Age Pension program, Canada's first social welfare program.
Lester Pearson's minority government brought in iconic Canadian legislation
Lester Pearson was prime minister during the 1960s when the Liberals were in a minority government position. His two back-to back minority governments are credited with these accomplishments:
introduced universal health care, the Canada Student Loan Program, the Canada Pension Plan (an expansion of the old Old-Age Pension plan initiated in the minority government of the 1920s), Order of Canada and the Maple Leaf flag;
created Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism;
limited capital punishment to so few crimes that it was never used again in Canada; and
kept Canada out of the U.S.-Vietnam war.
Pearson is considered one of Canada's greatest prime ministers despite never leading a majority government.
2. (protects minorities and majorities from the tyranny of the party chiefs.) With more flexible elections, candidates and representatives have increased independence.
3. It permits the utmost freedom of individual action [for both voter and representative]
4. It secures the most perfect co-operation and organization.
Party allegiance less strong, where chance of election better for independent or candidate that can bridge two different parties. larger opposition group in the legislature made up of more parties and independent reps may free up even government members from party control and by sheer persuasion push governments to soften their hard lines. In some cases this will be ensured through election of a minority government. (My proposed Double-democracy system would obviate minority governments.)
6. It gives every representative a constituency who are unanimous in his support. Government members do not have to try to appeal to all the people - an impossible job - but only to their supporters. So purer class or group representation presides but one coloured by the balanced, proportional representation under STV.
Miscellaneous:
No. 11 Ranked voting may be used in single member and multi-member districts.
No. 14 Stating hat the counting of votes under STV is not difficult is not an advantage so much as a defense against a charge often levelled against STV.
By-elections
No.12 (STV may eliminate by-elections) STV never used this way in Canadian history. Always a by-election held despite the increased cost of an election across a whole city just to fill one seat.
Chance of re-election
No. 6 It gives every representative a constituency who are unanimous in his support.) If the representative stays true to his/her support base, he/she will be re-elected if the voters stay true to the rep.
No. 7 (representative has a certain security in the tenure of his place)
No. 8. (produces a natural and reasonable method of rotation in office) Voters are freer to trade up representatives of the same party. Wider choice (more than one candidate of a party) allows flexibility while still maintaining party allegiance.
No. 7 and 8 can both apply depending on the circumstance. And their effects in different circumstances may be positive or negative as far as broad representation goes.
Voting
3. It permits the utmost freedom of individual action [for both voter and representative]
Voter has wide range of candidates and ability to vote among choice of candidate running fore same party. may vote along party lines or idiosyncratic ranking of own choosing. give one choice or many.
5. It gives every elector a representative after his own heart, whom he has actually helped to elect. leading to voter satisfaction and hopefully larger turn-out.
No. 13 (voting is not complicated); No. 15 (few votes wasted), No. 16 (votes used as voters directed)
Electoral benefits are derived from
A. different candidates running under STV than FPTP, and
B. different results (different people being elected) under STV versus FPTP.
A. Different candidates running under STV than FPTP
No. 9 (parties put forward their best men and women). This is difficult to measure in practice, but statements by those in the know after historical STV city elections at the in Canada, for example, do testify to a general raising of quality of representation. (see my blog "opinions...) Sometimes parties put up star candidates so strong that they unseat sitting representatives of the same party.
No. 10 (good men and women more willing to run)
More women candidates
Not evident in Edmonton's 1926 election - no women ran in Edmonton during STV experience while three had run in previous Block Voting election. (And because no woman ran, no woman was elected.)
B. Different results derived from STV versus FPTP
This refers to Ware's numbers 5 and 13.
"5. It gives every elector a representative after his own heart, whom he has actually helped to elect."
"13. It is easy for the elector to cast his vote intelligently." Under STV there is no fear of wasting your vote by voting for whom you want elected. It is said that the straitjacket FPTP imposes on voters grows stronger with each election. As parties elected are seen as winners and others as long-shots, voters are trained more and more deeply to vote only for a choice of two main parties. Often even voters feel compelled to vote just for the governing party. A voter might see it as important to have a government politician as the district representative (MLA or MP) and thus secure favourable treatment by the government for the district after election.
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What were effects of using PR-STV in Alberta?
The practical benefits of fairer representation are sometimes difficult to find
We don't know why governments make the decision they do, and governments usually take all the credit they can, giving as little to the opposition whose election was made possible under fairer elections systems.
Certainly electoral benefits are easy to spot:
under STV in Edmonton, a United Farmers MLA was elected in 1926 and 1930. Without STV, it is doubtful a Farmer candidate would have been elected in Edmonton. This man was named to the government cabinet. This meant that Edmonton had representation in the cabinet, with probable but unknown positive effects for city residents, whether farmers or not. The transferable vote also showed, as outside PR expert Hallett reported (as reprinted in my blog on the 1926 election), that Lymburn's support was across supporters of all other parties, his ballots' second choices, consulted for transfer of his surplus, went to all the other parties, not just Labour as might have been expected. STV thus provided a better polling of the voters than FPTP elections do.
The 1926 election also saw the election of the first Labour MLA elected in Edmonton and his re-election in 1930, giving voice to the workers of he city and putting an Edmonton representative in the caucus of four Labour MLAs that served in the Legislature between 1926 and 1930.
STV in Edmonton in 1926 also elected Conservatives and a Liberal, putting an Edmonton voice in those caucuses as well. It was more difficult to evoke regionalism or pit a part of the province against another part, urban against rural, north against south, Calgary against Edmonton when each part (mostly) elected representatives to all four major parties. This is bound to be good, but its practical value cannot be measured easily.
Fairer representation under STV and AV meant that all-around-great guy and much-respected local businessman and labourite Elmer Roper was elected at first in a 1942 by-election held using Alternative Voting, then re-elected several times under STV in Edmonton. His exposure at this level helped him be head-hunted by a group of concerned civic leaders in 1959, be elected and serve as mayor 1959 to 1963. His political career had started when Edmonton public school board used STV for its election in 1926. He had then moved onto provincial politics being elected MLA first in by-election in 1942 held using Alternative Voting, then re-elected MLA in 1944, 1948 and 1952 in elections that used STV.
Would he have ever been given the post of mayor of Edmonton without his start under STV at two levels? We don't know.
As for practical results of STV,
if we take Roper's re-election to the Legislature in 1944, 1948, 1952 as a result of STV
then we can look at his career and credit STV to that.
What did Roper do as MLA?
As an opposition (CCF) MLA in the Social Credit-dominated Legislature he had no direct powers but he did later state that he was at partially responsible for this:
when oil leases were being issued it was customary to grant leases over wide area, in which the oil company had monopoly right to drill in that area, Roper suggested in the Legislature that the government should retain the right to drill for oil in every second section in the leases. And awhile later the government did bring in a policy where the right to drill in every other township in a lease was retained. Roper said the policy brought billions of dollars into the government coffers over the ensuing decades.
(Revealing the uncompromising attitudes of governments under our present style of government, Premier Ernest Manning dropped STV in 1956. This was after Roper was not re-elected in 1955 (due to Liberal upsurge and SC and Conservative continuing strength). Roper later said that STV was dropped to keep him from returning to the Legislature.
He never did return. Under non-proportional FPTP, it would be 27 years before the next CCF or NDP was elected in Edmonton. This pattern was produced despite 13 percent of city voters giving NDP candidates their votes in 1971. Edmonton had 16 seats in that election so the NDP was due two seats just in that election alone. But the NDP did not win any seats in Edmonton between 1955 until 1982.
Value of opposition MLAs keeping government true to the people
Under arch-conservative Premier Klein, protests at the Legislature slowed his government's move to privatize Alberta healthcare in 2000. But it was likely the presence of 18 opposition Liberal and 2 NDP MLAs in the Legislature, principally the two NDP MLAs, that pushed him to look at the uproar he was evoking and eventually to back down, In fact later in the legislature Klein pointed his finger and blamed the NDP MLAs for having made him back down.
The NDP MLAs were not elected under STV, but were elected in part due to concentration of NDP-ers in Edmonton strong enough to overcome the barrier to minority representation under FPTP.
But it shows how the presence of even two NDP MLAs can use persuasive powers to force a government to back down or at least swerve. The relevance being that it is known that minority MLAs will be more often elected under STV than under FPTP.
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Thanks for reading.
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