On May 19, 2010, at 2:04 PM, Juho wrote: > - Maybe there is no need to defend proportional representation. Proportional > representation should in principle be taken as granted since that is the way > the whole country operates.
It's worth keeping in mind that a majority faction has a built-in incentive to prefer majority-take-all to PR (and this has played a role in the repeal of PR in some places--eg New York City). Depending on the culture of the overall group, it may be impolite to put this reason on the table, but surely it must influence opinion. > > - One approach to this question is to say that the already used method is > already a serious attempt to implement proportional representation but that > it is not good enough and does not meet the standards that are generally used > in proportional systems. > > - I think practically all political systems have a representative body that > is in some sense proportional. Governments may be majoritarian but usually > governments are not the only representative bodies. > > - It very common that the largest groupings (that currently have the power) > don't want to distribute power any more than they have to, in any political > system. But maybe also they agree that reasonable level of proportionality is > what the party wants. And then the question is if the current method is bad > enough to be upgraded. > > - You mentioned that some people might leave the party. They could also well > establish a competing party. Since your party is small it can not afford > fragmentation. A better strategy would be to collect all the similar minded > people from all greenish segments of the society together and that way gain > more weight. This means that all segments need to be respected and be > represented. This is a possible counterargument to the majority-take-all argument above--possible the best one. > > - You mentioned earlier that the first vice president should come from a > different grouping than the president. If people agree with this, then they > should agree that similar principles should apply also to the rest of the > council. As a historical note, the US Constitution originally had a rather convoluted scheme for electing the president and VP (even more convoluted than the present scheme, that is). The fact that it could (and did, in 1796) result in the P & VP being from opposing parties was one of the reasons for the 12th amendment <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twelfth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution>. > > - If the members will decide, then they may like the fact that proportional > representation means that higher number of them will have some of their > favourites in the council. > > - You could also explain why the current system does not work. (But be > constructive and not destructive.:-) > > - The first practical example in my mind is one where in a good council all > the imagined groupings will have their representative in the council while in > a bad council, that could be elected with the current method, things would > not look as rosy. > > - A working demo may also interest some people. Maybe better focus on some > imaginary situation first and not directly on how the new method would change > the current leadership to something better :-). ---- Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
