Where a multitude of small single-member districts are used. Gerrymandering may give unfair representation to one party or another.
And even if there is a balancing of extreme gerrymandering in different regions, it means that parties were represented equally or as per their vote tallies, but meant that supporters of the lesser party in each different region were unrepresented.
Multi-seat districts under STV or district-level party-list PR and
pooling of votes as under MMP or party-list PR,
or both as under Denmark's MMP/district PR,
means that a large proportion of the voters have actual representation that they voted for.
Multi-member districts means:
less fragmenting of the electorate (because there are fewer districts) so less opportunity to gerrymander
and
use of natural pre-existing boundaries for the districts
such as city corporate limits or counties or provincial borders or rivers
with the varying sizes of such natural districts being compensated for by varying number of members.
As long as each district has multiple members and each voter cast just one vote, balanced mixed representation is almost always produced -- and always produced if seat count is more than three, if we look at past use of MM districts in Canada
or if voters may cast multiple votes, one party may not be able to take all the seats in the district if voters have liberty to lump their multiple votes on one candidate (but that is less guaranteed than if single voting is the rule.)
As well, party-proportionality of results is more guaranteed if voters can mark back-up preferences, as in ranked voting (in MM districts of course - meaning STV).
Increased proportionality of representation in each district means
less incentive to gerrymander.
If party A gets all its due seats in district North and also in district South, why bother to shift the border southward or northward?
And the same holds true for Party B.
PR means fairness to all, small and large parties and of all stripes.
Each party will get what the voters decide is its due.
Very fair...
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To my mind, good electoral systems are ones that use create multi-member districts, have some fair system of voting where each voter casts just one vote, and then add top-up if desired to ensure overall party-proportional results.
The values of proper electoral system that I would like to see are:
multi-seat districts for these reasons:
- voters being offered a choice of candidate, between multiple parties and and within parties between multiple individual candidates
- seat allocation system where seats are given to multiple candidates who are the most popular with voters.
- districts can be rational and not arbitrary; can be based on already-existing recognizable city or county boundaries, decreasing opportunity for gerrymandering.
(single-seat districts and single-winner FPTP always create disproportional results.)
- voting system that allows liberty for votes to vote for whom they want to be elected, by having some "after-count" pooling of votes (under MMP) or transfer of initially-ineffective votes (as under STV), to prevent widespread waste and bad effects of vote splitting (but without denying district leaders from taking district seats).
(In STV, usually one or two receive quota in the first count and are declared elected. then subsequent vote transfers establish who has most general acceptability (or at least who is the most popular on the left and who is the most popular on the right and the remaining seats are awarded one by one to those leading in the popularity thereafter).
Such a voting system should allow a voter to vote for a party candidate or an independent candidate with equal ease.
- a voting system that prevents one group from taking all the seats in the district, through each voter casting just one vote (or at a stretch a system where each voter casts multiple votes and they are able to lump all their votes on one candidate). MMP systems where a voter casts one vote in the local district contest and another in the overall party contest use Single Voting in the two different contexts so pass this test. (but some say there are valid reasons why it is better if MMP uses just one vote and tht one vote is used for both contests.)
- a voting system that does not force voters to do more work than they want - it allows a votes to mark his or her first choice, and if desired stop there or proceed to mark back-up preferences (if preferential voting is used at all).
The electoral system should be set up so that the basic design and the officials work to ensure PR without forcing voters to do more than they want to do.
(Multi-seat districts and single voting produce mixed representation that is unlike that produced by FPTP, even if voters do not mark back-up preferences.
Instant-runoff voting/Alternative Voting only ever produce results that are different from FPTP if voters mark back-up preferences - and even if they mark back-up preferences, it often happens that the result is identical to who would have won under FPTP.
Single voting in multi-seat district (of more than three seats in a district) always produces mixed and thus approximately balanced representation even if voters do not mark any back-up preferences at all. (This statement is always true except in the rare cases where one party has three times the support of every other candidate and the party splits its vote equally. otherwise there is no way a small party could not take at least one seat, even with no vote transfers.
Thus, mixed representation is almost always the case -- more voters are represented; more votes are used effectively; more proportional is the representation elected, than would happen under single-winner FPTP - even if no voters mark back-up preferences.)
If you (or a Citizens Assembly) gives me a system that has these values, I'll be a happy person.
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There has been no electoral reform in Canada since 1996 when the last multi-member districts used anywhere in Canada in government elections were disbanded in PEI. (except that since then, shorter terms (max of four- year not five-year terms) were more or less solidly brought in in some provinces and federally.)
The last time a non-plurality system (a PR system) was used at the provincial level was in 1955 in Alberta when PR-STV was used to elect Edmonton and Calgary MLAs in 6- and 7-seat districts.
all provinces except Quebec used multi-member districts at one time or another, to elect all or only some of their members.
Most of the MM districts used Block Voting, where often - but not always - one party took all the district seats.
Alberta and Manitoba, alone of the provinces, used PR-STV to elect some of their MLAs. They did this for 30 years, ending in the 1950s.
None of these reforms followed referendums, but were simply governments passing necessary legislation. except Manitoba's dropping of PR-STV in Winnipeg (and dropping of IRV outside Winnipeg) may have followed public meetings of some sort. (Dawood's article is silent on this subject.)
Four ER referendums have been held. in one (BC 2005) a majority voted to change the system but the vote was ignored.
Hopefully a Citizens Assembly is more definite, certain route toward ER than governments or referendums have been in the recent past.
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Apparently governments were braver in the past to take the step of ER, or there was more public clamour for the change, or politicians were less self-serving, or something.
Steps to a reform
a problem existing
some citizens (or independent-minded politicians) seeing the problem and articulating it
government leaders seeing that the problem even exists,
the government seeing the problem's seriousness and the need for change
government thinking it important enough to work toward making the change
government formulating a way to address the problem, perhaps being aided by citizens and perhaps going its own direction
government making the change - before its attention is attracted to something else, or before a different, more pressing problem emerges, or before the problem fades or is seen to fade, or before the government loses its confidence or courage or is struck by indecision.
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some of these steps happen simultaneously.
In 2015-2018 Canada might have gone right to the last step, and then the government lost its confidence or courage or was struck by indecision.
Apart from actual institution of royal commissions on ER in the 1920s and 1930s, that seems to be the closest the federal government had ever gone in that direction since the need for electoral reform was perhaps first mentioned about 150 years ago, in Edward Blake's 1874 Aurora speech.
so that at least was something. But definitely a missed opportunity.
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Here's a well-written account of benefits of multi-member districts.
The advantages and disadvantages of multi-member districts mirror those of single-member districts and overlap with the debate over plurality or majority systems and proportional representation systems. The focus in this section will be solely on the advantages and disadvantages of multi-member districts as compared to single-member districts.
Advantages of Multi-member Districts
The most often cited advantages are that multimember districts
can more easily reflect administrative divisions or communities of interest within the country because there is flexibility with regard to the numbers of representatives per district and, therefore, the size and geographic composition of the district;
need not change boundaries, even if the population of a district increases or decreases, because the number of representatives elected from the district can be altered;
are essential for achieving proportional representation, although not all multimember district systems produce proportional representation for political parties;
tend to produce more balanced representation by encouraging the nomination of a diverse roster of candidates.
On the last point, there is a good deal of evidence to suggest that women are more likely to be elected from multimember districts. Ethnic, religious and different language groups also tend to be better represented in multimember districts, because political parties strive for an overall balance when selecting candidates. The consequences of multimember districts are less certain, however, for groups that are concentrated within a given territory. In the United States, in particular, blacks and Hispanics are more likely to be elected from single-member districts, in large part because the U.S. Voting Rights Act encourages the creation of districts where these racial or ethnic minorities predominate. For a more detailed discussion of the issue of single-member districts and minority representation in the United States, see US: Ethnic Minorities and Single-Member Districts.
Disadvantages of Multi-member Districts
The primary disadvantages are that multimember districts
dilute the relationship between representatives and voters;
dilute the accountability of individual representatives.
Conclusion
The strength of multimember districts rests in their ability to generate more balanced representation, both for certain groups traditionally under-represented, such as women and ethnic minorities, and for political parties. The degree to which multimember districts are able to do this, however, depends on both the magnitude of the districts and the voting rules employed. The larger the district magnitude, the more proportional the election outcome for political parties. Voting rules, however, also matter. Block voting within multimember districts will actually produce more electoral distortion than plurality first-past-the-post voting in single-member districts.
Only multi-member districts with large magnitudes and some form of proportional voting will consistently produce proportional election outcomes.
from Ace The Electoral Knowledge Network
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Ace The Electoral Knowledge Network indicates there is a matrix between DM, type of district and variation in DM allowed.
single-member districts do not use PR, and usually their boundaries are arbitrarily set with no regard for pre-existing administrative or political units.
multi-member districts may use PR, and if they are allowed to vary in size, their boundaries reflect pre-existing administrative or political units.
multi-member districts, if they are not allowed to vary in size, their boundaries sometimes do not reflect pre-existing administrative or political units.
PR Use of pre-existing geographic units
At-large POSSIBLE yes, the whole jurisdiction
where all districts have same number of members
PR Use of pre-existing geographic units use currently
SMD NO NO (usually) Canada
MMDs POSSIBLE NO (usually) Malta
where districts may have different number of members
PR Use of pre-existing geographic units
SMD NO YES in Switzerland
MMDs POSSIBLE POSSIBLE
STV NO Ireland,
list PR NO* Denmark
*Denmark:
has 10 constituencies are said to largely correspond to the Provinces of Denmark (which themselves are statistical divisions of the regions of the country each having between 2 and 20 members.
But we see that Denmark has five regons and ten districts plus Faroe Isl. and Greenland
none of the constituencies use same name as the regions, so that avoids some confusion but also makes it unclear what is happening.
it seems two regions are used as MMDs.
One is divided into four constituencies.
Two are divided into two constituencies.
Region districts
Syddenmark includes both South Jutland and Funen
Midtjylland is divided into East Jutland and West Jutland
Nordylland is North Jutland
Sjaelland is Zealand
Hovedstaten is divided into Copenhagen, Greater Copenhagen, North Zealand, and Bornholm.
Funen and Bornholm are each an island, so those are cases of the use of a pre-existing geographical entity as the constituency.
Canada's PR system could use same sort of variation.
Some provinces might be used as province-wide MMDs,
some might be two districts;
others might contain as many as ten districts.
(unlike Denmark's example, some single-member districts might be retained within a province. Labrador or the large northern ridings are prime candidates for this retention.
The NWT, Yukon and Nunavut single members will lilkely retained as another example of SMD, even under Canada's future PR.)
In Canada's case, the largest DM would be the number of MPs in a province.
The largest DM used in a government election using STV anywhere in the world is 21 (NSW Australia, since 1996).
The most number of members elected in an STV contest before the use of computers was 19 (Ireland Seanad in 1925).
The most members elected using STV in Canadian history were 10 MLAs elected in Winnipeg from 1920 to 1949.
under list PR the largest number of members is more than 100, so if list PR is used, only one province is potentially too large to use aprovince-wide district.
taking ten or 19 as our utmost limit, based on STV's historic pattern, we see that
PEI, NL, NB, NS, SK, MB could all be province-wide contests. Those with more than ten members (NB, NS, SK, MB) likely would choose to divide the province into two districts, with perhaps the largest ridings retained as SMDs.
BC and Alberta with 37 and 43 MPs respectively would likely choose to have
city-wide districts in their largest cites and small-DM districts or even SMDS outside the cities.
Toronto and Montreal would each need two or more districts in the city, but otherwise city-wide districts and small-DM outside the cities would seem to work even in Ontario and Quebec.
districting similar to Denmark's could be used in Canada.
The Danish system uses flexibility.
If Canada uses same flexibility, if practicable, a province could be a province-wide district,
where islands are given their own district if practicable,
where cities and counties are given their own district if practicable.
perhaps in Canada, Vancouver Island would be its own MMD,
and mainland BC divided into Vancouver, separate from its suburbs, spearate from non-urban areas., each with its own MMD.
the same for cities in the other provinces.
- no district would take in parts of more than one province.
- each major city would be in one district or in districts that cover the city and do not extend past the city.
- each county would be in one district or in districts that cover the county and do not extend past the county. that is, no county would be divided into different constituencies.
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Perhaps a friendly competition could be enacted. The city with the highest vote-to-member ratio would be accorded an additional seat in the next election, or in the present election prior to any vote transfers.
This would help prevent any disproportionality caused by a surprisingly-high vote turnout.
It is expected that more voters will vote if PR is used, but that higher vote turnout is likely to vary from riding to riding. (and the vote cast per seat already varies widely from district to district under FPTP, not to mention the wide variance in the number of votes that each successful candidate receives.)
Proportionality depends on adherence to votes cast, not to population figures.
using population figures is good as start at allocating seats but re-allocating as per votes cast is proportional way to go.
Precedent of a sort for this is the Edmonton school board elections circa 2000, where each district was guaranteed one seat with one more being allocated to the unsuccessful candidate with the most votes wherever in the city he or she was running.
that was easily possible under SNTV, but if STV is used, the additional seat would change the quota so would have to be allocated prior to first transfer of surplus votes,
Or less immediately and thus less excitingly, the seat count in each district could be adjusted not in this election, but prior to next election.
Either way it would add excitement to the contest - PR contests are sometimes regarded as boring as the parties receive pretty much what their vote tallies show is their due, PR contests have little of the accidental flips and turnovers of FPTP, which some see as exciting. so seat re-allocation would add some excitement, as well as adding proportional fairness. (if the seat is allocated prior to next election, then the expectation would be that the vote turnout would stay strong next time or at least it would vary not more than normal function of the use of districts.
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