POLSC221: Introduction to Comparative Politics

5.4: Voting System Factors

• International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance: "Electoral System Design: The New International IDEA Handbook" File

  Read the IDEA Handbook. What are the criteria for effective electoral system design? What are the pros and cons of various countries' systems?
  

• The Brennan Center for Justice: Jennifer Rosenberg and Margaret Chen's "Expanding Democracy: Voter Registration Around the World" URL

  Read this report, which is a multi-nation examination of the details of voter registration systems. It examines the way sixteen other countries create and keep voter lists.
  

• 5.4.1: Voting and the Human Development Index (HDI)

  • Boundless Political Science: "Chapter 8, Section 5: How Voters Decide" URL

    Read this full section. What are the central features that make up party identification? How prominently do issues affect voter choices? How important are a political candidate's personal traits?
    

  • Rio+20 Dialogues: "Vote for the Future You Want" URL

    Go to this website and click on each of topic links at the top of the page to view how participants at the 2012 Rio+20 Conference voted on various proposed actions concerning sustainable development. The conference brought together thousands of world leaders, government officials, private sector entities, and non-governmental organizations to discuss poverty reduction, social equity, and environmental protection. The results presented here are not intended as a complete representation of the world's opinion, but rather as a set of insights into the nature and distribution of public support for these issues.

• 5.4.2: Controlling the Vote: Turnout, Suffrage, and Gerrymandering

  • Luca Ferrini's "Why is Turnout at Elections Declining Across the Democratic World?" URL

    Read this article, which examines declines in voter turnout among the world's representative democracies. What does the author offer as explanations for this trend?
    

  • The Independence Hall Association: "Voting: A Forgotten Privilege" URL

    Read this article about some of the barriers to voting in the United States.
    

  • American Journal of Computational Mathematics: Mizan Rahman's "Computational Modeling of Government Policy to Attain Long-Term Higher Voter Turnout for Sustainable Democracy" File

    Read this article, which examines ways to enhance voter turnout in the U.S.
    

  • Stein Ringen's "Democracy in America, Part 1: What's Wrong with Gerrymandering?" URL

    Read this article about the practice of gerrymandering. While it is often criticized, some argue that it provides an important method for underrepresented groups to be represented and elected to office. Do you agree with this position? Why or why not?
    

• 5.4.3: Proportionality and Election Thresholds in Parliamentary Systems

  • Wikipedia: "Proportional Representation" URL

    Read this article. In parliamentary systems, the number of seats given to a particular party is proportional to the number of votes that party receives. A minimum number of votes (a threshold) are required to secure any seats at all.

• 5.4.4: Protest Votes and Nonvoters

  • Dark Politricks: "Are Protest Votes Wasted Votes?" URL

    Read this article. Do you feel that protest votes are wasted in either a parliamentary or presidential system?