Single Transferable Vote

8 Key excerpts on "Single Transferable Vote"

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  Politics and Gender in Ireland

  The Quest for Political Agency

  • Fiona Buckley, Yvonne Galligan, Fiona Buckley, Yvonne Galligan(Authors)
  • 2016(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  Employing a feminist-institutional framework, this article focuses on a primarily ‘Anglo-Saxon’ form of PR – the Single Transferable Vote (STV) – to assess and compare patterns of female representation across the island of Ireland. STV is a highly candidate-centred system of PR, in which proportionality is delivered, and the majority of seats rewarded, through the distribution of vote transfers. Examining candidate numbers and success rates in the most recent elections to Da ´il E ´ ireann and the Northern Ireland Legislative Assembly, both held in 2011, the research finds internal party cultures, systems of party competition, and electoral preferences for incumbency mainly account for the dearth of women representatives in Ireland, not the specific mechanics of STV. If anything, STV’s multimember nature facilitates 8 the election of new women, which would not have been the case under a single-seat system. The article concludes that the key to women’s improved representation in both jurisdictions lies in reforming candidate selection processes within party organisations. Single Transferable Vote in Ireland 1 STV has been described as an ‘Anglo-Saxon’ method of securing proportional rep-resentation. After first past the post (FPTP), it is most commonly used in countries historically influenced by British political culture. 2 Apart from presidential and by-elections (both use the alternative vote, which is essentially STV in single-seat districts), STV has been used at all electoral levels in the Republic of Ireland since independence in 1922. In terms of district magnitude, Da ´il E ´ ireann (the Republic of Ireland’s lower house) constituencies range from three seats to five seats, which are very small in comparison with most other European PR systems, and may negatively suppress rates of vote–seat proportionality (Gallagher, 2011).

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  Women and Legislative Representation

  Electoral Systems, Political Parties, and Sex Quotas

  • M. Tremblay(Author)
  • 2016(Publication Date)
  • Palgrave Macmillan

    (Publisher)

  For instance, a voter could choose to give one of the Fianna Fail candidates her “number one,” follow this with a second preference for the Progressive Democrat can- didate, then indicate another Fianna Fail candidate as a third choice, and an Independent, running on a local issue, as a fourth preference, and so on until all candidates were ranked. Another voter might choose to give her vote to the more senior Fine Gael candidate, followed by the second Fine Gael can- didate, then give a third preference to Labour, a fourth to the Green Party, and then not rank the remaining candidates. Thus, from a voter perspective, STV offers considerable choice. It emphasizes individual candidates over parties, and it delivers relatively proportional results (Sinnott 2005: 123). The technical operation of the STV is rather more complex. Because STV operates in a multiseat district context, each constituency has a “quota”—the minimum votes required in order to win a seat. The quota is calculated on the basis of the valid votes cast in relation to the number of seats to be filled in each constituency. There is a simple formula for calculating the quota: Quota 1 In a three-seat constituency, the quota is one quarter of the valid votes 5 plus one, in a four-seater it is one-fifth plus one, and in a five-seat district the quota is one-sixth the valid ballot plus one. A second feature of STV is the utilization of voter preferences in deter- mining the result. This is done through a transfer of surplus votes a candi- date receives above the quota required to win a seat. Earlier we noted Fitzgerald’s remarkable surplus of votes in 1992. If we take this as an example, we see that she obtained 17,256 votes in a five-seat constituency, where the quota was 9,940. In other words, Fitzgerald garnered 7,316 votes more than was required to win a parliamentary seat.

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  How Ireland Voted 2011

  The Full Story of Ireland's Earthquake Election

  • M. Gallagher, M. Marsh, M. Gallagher, M. Marsh(Authors)
  • 2011(Publication Date)
  • Palgrave Macmillan

    (Publisher)

  9 Preference Voting under PR-STV 1948–2011 Richard Sinnott and James McBride Given the seismic shifts that transformed the Irish electoral landscape in February 2011, it is tempting to focus solely on the massive changes in the distribution of first preference votes recorded in that election. However, such an approach would grossly underrate the role of second and subsequent preferences in allocating seats and in uncovering fundamental aspects of Irish voting behaviour. 1 In using these preferences to proceed count by count and elimination by elimination towards the final outcome, proportional representation by the Single Transferable Vote (PR-STV) generates unparalleled additional evidence on how voters relate to the candidates and to the parties. In analysing this evidence, it is important to note several features of the Irish electoral system. In the first place, and contrary to a not uncommon view, in PR-STV each voter has only one vote. Secondly, that vote is transferable, according to the preference order indicated by the voter. Thirdly, although from the point of view of the act of voting, PR-STV is simple and transparent, the mechanics of transferring votes are quite complex. Because the complexities can affect the interpretation of the transfer evidence, the mechanics of PR-STV are addressed in some detail below. The evidence generated by the transfer of votes can be thought of in terms of three behavioural variables. The first is party loyalty. This manifests itself when votes are being transferred from a candidate of a given party in a situation in which there is a continuing candidate from the same party in contention. In these circumstances a loyal vote or a loyal transfer is one that goes directly from the eliminated or elected 205 206 How Ireland Voted 2011 candidate to his or her party running mate. The second variable is party plumping. This arises when there is no running mate available to receive the transferable votes.

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  Criminalization of Politics

  • Marko Nikoli?, Marko Nikolić(Authors)
  • 2020(Publication Date)
  • Society Publishing

    (Publisher)

  It is also known as the Hare system which was named after one of its British proponents of electoral reform, Thomas Hare. It employs a ballot that allows the voter to rank candidates in order of their preference. At the point when the polling forms are tallied, any competitor accepting the fundamental amount of first inclination votes, determined as one or more the quantity of votes isolated by the quantity of seats in addition to one is granted a seat. In the various kinds of computations that hold discretion, the votes secured by a candidate who is winning which are more than the share are moved to another candidate agreeing according to the preference they have given in the ballot as their second preference, which is held under the STV system. Any candidate who then accomplishes the necessary quota is also awarded a seat. This process is a recurring one, in which the votes Criminalization of Politics 72 in surplus are transferred to the remaining candidates until the remaining seats have found a candidate that can fit in. The best and the most optimal constituencies for the application of the single transferrable voting system is that of five members. As the system involves the consideration of the preferences that have been ranked by the voters, the electoral system of single transferrable vote involves a lot of complex computations. This complexity coupled with the fact that its use minimizes the impact of the political parties on the elections, limits its use. It has been used in Northern Ireland and Malta and the selection of the Australian and South African senates. The main advantage of the Hare formula is that it lays a lot of emphasis on the candidates and not on the parties that may belong to, which makes it unique among all. The party affiliation of the candidates doesn’t matter to the calculations.

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  Parliament the Mirror of the Nation

  Representation, Deliberation, and Democracy in Victorian Britain

  • Gregory Conti(Author)
  • 2019(Publication Date)
  • Cambridge University Press

    (Publisher)

  Aili Mari Tripp and Alice Kang, “The Global Impact of Quotas: On the Fast Track to Increased Female Legislative Representation,” Comparative Political Studies, 41 (2008): 338–61. 2 The Institutional and Conceptual Core of Victorian PR 239 which such criteria could be imposed; the composition of the assembly that comes out of it is an unmediated product of the electors’ will. Victorian PR and the variety-of-suffrages were, consequently, at opposite ends of the spectrum when judged from this perspective: in the former, everything was constructed from the tally of votes given in conditions of maximal freedom; in the latter, the electors’ task was to choose the specific people who would fill the various slots preappointed to different segments of society. Out of this analysis of the voluntary constituency two questions arise concerning the genre of representation to which Victorian STV should be said to belong. First, we are now in a position to answer the question of whether STV constituted a form of minority representation. “Minority representation” was a common label for Hare’s plan for at least the first two decades after its arrival, although “proportional representation” had mostly won out by the end of the nineteenth century. While many STV proponents would ultimately reject the name “minority representation” as “misleading,” 193 others remained content with it. This satisfaction was sensible enough. Like the original minority-representation schemes, STV was opposed to the principle of “majority representation” by which only “local majorities” could gain representation and “due weight to the minority” within dis- tricts was denied; all its supporters acknowledged that they wished to end a system that “deprive[d] the minority . . . of any share of representation.” 194 The genius of STV was that it could give representation to what were minorities according to block-voting or single-member-district arrangements, and the older nomenclature captured this facet well.

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  Preferential Voting Systems

  Influence on Intra-Party Competition and Voting Behaviour

  • Gianluca Passarelli(Author)
  • 2019(Publication Date)
  • Palgrave Macmillan

    (Publisher)

  preferences . In addition, in PLPR systems, the number of seats won by a party depends only on the lists’ electoral performance and not (also) on the distribution of votes across its candidates. Instead, the votes for parties and candidates are pooled. Conversely, in SNTV and STV systems, candidates compete against their co-partisans and candidates of other parties, and the number of seats won by each party is entirely dependent on candidates’ individual performance. These systems carry risks of so-called allocation errors and over-nomination. Parties have to worry about the possibility that votes will become overly concentrated on one or two candidates, diminishing the enthusiasm for other candidates further down the list and hurting the party’s seat allocation.

  In sum, the “preferential voting ” system category brings together countries that have very different characteristics and generate just as many different outcomes, suggesting that a common conception of preferential voting is still lacking. Norris notes that in “open-list multimember districts electors cast a ballot for a party, but they can express their preference for a candidate or candidates within a party list” (2004 : 213). This clarification is important, albeit partially nullified when the author considers “27 PR electoral systems worldwide […] as well as in STV elections in Ireland” (2004 : 213). The problem with preferential voting is thus both theoretical and empirical. A standard definition is needed as well as a categorical portfolio of definitive empirical cases. There is, as I shall outline, a conceptual overlap and stretching between preferential voting systems and the precise definition of a “preference vote”. In this vein, Cox’s analytical distinction is very valuable. Cox focuses on seat allocation processes, a critical distinguishing aspect between PR systems: “when intermediate seat allocations are made to lists, then the question arises as how to the list’s seats are allocated among the candidates on the list” (1997 : 60). In particular, he differentiates between closed-list systems, in which “the party establish[es] an order of candidates on the list, with the first candidate on the list getting the first seat to which the party is entitled […], and so on”, and open-list systems, in which a “party’s voters decide which of its candidates will win the seats allocated to the party’s list” (ibidem: 60–61). Cox also refers to flexible systems in which voters “have the ability to vote for individual candidates (possibly in addition to the ability to vote for lists)” (ibidem: 61). However, this is a little misleading, as it is possible to have PLPR, or even OLPR, systems in which the voters only casts a vote for the candidate whom they prefer (e.g. Finland and Chile, as I shall detail in Chapter 5 ) and flexible systems in which the preference votes are automatically pooled and calculated alongside the list votes (e.g. the Netherlands). Finally, Lakeman and Lambert simply state that “most countries using list systems of proportional representation have modified them so as to give the voters a choice between candidates in a more or less effective form” (1946

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  Behind the Ballot Box

  A Citizen's Guide to Voting Systems

  • Douglas J. Amy(Author)
  • 2000(Publication Date)
  • Praeger

    (Publisher)

  In the end, my hope is that all the information and analysis in this book will enable you to think more clearly and critically about voting systems; allow you to engage in more intelligent discussions and debates about these systems; and ultimately, if you choose, help you to change what goes on “behind the ballot box.’’ Page xxiii Abbreviations AV Alternative Vote FPTP First Past the Post IRV Instant Runoff Voting List PR List Proportional Representation LV Limited Voting MMP MixedMember Proportional PR Proportional Representation SemiPR Semiproportional Representation SMDP SingleMember District Plurality SNTV Single Nontransferable Vote STV Single Transferable Vote TRS TwoRound System Page 1 CHAPTER 1 What Are Voting Systems and Why Are They Important? Before looking at voting systems in more detail, two preliminary questions need to be answered: What are voting systems, and why are they important? The first question is the easiest to answer. A voting system is the set of procedures that determine how people are elected to office. These procedures include how the ballot is structured, how people cast their votes, how those votes are counted, and how the winners are decided. Or as political scientists often put it: Voting systems are the means by which votes are translated into seats in the legislature. 1 As an illustration, let’s do a quick overview of two of the most common voting systems in Western democracies. The most prevalent system for legislative elections in the United States is the winnertakeall system—or in more formal parlance, the singlemember district plurality system. That rather technical phrase captures the two basic attributes of this system. First, votes are cast in singlemember districts—districts in which only one member of the legislature is elected. All the candidates are on the ballot and we cast a vote for only one of them. Second, the winner is determined by who receives the most votes—the plurality of the vote.

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  The Coalition and the Constitution

  • Vernon Bogdanor(Author)
  • 2011(Publication Date)
  • Hart Publishing

    (Publisher)

  It may not be the choice that the people themselves would want to make, given the opportunity. David Owen has argued that the proposal for a referendum on the alternative vote was an ‘inter-party fix agreed as part of the coalition agreement’, and that Parliament should not ‘feel pre-empted’ by it. 24 There is a striking contrast between the way in which reform of the electoral system has come onto the political agenda in Britain, and the procedure adopted by New Zealand, another Westminster system without a codified constitution. In New Zealand, reform was preceded by a Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Electoral System, and by a two-stage referendum process in 1992 and 1993, the purpose of which was on account of ‘the wide diver-sity of public opinion on this issue’, to give ‘as far as possible . . . a range of options for the public to choose from’. 25 The first stage of the referendum process, held in 1992, asked two questions. The first was: Should the current first past the post system be retained? The second was: Regardless of how you voted under Part A, if there was a change to another voting sys-tem, which voting system would you choose? I would choose the Mixed Member Proportional system (MPP) I would choose the Preferential Voting system (PV) I would choose the Single Transferable Vote system (STV) I would choose the Supplementary Member system (SM) The Mixed Member Proportional system is the system known in Britain as the Additional Member system, as used in elections to the devolved bodies in Scotland and Wales and the London Assembly. It had been recommended for adoption in New Zealand by the Royal Commission. The Preferential Voting system is the alternative vote.

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