Germany elects the members of the Bundestag by two separate processes: half of them are elected locally by majority voting in, currently 299 constituencies, while the other half are elected by proportional representation on the basis of party lists in the different regions of the country. The Swiss also use two different systems, but these apply separately to the two chambers: in the Council of States, the upper house, seats are allocated according to the majority of the votes per candidate, whereas in the National Council, the lower house, they are allocated on the basis of the proportion of voters for each party in the cantons. Historically, the mixed voting system is still relatively young. It was first used in Germany in 1949. Thats why we have data going back the furthest for that country. However, in the meantime other countries are also using various different forms of the mixed voting system. I am interested in how the actual decision-making behaviour of individual members of parliament differs in a mixed voting system from that in a pure system, explains Tamaki Ohmura. She is expecting to complete her doctoral thesis project next year.
Posted on: Sun, 23 Nov 2014 11:41:56 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015