Outline:
1st
Introduction
2nd Stable
majorities in a majority voting system
3rd Danger
of interest groups entering parliament
4th The
influence of radical parties
5th
Insufficient sensitivity in the case of a proportional representation
6th
Uncertainty of the election outcome
7th
Disadvantages of the existing mixed system
1st
Introduction
In this
chapter, we will address the question of whether the will of the people can be
expressed the best way through proportional representation. Democracies
represent a political system in which all power emanates from the people and in
parliamentary democracies the will of the people is ascertained by holding a
general, equal and secret election at intervals of four to five years, in which
the individual parties seek to be elected to parliament and the parties that
have obtained the majority of votes form the government.
Whether
it is possible to realise the will of the people through parliamentary
elections depends on the question of when we can say that the will of the
people has been fulfilled. We cannot assume that in elections all voters prefer
the same politicians and the same decisions. As a rule, the individual voters
have quite different ideas about what the right decision is for the political
problems at hand.
In
general, it is assumed that the will of the people is expressed in the opinion
of the majority. But already here, a kind of compromise is assumed. First and
foremost, one should actually only speak of the will of a population having
been fully expressed when there is unanimity, when everyone considers the same
solution to a problem at hand to be correct. This conception already results
from the fact that in a representative democracy - also in every liberal
constitutional state - all citizens are equal before the law. There is
initially no reason to place the opinion of a certain group - no matter how
much it may correspond to the opinion of a majority - above the opinion of
another group, the minority. With regard to the common good, every opinion - we
will for once assume that only morally impeccable opinions are expressed - is
of equal value.
This
principle of unanimity corresponds to the Pareto criterion in the welfare
theory of economics, which was formulated by the founder of modern welfare
theory. Vilfredo Pareto is concerned with the question of when a certain state
of affairs or a certain measure can be described in a scientifically sound
manner as increasing welfare. The Pareto criterion states that an increase in
the welfare of the entire population (group) can only be scientifically
confirmed if at least one individual has experienced an increase in
welfare and at the same time no individual has experienced an impairment of its
welfare.
If we
now assume that every individual acts rationally in the sense that, in a vote
(election), he or she only votes for those solutions which promise him or her a
welfare gain, the application of this Pareto criterion will automatically
presuppose that only those decisions can be regarded as corresponding to the
will of the population which were taken unanimously (perhaps with certain
abstentions).
Now,
this rule should not be interpreted in the sense of utilitarianism or hedonism.
According to the utilitarianism developed by Bentham, people strive for maximum
utility and try to avoid misuse, and the welfare of a population is then
realised when the greatest possible utility of the greatest possible number is
realised. Hedonism further narrows this formula by equating utility with
pleasure and disutility with displeasure.
While it
is true that a large part of the liberal founders of economic science indeed started
from utilitarian and hedonistic premises, Joseph Schumpeter stated that the
economic principle and thus also the Pareto criterion need by no means to be
interpreted in this narrow form. The Pareto criterion is rather about the fact
that self-determination is only granted if each individual can decide for
himself which alternative he considers to be right, regardless of whether he
came to this decision because he expects a material benefit (or even pleasure)
from this decision or because he considers this alternative to be the right one
for moral reasons.
In the
harsh reality, however, one will find very few political solutions that benefit
completely all individuals or at least cause no harm to any individual, and for
the same reasons, very few decisions are likely to be adopted unanimously.
One
might be willing to accept this with the argument that if one cannot find a
solution that everyone can agree to, one should simply refrain completely from
making changes; after all, it is better if no one comes to harm than if the
utility of some is offset by the harm of others. According to Pareto's thesis,
ideas of utility cannot be compared interpersonally and thus cannot be set off
against each other.
This
line of argument is not convincing, however, since doing nothing can also have
negative consequences; after all, most political proposals arise from the fact
that the existing order has led to inadequacies that have caused harm to many
citizens. Political inaction itself represents one of the alternatives, so that
even if one refrains from finding a solution, one is in a sense violating the
Pareto criterion. One is then faced with the fact that no matter what one
decides, even in the case of doing nothing, partial damage is caused in any
case, so that one is only faced with the choice of selecting the alternative
with the least damage.
But how
to measure which alternative has the least harm or the most utility?
Traditional democratic theory sees this requirement as fulfilled when a
political proposal achieves a majority of votes. However, this is only a rather
imperfect solution. The harm experienced by individual citizens through the
individual measures or even through doing nothing is usually quite different,
yet the majority principle in no way asks whether the harm to the minority is
great or small.
Thus, it
corresponds to the majority rule if 51% of the voters would have experienced
minimal damage with the rejected solution, but if at the same time 49% of the
voters would have experienced existential damage with the solution preferred by
the majority. Now, this example may show an extreme case, which occurs only
very rarely in practice. Nevertheless, it contradicts all moral concepts when a
measure comes into effect in which the winners only experience a minimal
increase in utility, but a considerable minority suffers extreme damage.
Precisely
because of these shortcomings, all constitutions of representative democracies
provide that, although the majority has the decisive role, the outvoted minority
has a number of minority rights which may not be abolished by any majority, no
matter how large. These are human rights, i.e. rights to which every citizen is
entitled. These include, above all, the prohibition of all forms of
discrimination and, most importantly, the inviolability of human dignity. Only
both institutions together, the majority principle as well as the observance of
human rights, guarantee that decisions in a representative democracy correspond
to the will of the people.
The
result of an election also depends on how the cast votes are counted. A
distinction is made here between majority and proportional representation.
Under the majority system, the candidate who received the majority of votes is
determined for each constituency; this candidate moves into parliament, and the
votes cast for the other candidates are not taken into account. In proportional
representation, the distribution of seats in parliament corresponds to the
percentage share that a party was able to achieve in the election as a whole in
all constituencies. If a party S was able to achieve 35% of the voters in the
election, this party also receives 35% of the parliamentary seats.
Sometimes mixed systems are present, such as in
the FRG of Germany. In the FRG, each voter has two votes in the Bundestag
election. With regard to the first vote, as in the majority system, the
candidate with the most votes in each constituency is elected to parliament.
The second vote, on the other hand, as in the proportional representation system,
serves to allocate to each party as many seats as necessary to ensure that the
percentage composition of the parties in parliament corresponds to the share
that the parties were able to achieve in the population.
Problems
always arise with the mixed system when a party manages to send more direct
candidates to parliament than its percentage share of the electoral votes. In
the FRG, this problem is solved by creating overhang mandates in this case,
i.e. that this party can fill additional parliamentary seats so that every
candidate who had won a majority in the direct election can also enter
parliament.
It is
obvious that even with the same distribution of votes in the population, the
composition of parliaments under majority voting differs from that under
proportional representation, and this means at the same time that the
distribution of parliamentary seats among the individual parties under majority
voting differs more or less from the proportion of votes that the individual
party was able to obtain in the population. Let us illustrate this consequence
with an example.
For the
sake of simplicity, let us assume that there are only two parties (K and L) and
that the country was divided into 100 constituencies of equal size. Party K has
obtained 51% of the votes in all constituencies. In the case of a majority
voting system, party K is therefore awarded all seats, whereas in the case of a
proportional representation system, party K could also achieve a majority, but
only 51% of the seats and thus only a narrow majority in parliament.
Of
course, this is an extreme example. In reality, each party has certain
strongholds in which it can achieve a majority of votes in any case, so that
both parties are also represented in parliament. Our example has shown,
however, that the composition of parliament can by no means be expected to
correspond exactly to the share of voters of the parties. Experience has shown
that the party that has obtained the majority of votes can generally obtain a
much higher share of parliamentary seats than corresponds to the share of the
electorate of that party.
What are the arguments in favour of
proportional representation and majority voting? The advocates of proportional
representation point out that only in the case of proportional representation
the composition of parliament corresponds to the structure of the electorate,
whereas in the case of majority voting system the composition of parliament
deviates more or less from the composition of the electorate. The fact as such
can hardly be disputed. What remains questionable, however, is the tacit
assumption that the will of the majority in the population is only expressed if
parliament is a reflection of the electoral composition. We will show later in
this section that this assumption can very well be questioned.
2nd Stable
majorities in a majority voting system
However,
let us first consider the arguments put forward by the advocates of the
majority voting system. The arguments in favour of majority voting system are that
it guarantees greater stability and sensitivity than proportional
representation. This is true for several reasons.
First of
all, it has been shown empirically that the respective governing party in a
majority voting system usually has a full majority of parliamentary seats,
whereas governments in a system of proportional representation very often only
have extremely narrow majorities of one or two votes. Sometimes the government
has no majority at all, it forms a minority cabinet and is dependent on individual
members of the opposition voting in favour of the government bill in individual
cases, or on individual opposition parties supporting the government without
participating in the government in terms of personnel.
In these
cases, the government has to fear for the majority for every legislative
proposal. If it only has a narrow majority, it runs the risk of losing the vote
and having to resign only because one or two parliamentarians of the governing
parties could not take part in the vote due to illness or other absences. Note
that the government is falling here not because it is pursuing a wrong policy
that is not shared by the majority of the population, but for purely
coincidental reasons that have nothing to do with the real issue.
With a
narrow majority, a government also has to fear that during the legislative
period one or the other parliamentarian will switch to an opposition party
because of differences of opinion and that the government will lose its
majority for this reason. Only if the said parliamentarians justify this change
of party by saying that they had promised their voters that they would vote
against these plans of the government, one could still speak with some
justification that the government is being overthrown here because it is trying
to push through measures that are not shared by the majority of the population.
As a
rule, however, individual parliamentarians only change their party if they no
longer agree with the objectives of the party leadership due to fundamental considerations.
In general, it is necessary to compromise on every political decision, so most
parliamentarians cannot impose their opinion on every issue. But even a
parliamentarian who has been outvoted in a vote is perfectly capable of
defending that compromise before the electorate even if he or she has been
outvoted on a specific issue. The only decisive question is whether he agrees
with the party leadership on the fundamental positions of his party.
If there
is even a minority government, the stability of the government is even more
threatened than if the government still has a small majority. Parties that
participate in the work of the government benefit from this cooperation by
taking on positions in the government; they therefore also have an interest in
the government being able to hold out until the end of the legislative period.
An opposition party has a much smaller interest in the preservation of the
government, since it does not receive any of the fruits of the work of the
government, and it will therefore be much quicker to withhold its consent from
the government if the government does not reward its consent in some other way.
3rd Danger
of interest groups entering parliament
The majority system guarantees greater
stability than the proportional system for another reason. Precisely because
under the majority voting system a party only has a chance of being elected to
parliament if it has been able to win a majority of the votes in individual
constituencies, it results that generally only large parties that appeal to
several population groups have a chance of success at all. Majority voting
systems are characterised by the fact that usually only two major parties
compete in the election.
In a
system of proportional representation, even parties that appeal to only a small
section of the population from the outset have a chance of being elected to
parliament and even participating in the government as coalition partners.
There is therefore a danger that a large number of smaller parties will run for
office and that they will pursue a policy of interests and make no effort to
find solutions that are approved by the majority of the population. As has been
noted, they also get into parliament if they have only addressed a minority
before the elections and have not striven for a compromise that is also shared
by several groups of the population.
Precisely
because it is now worthwhile for a large number of interest groups to form
themselves as a party, the probability that the larger parties will still be
able to achieve a majority of votes decreases with the consequence that the
larger parties are forced to form a coalition government with one or even
several smaller parties. In this way, even a party that only appealed to a
single interest group before the elections and therefore fell far short of a
majority can still expect to be involved in government work.
But it
is precisely this prospect that in turn changes the interests of the smaller
parties. If a party is to represent the interests of various population groups,
it is forced to hold out the prospect of solutions even before the election
which, precisely because compromises become necessary, do not correspond so
clearly and radically to the interests of a population group. A smaller party,
on the other hand, can increase its chances of being elected by formulating
extreme radical demands and thus win over the voters concerned much sooner than
if it had campaigned for solutions that benefit the entire population and
require compromises for that very reason.
This
fact, however, reduces stability and increases the risk that governments will
fail and have to resign before the end of the legislative period. Coalition
governments entail that compromises have to be made between the coalition
parties after the election. This means that no party can impose its objectives.
They then run the risk of becoming untrustworthy in the course of the
legislative period because they support policies that deviate more or less from
the promises they made before the election. This can very quickly lead to a
break-up of the coalition if a coalition partner has to fear that it will
become untrustworthy among its voters precisely because of the necessary
compromises and runs the risk of suffering considerable losses at the next
election.
Here,
the position of the single ruling major party is much more stable under the
conditions of a majority electoral system. Like the coalition government, it
too has to make compromises. What is decisive, however, is that the governing party
had already promised these compromises before the election and that it
is precisely for this reason that it can also deliver what it promised before
the election.
4th The
influence of radical parties
Another
third reason favours a greater stability of the majority voting system. The
experience with the constitution of the Weimar Republic, which provided for
proportional representation, shows that precisely because of the connections
that have just been explained, a party structure emerged with a radical party
in the right spectrum (the National Socialists), another radical party in the
left spectrum (the Communists) and a number of smaller parties in the middle of
this spectrum. Only these parties in the middle stood on the ground of the
constitution, while the declared aim of the two extreme parties was to gain a
majority by way of the Weimar constitution, but then, once they had come to
power, to undermine and eventually abandon the democratic constitution.
Now the consequence of this party structure was
that precisely because a large number of smaller parties were given and the two
radical parties together won a large share of the votes, the actual governments
almost always consisted of most of the smaller parties in the middle, often
only the head of government was changed, while the governing parties were
almost always the same.
If the
people were dissatisfied with the work of the government, it was of no gain to
the voters to switch from one moderate party to another moderate party in the
elections, since all these parties supported the work of the government. Only
the two radical parties offered a real alternative to the existing policy. As a
result, it was not surprising that more and more voters turned to the radical
parties; dissatisfied workers switched to the Communist Party, while
dissatisfied white-collar workers, civil servants and the self-employed
switched to the National Socialists.
Let us take as an example the elections in the
USA and Germany during the Great Depression in the late 1920s and early 1930s.
In both countries, the economic crisis brought about 8 to 10 million
unemployed. The people of both countries thus had reason to be dissatisfied
with the work of the governments (Hoover in the USA, Brüning
in Germany) and to vote out the government at the next election.
In the
USA, there is a majority voting system with two strong parties that stand on
the basis of the constitution. Voters therefore had the option of switching to
an opposition that defended the existing constitution. The Hoover government
was replaced by the Roosevelt government. In the Weimar Republic, on the other
hand, so many dissatisfied voters switched to the radical right-wing parties,
especially the National Socialists, that Reich President Hindenburg finally
felt compelled to appoint Hitler to lead the government.
Of
course, other factors also contributed to the collapse of the Weimar Republic.
At this point, it was only important to show that electoral law also
contributed to this reversal and that, in general, majority voting systems are
more immune to a constitutional breach than proportional representation
systems.
5th
Insufficient sensitivity in the case of a proportional representation
Fourthly,
the particularities of the majority voting system mean that dissatisfaction
with the existing government leads more quickly to the replacement of the
existing government. The system reacts more quickly to dissatisfaction. In
general, a swing of a few percentage points is enough for the previous
opposition to achieve even a sizeable majority in the next elections.
This
strong sensitivity is related to the fact that a majority can be overturned by
even a small swing in the cast votes. As an example, let us again choose a
majority electoral system with two parties. Party K is the government and has
won a majority of 51% in 60 out of 100 constituencies in the previous election.
Therefore, party K had a majority of 60 out of 100 votes so far. Let us now
assume that in 30 of the 60 constituencies Party K lost only 2% of the votes,
but for this very reason did not gain a majority in these constituencies.
The
previous opposition party was therefore able to gain 30 seats compared to the
previous elections with 40 out of 100 seats and therefore receives a full
majority of 70 votes, although only in 30 out of 100 constituencies two percent
of the voters switched to the opposing party. Of course, it is not to be
expected that such extreme changes will take place in practice; it should
merely be shown by means of an extreme example that a majority voting system
reacts very quickly and very strongly to changes in the will of the voters.
Let us
now bring a counter-example from the field of proportional representation. We
assume that all parties loyal to the constitution in the middle of the party
spectrum are already involved in the government. If the voters are dissatisfied
with the policies of the government and therefore switch to another party that
is also loyal to the constitution, this dissatisfaction is not reflected in the
actual policies, since the strengthened party was previously part of the
government.
Changes can only be expected when the
discontent in the population becomes so great that voters switch in large numbers
to the extreme parties. This is not only undesirable. It is made worse by the
fact that this system is not able to process changes in the will of the
electorate. For a long time nothing happens. But
precisely because of this, the discontent in the population rises, and one day
it becomes so strong that it can lead to a revolution.
Now, one
could argue that majority voting also overreacts in a sense and makes a
mountain out of a molehill. This would have to be regarded as undesirable,
since the changes in the composition of parliament should only correspond to
the extent of the discontent that is actually expressed.
Such
criticism fails to recognise that not every dissatisfaction with the existing
government manifests itself immediately in voters switching to opposition
parties. Many voters remain loyal to their party because they prefer a party
not only because of the concrete measures announced, but also because of its
basic attitude. A convinced trade union official is unlikely to switch to, for example,
the FDP if he is dissatisfied with the current policies of the SPD, as the
ideological differences between the two parties are too great.
As a
general rule, dissatisfied voters limit themselves to teaching the party of
their choice a lesson, e.g. by voting for another party in opinion polls, or
they abstain from voting or only vote for another party if they expect their
'own' party to gain a majority anyway, only a reduced majority in comparison to
previous elections.
If the
current government remains in office despite voter dissatisfaction, there is a
risk of major welfare losses. Thus, there is much in favour of a system that
reacts very sensitively and very quickly to changes in the opinion of the
population. If one waits until the government can be replaced, there is always
the danger that the entire system will be called into question because of
increasing dissatisfaction.
6th
Uncertainty of the election outcome
Fifthly
and finally, it should be pointed out that the election result becomes
uncertain if the formation of different coalition governments becomes possible
after the election. The probability of this rises as the number of competing
parties increases, which itself is more likely in proportional representation
systems than in majority voting systems. The will of the electorate cannot come
into play here at all, since various combinations become possible after the
outcome of the election. This uncertainty could only be ruled out if the
parties were to determine before the election with which and only with which
other parties, if any, a coalition would be entered into.
However,
such a self-commitment contradicts the interest of the entire community as well
as of the individual parties. A self-commitment can lead to the fact that no government
can be formed after the election, since the parties have excluded from the
outset those coalitions before the election which would be possible in purely
mathematical terms after the election (i.e. would result in a majority). It
would certainly be undesirable if several rounds of elections were necessary
for reasons of self-commitment alone. Apart from the fact that holding
elections incurs costs, a too frequent ballot leads to election fatigue, fewer
and fewer people participate in the election. However, the lower the voter
participation, the less the election result reflects the opinion of the
population.
But the
parties themselves are also not interested in a prior determination of the
coalition partner. If a party S has already decided that it will definitely
only enter into a coalition with party G, its negotiating position vis-à-vis
the coalition partner is weakened. This party then lacks the trump card that it
can also enter into a coalition with another party if necessary.
How
indeterminate an election can turn out within the framework of a proportional
representation system is shown by the result of the Bundestag election of 2013.
Purely arithmetically, three alternatives could have been realised: a grand
coalition of CDU/CSU and SPD, further a black-green government of CDU/CSU and
Green Party and finally a red-red-green coalition of SPD, Green Party and Left
Party. Now, the mere fact that the election result allows for several
alternatives in the formation of a government cannot yet be regarded as proof
that the will of the people was not properly expressed through the election.
After all, it is also in line with the responsible behaviour of an individual
to consider several alternatives. One makes a plan A, if this does not lead to
success due to unforeseen contingencies, one applies plan B or finally plan C,
which presumably have a lower efficiency than plan A, but still express the
goals of this individual. However, these three alternatives, which were
possible in purely mathematical terms according to the results of the 2013
federal election, are mutually exclusive programmes. If an individual were to
pursue such contradictory plans, one would speak of irrational behaviour.
7th
Disadvantages of the existing mixed system
Our considerations so far have come to the conclusion that the two electoral law systems
are based on two different, competing objectives: While proportional
representation obviously ensures that politicians are more likely to fulfil the
exact will of the population, majority voting ensures to a greater extent that
the system remains stable, i.e. that representative democracy is preserved. And
it seems that in the current system, which combines both forms of electoral
law, a highly desirable compromise has been reached in favour of both goals.
But this
appearance is deceptive. On the one hand, the advantages of the majority voting
system only occur in its pure form; the current mixed system has, after all,
triggered the difficulties described above with the overhang mandates in the
last decade. On the other hand, one should ask oneself whether it is really
necessary for the realisation of the will of the electorate that the party
structure of parliament corresponds precisely to the structure of the
electorate.
Let us take
a fictitious example. We assume two cases, in both cases two parties S and C
run in an election, party C gets 60% of the votes in each case. In the first
case the votes are counted according to the majority principle, in the second
case according to proportional representation. Let us further assume that
voting took place in 100 constituencies of 100 voters each and that party C
achieved a majority of 70% in 80 constituencies, but only a 20% share of the
vote in the remaining 20 constituencies. Thus, under the majority voting
system, party C would get 80 out of 100 seats, but under proportional
representation, party C would only get ((80*70) + (20*20))/100 = (5600 +
400)/100 = 60% , i.e. 60 seats.
Since party C had presumably won the majority
of parliamentary seats under both electoral systems, it can also form the
government in each case and implement its measures as intended. The fact that
the opposition party S has 20 more seats under the conditions of proportional
representation than under the conditions of majority voting has no influence on
the behaviour of the government. In both cases, the government can implement
its programme unchanged - after all, it has a sizeable majority - and in both
cases the realised policy corresponds to the will of the majority of voters.
There is
absolutely no guarantee that the mere fact that the composition of parliament
corresponds better to the structure of the electorate in the case of
proportional representation will in any way mean that the policies of the government
will also correspond more closely to the will of the electorate. Due to the
shortcomings pointed out above, we even would have to admit that despite
greater symmetry between the structure of parliamentary seats and the structure
of the electorate as a whole, the will of the electorate is not fully reflected
precisely in the case of proportional representation because, for example, the
election outcome allows for several different coalition governments.
In our
considerations, however, we have tacitly assumed that - assuming the same
behaviour of the voters - the same party obtains the majority in both electoral
systems. And this in turn presupposes that all constituencies have
approximately the same size. If this is not the case, it must indeed be expected
that under certain circumstances, even with the same number of votes, a
different party will gain the lead in the majority system than in the
proportional system. Let us take another example.
Again,
we assume 100 constituencies and now assume that just in the 80 constituencies
in which party C gained the majority of 70%, only 10 voters are registered,
while the remaining 20 constituencies each have 1000 voters and party C could
only gain 20% of the votes. In this case, under the conditions of a majority
election, party C would win 80 of 100 parliamentary seats and thus the
majority, although it only obtained (80 * 7 = 560) + (20 * 200 = 4000) = i.e.
4560 votes. Since the total number of voters is (80*10 = 800) + (20*1000 =
20000) thus 20800 in total, this means that under proportional representation
party C would only have got about 22% of the seats and would thus have to form
the opposition.
This inequality of constituencies has indeed
existed for a long time in Great Britain, the model country of majority voting.
It is only natural, however, that the demand for equal voting rights for all
citizens also presupposes that efforts are made to tailor the constituencies in
such a way that each constituency contains roughly the same number of eligible
voters.
Our
considerations were also based on a second tacit assumption. We have tacitly
assumed that - as is the consistent practice in almost all representative
democracies - voters elect parties and that elected representatives largely
follow the ideas of their party leaders. Let us briefly abandon this assumption
and assume that there were no parties at all and that only independent
politicians stood for election.
In this
case, one would have to assume that every vote on both the choice of government
and the substantive issues at hand was completely free of party statutes and
that the outcome of the decision depended substantially on the consultations
that had taken place beforehand. Under these conditions, it would be quite
conceivable, yes even probable, that the composition of parliament would also
have a decisive influence on the voting results and that, under the assumptions
made above, different results would indeed be achieved under the condition of
proportional representation than under the conditions of majority election.
It would be wrong, however, to already conclude
out of this that in these cases the policy would be more in line with the
actual will of the people in the case of proportional representation than in
the case of majority voting. Since the outcome of each individual vote would be
open and would depend on the arguments that had just been put forward in
plenary and, moreover, would also depend on which parliamentarians were present
at the moment and how imaginative they were, it would also not be possible to
speak unequivocally of the fact that precisely those compromises would be found
that would correspond to the will of the majority on the issues at hand.
The
decisive factor here is that within the framework of a majority voting system,
politicians are forced to address as many groups of the population as possible
before the election, and this only succeeds if the politicians have to name the
necessary compromises before the election, so that the voter is also informed
about which compromise he or she has agreed to by electing his or her
representative.
Under
the conditions of proportional representation, the voter is still completely
unaware of the compromise on which the parliament will agree; he or she only
knows the position of the representative whom he or she is voting for at the
moment; it is completely unclear to the voter to what extent his or her
candidate will prevail in the vote.
If this
uncertainty already exists under the current regime of parties, it increases
many times over if each individual parliamentarian only campaigns for himself
and no party, which summarises certain objectives in a party programme, stands
behind the ideas of the parliamentarian. It is then completely open what the
result of the vote in parliament will be and to what extent these results then
correspond to the will of the people.
Irrespective
of whether or not the majority will of the population comes into effect in a
parliament consisting only of non-party parliamentarians, there are good reasons
for the fact that in reality parties always act in parliamentary elections and
that it is ultimately the party programmes that are chosen by the electorate.
Friedrich
von Hayek once reproached parliamentary democracy for the fact that political
results go round in circles, with one government passing laws that favour the
groups of the population that elected it and disadvantage other groups. In the
next legislative period, another party prevails, which then repeals these
measures and favours other groups. In the long run, this only leads to the fact
that the distribution of resources is not changed significantly, that only
through this back and forth many resources are wasted and thus the welfare of
the entire population was burdened.
Dennis
Mueller has pointed out in a somewhat different context that the distribution
of resources is regulated much more efficiently in rules on the constitution.
If an individual citizen can see to what extent he or she will be positively or
negatively affected by a planned measure of the politicians, then it is to be
expected that he or she will work via interest groups to ensure that those
measures that favour him or her are pushed and those measures that burden him
or her are prevented.
However,
if long-term rules are laid down in the constitution, it is no longer possible
for the individual to clearly determine whether these rules bring him and his
children and children's children advantages or disadvantages. If he proceeds
rationally, he must assume that advantages and disadvantages are equally
probable. In this case, however, he will out of necessity decide in favour of
the arguments that promise an increase in overall welfare. He then behaves
quasi-intrusively, since he cannot assess whether he will benefit or be
disadvantaged by this rule in the future.
If the
replacement of governments is already considered to be welfare-reducing, this
is all the more true for a procedure in which
non-party parliamentarians are elected to parliament and it is entirely at the
mercy of coincidence what the outcome of the individual votes will be. There is
a danger here that many measures contradict and cancel each other out with the
end result that the welfare of the population is not advanced.
The
demand that the parliament shall be composed in the same way as the people have
elected the parties is probably based on a perhaps romantic, but not realistic
idea of the function of the parliament. When a law is voted on in the final
reading, the die has been cast long ago, it is clear which way one wants to go
with this law. It is the subcommittees of the parliamentary groups and also of
the parliament that discuss the possible alternatives and ask about the
possible effects of the individual measures.
The task
of the plenary in the final session of a law is not to make serious changes to
this law; these decisions have been made much earlier. It is rather about the
public being able to check whether the government parties also keep their
election promises, furthermore whether the government parties can convincingly
refute the criticism of the opposition and which alternative recipes the
present opposition offers. This spectacle of the final reading is thus a
prerequisite for the voter to be informed at the next election about which
parties can be most expected to implement his/her goals and wishes.
Only
when, in exceptional cases, an amendment to the constitution is to be decided
and thus a qualified majority is required for its adoption, does the government
need the cooperation of the opposition and is forced to compromise with the
opposition. Only in this case will the transition to proportional
representation and a different composition of parliament also significantly
influence the decisions of governments. In normal legislative work, on the
other hand, it would be precisely contrary to the will of the people if the
government were to abandon the positions for the sake of which it was elected.
Our
considerations have shown that proportional representation only very
imperfectly reflects the will of the electorate and leads to governments that
mostly fulfil the will of the people. At the same time, the analysis has shown
that with a majority voting system, the will of the electorate also takes
effect when the structure of parliamentary seats deviates from the structure of
the distribution of votes of the population. If certain conditions are met
(e.g. approximately equal size of the electoral districts), it is also
guaranteed that the government that represents the majority of voters will come
to power and that the political decisions in parliament will not be
significantly different than they would be under proportional representation.
The
great advantage of a majority voting system lies in the fact that the parties must
strive for compromises capable of obtaining a majority before the election and
that the voter can therefore decide for himself which compromise he prefers. In
the case of proportional representation, the outcome of the election very often
allows for different kinds of compromises that are only reached after the
election and which, precisely for this reason, the voters cannot help to
decide.