Modern democracy and voting systems - General

[QUOTE=glitchvid;43131821]Wall of text, I'm surprised noone posted CGPGrey's video on types of voting process. [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7tWHJfhiyo[/media][/QUOTE] Some of CPGrey's explanations are poor, such as his one on MMP. Also, as far as I know he hasn't done videos on STV and plurality at large (bloc, limited and SNTV).

[QUOTE=onebit;43111254]How about no representatives and laws are voted on over the internet by the whole country? (Voting would have to be mandatory.) Would remove all weaknesses in the political system I think.[/QUOTE] Switserland!

[QUOTE=yawmwen;43118961]i think direct democracy is a better answer. let people vote on the decisions that affect them. you can get more complicated than that like giving different voters different numbers of votes based on how disproportionately a decision affects them or using consensus forming techniques to make decisions. however, the idea of representation is outdated and not in the spirit of any free country.[/QUOTE] As much as some people would love direct democracy because they may know what they're talking about, a lot, if not most of the electorate just don't have a bloody clue how something will affect them which their respective representative will know. Take immigration for example, the large majority in a country like the US or UK will only think "muh jobs" and try and get immigrants out when representatives know the benefits of them. It doesn't work on the kind of scale we have today very much, hence why caucuses for example are only in sparsley populated places.

[QUOTE=Nightsure;43137208]As much as some people would love direct democracy because they may know what they're talking about, a lot, if not most of the electorate just don't have a bloody clue how something will affect them which their respective representative will know. Take immigration for example, the large majority in a country like the US or UK will only think "muh jobs" and try and get immigrants out when representatives know the benefits of them. It doesn't work on the kind of scale we have today very much, hence why caucuses for example are only in sparsley populated places.[/QUOTE] I think a bigger problem is just the sheer number of bills that legislatures vote on. Not only supply bills but even ones such as naming national parks. When referendums are announced, they are normally done so months if not years before the referendum takes place and is usually on a single, specific issue. However many bills go into incredible detail and the files that go alongside bills can easily number into the hundreds of pages. Also there is the issue of tyranny of the majority that I mentioned earlier.

[QUOTE=Nightsure;43137208]As much as some people would love direct democracy because they may know what they're talking about, a lot, if not most of the electorate just don't have a bloody clue how something will affect them which their respective representative will know. Take immigration for example, the large majority in a country like the US or UK will only think "muh jobs" and try and get immigrants out when representatives know the benefits of them. It doesn't work on the kind of scale we have today very much, hence why caucuses for example are only in sparsley populated places.[/QUOTE] that's why decentralization of the system would need to accompany direct democracy.

Here's a topic I want to talk about, regarding mixed-member proportional representation. I went over the basis of the system in the OP but I will go over it again. Voters have two votes - one vote to elect a local representative, and another vote for their favourite political party - to determine seats in the federal / national legislature part of government. The party vote determines the proportion of seats a party wins. Eg if the Conservative party gets 40% of the party vote, 40% of the total seats in the legislature go to that party. The seats are then filled first by members elected through the constituency (local representative) vote. If the legislature has 60 seats elected from constituencies and 120 seats in total, then if we say that the Conservative party wins 35 constituency seats, then going along with the Conservative party winning 40% of the party vote (winning 48 seats) the first 35 seats are filled with the constituent representatives, with the remainder of 13 filled by the top 13 members on the party's party list. However, what if a party wins more constituent seats than there party vote would allow? The Blue Party is a small party, and instead of marketing themselves nationally they focus all of their efforts on strengthening their position in the two constituencies where they are most popular. This works out well - the Blue Party wins the constituency seats in both of those constituencies, however it only receives 3% of the national party vote - which is such a small figure that it does not reach a 5% quota which parties need to receive the allocation of at least one seat. This leaves an overhang of two seats, as the party vote determines 40% of seats to go to the Conservatives, 35% to go to the Liberals and 25% to go to the Greens (after parties which did not poll at least 5% support are eliminated). What would be more fair? To allow for that overhang of two seats, or to reduce the amount of seats available for the party vote via the overhang amount to prevent the overhang, so that the party vote only affects 118 seats and not 120? To illustrate this latter concept better, say that all 60 constituency seats are won by independent candidates, meaning that only 60 seats (the remainder of the 120) are decided on by the party vote. Would you think that this would be a more fair system?