Also by /osep M.

Colomer
GAME THEORY AND THE TRANSITION TO DEMOCRACY: The Spanish Model Handbook of Electoral
POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS: Democracy and Social Choice
POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS IN EUROPE (editor)
System Choice
STRATEGIC TRANSITIONS: Game Theory and Democratization
Edited by

Josep M. Colomer
Research Professor in Political Science, Higher Council of Sdentific Research, Barcelona, Spai11

Foreword by

Bernard Grofman
Professor of Political Science and Mathematical Behavioral Science, University of California,
lrvine, USA

UNIV ERSID AD

ICES! BIBLIOTECA
11 IJ l~IBl~I Hl
111

\ .
 Editorial Matter and Selection C> josep M. Colomer 2004
Contents

*
Chapter 6 C> Alberto Dfaz-Cayeros and Beatriz Magaloni 2004
Chapter 16 C> Patrick Dunleavy and Helen Margetts 2004
Remaining chapters ~ Palgrave Macmiltan Ltd 2004
Ali rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this
publication may be made without written permission.
No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted
save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence
permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, List of Tables viii
90 Tottenham Court Road, London W1T 4LP.
Acknowledgements X
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may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. xi
Foreword by Bemard Grofman
The author has asserted his right to be identified
as the author of this work in accordance with the Copyright, List of Contributors xxi
Designs and Patents Act 1988.
First published 2004 by
PALGRAVE MACMILLAN Part 1 Introduction
Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS and
175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010 1 The Strategy and History of Electoral System Ch oice 3
Companies and representatives throughout the world fosep M. Colomer
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ISBN - 13: 978-1-4039-0454-6 fosep M. Colomer
ISBN-10: 1-4039-0454-5 110
3 Argentina: Compromising on a Qualified Plurality System
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Handbook of electoral system choice I edited by Josep M. Colomer; foreword by
Bernard Grofman. 5 Costa Rica: Modifying Majoritarianism with
p. cm. 40 per cent Threshold 133
lncludes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 1-4039-0454-5 (cloth) Fabrice Leho11cq
1. Elections. 2. Comparative government. l. Colomer, josep Maria. 145
6 Mexico: Designing Electoral Rules by a Dominant Party
JF1001.H26 2004
324.6'3-<k22
Alberto Díaz-Cayeros and Beatriz Magaloni
2003062675
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 7 The United States: the Past - Moving from Diversity
13 12 11 10 09 08 07 to Uniform Single-Member Oistricts 155
Erik f. Engstrom
Transferred to Digital Printing 2008
8 The United States: the Future - Reconsidering Single-Member
Oistricts and the Electoral College 164
Richard L. Engstrom

Part 3 Western Europe

9 Western Europe: General Overview 179
fosep M . Colomer

V
 1
The Strategy and History of Electoral
System Choice
fosep M. Colomer

It is on account of the importance of the consequences of the electoral system,

especially on the number of political parties and the political composition of
assemblies and governments, that the choice of system matters. However, electoral
systems - as are other prominent political institutions - are also a consequence of
already existing political parties in assemblies and governments, each of which
tends to prefer those institutional formulas and procedures that can consolidate,
reinforce or increase their relative strength. As will be argued and discussed in the
following pages, political configurations in which there is a single dominant party
or two rather balanced parties tend to produce choices in favour of rather restrictive
or exclusionary electoral systems, such as those based on the majority principle,
while pluralistic settings with multiple parties tend to support choices in favour
of more inclusive electoral formulas, such as those using rules of proportional
representation.
More generally, the choice of electoral system seems to follow what could be
called the 'Micro-mega rule', by which the large prefer the small and the small prefer
the large: a few large parties tend to prefer small assemblies, small district magnitudes
and rules based on small quotas of votes for allocating seats, while multiple small
parties tend to prefer large assemblies, large district magnitudes, and large quotas.
In a nutshell, large parties prefer small institutions in order to exclude others from
competition, while small parties prefer large institutions able to include them within.
This may be seen as Duverger's laws upside down. As the French political scientist
brilliantly sketched in the mid-twentieth century and several generations of
scholars have further developed and re-elaborated, electoral rules and procedures
have indeed paramount influence on relevant aspects of public lite, including the
number of candidacies or political parties that are created by would-be leaders and
the number of them that prove durable, the number of individuals and different
groups in the electorate that attain representation in councils and assemblies,
their relations with elected representatives, the political party composition of the
legislative and the executive, and the degree of social acceptance or rejection of
the polity and its constitutional structure. But we should take into consideration
that electoral systems - and formal political institutions and rules more generally -
are not absolutely independent variables, but also subjects of political choices by

3
4 fosep M. Colomer ' Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice S

already existing political actors, which tend to make decisions in their own interest. Two caveats can be taken into consideration. First, of course, the type of change
Thus it can be expected that electoral systems will usually crystallize, consolidate will also depend on the knowledge of alternative formulas and, in absolute terms,
or reinforce previously existing political party configurations - and the other on the stock of mathematical and legal inventions available at the moment. But it
political features that can be associated with them - rather than generate new is 'bad' - that is, unfavourable or unpalatable - performances that can be more
party systems or political outcomes by themselves. It is exogenous changes in the likely to induce political actors to experiment with alternative formulas or suggest
parties' relative strengths or expectations, whether by the emergence of new parties that scholars and experts should invent new rules and procedures able to produce
or, in general, by coordination failures of the existing parties - in spite of or against different outcomes than those already enforced. Intellectual creativity can then
the incentives provided by the existing electoral system - that can induce further feed new expectations and reshape actors' institutional preferences and political
electoral system changes. These statements do not deny, but, on the contrary, strategies accordingly.
assume Duverger's laws as granted, that is that electoral systems have clear conse- Second, it could be expected that electoral institutions - as with any other enforce-
quences on the number of parties, but it inserts this relationship within a more able rules of the game in social interactions and exchanges - may have sorne capability
encompassing analytical framework including the choice of electoral system by of imposing costs on those not complying, fostering learning processes by which
already existing political parties. 1 even the losers in the game can obtain relative net benefits from playing (in com-
It seems reasonable to assume that, under restrictive formulas such as majority parison with the costs of undertaking changes and playing under a new electoral
rule, political actors facing the effects of their own failure at coordinating them- system), and attracting actors' adaptation to the constraints and incentives provided.
selves into a small number of candidacies and the emergence of new issues and new Thus the longer the duration of an existing system, the higher could be the
contenders for seats and offices may shift their preference to electoral institutions probability that adapted actors will give the system endogenous support while
able to reduce the risks of competing by giving all participants greater opportunities institutionally-induced losers will be eventually absorbed or excluded and decreas-
to obtain or share power. When there are only a few parties, they can be satisfied ingly able to challenge the rules. In other words, the relative capability of institutional
with majoritarian electoral systems, but when the number and the size of new decision-making may decrease over time for those actors which are victims of the
parties increase, the incumbent parties may begin to fear the risk of becoming existing institutional rules.
absolute losers and try to shift to more inclusive electoral formulas. As will be In a first, very simple approach, it can thus be hypothesized that:
shown in the following pages, electoral system changes indeed tend to move
overwhelmingly in favour of increasingly inclusive, less risky fonnulas: from indirect to l. electoral system changes will move mostly in favour of more inclusive fonnulas
direct elections, from 1manimity to majority mle, and from tite latter to mixed systems permitting representation of a relatively high number of parties;
a11d to proportio11al representation (in other words, towards large assemblies, districts 2. they should be more probable the higher the effective 11111nber of existing parties;
and quota rules). and
Three basic variables emerge for consideration at the time of choosing a specific 3. the slwrter the d11ration of tl1e previous electoral system had been.
electoral system: the performance of the existing rules and the changing actors'
expectations of electoral results under them; the availability or invention of alter- From this perspective, this introductory chapter presents three different approaches -
native electoral rules and formulas with different expected effects; the actors' relative logical, historical and empirical - to the problem of electoral system choice. First,
capabilities for institutional decision-making. The performance of the existing electoral it presents a 'strategic' model of how electoral systems are chosen by decisive political
rules will likely be evaluated by political actors for the type of winners and losers actors. Second, it displays a very long-term historical panorama of the invention
they tend to produce, that is for the opportunities they create for the survival of and adoption of different electoral rules and formulas which is organized around
different political parties, the attainment of seats and offices within the institutional four basic principies: unanimity, lottery, majority and proportionality. Finally, severa!
structure, the possibility of implementing their preferred policies, the likelihood worldwide tests of the choice of electoral systems on 154 occasions in 94 countries
of being re-elected, and the faimess of the overall distribution of power positions. since the nineteenth century strongly support the hypotheses just sketched above.
lt can be postulated that the more restrictive and exclusionary the existing elect-
oral system - such as those based on majority rule - and the higher the number of A model of electoral system choice
parties with popular support or reasonable expectations of getting it, the stronger
the pressures for electoral system change in favour of more permissive and inclusive Let us, first, present a 'strategic' model of how electoral systems are chosen by '
formulas will be. In the analysis which follows, we will use the 'effective number' relevant political actors, whether in situations of general change of institutional
of parties in votes (that is, the number of parties weighed by their size in votes) as regime or within more stable frameworks. A few assumptions can be stated in
a proxy for the potential parties suffering from under-representation under the a preliminary way in order to develop a deductive reasoning which will be further
existing rules and able to expect benefits from such a change. tested and discussed.

··~ .. • ,. ; t.....
6 fosep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 7

First of all, let us assume that voters a11d leaders are motivated to participate i11 elections Let us adopt now the standard assumption that most actors are risk-averse when
and voting dedsions in order to win, that is to see their preferred candidates elected they make their choices, including, for our problem, choices with regard to electoral
or their values or policies adopted as collective, enforceable decisions, or at least rules and procedures. A logical implication not difficult to make from the assump-
to achieve a situation in which the winning alternatives are as close as possible to tions just presented is that, under conditions of uncertainty or threat, self-interested,
their most preferred ones. Self-interested individuals thus will prefer and, if given risk-averse actors will prefer and tend to c11oose electoral niles and voting procedures
the opportunity, choose or contribute to choosing the electoral rules and voting creating less opporhmities for them to become absolute losers. More specifically, if the
procedures from which they can expect a higher likelihood of winning or achieving existing winners cannot impose their preferred rules because increasing demands
satisfactory outcomes. Other criteria may, doubtless, appear in the public debate and pressures from opposition groups force them to cede or negotiate or, even if
and the corresponding exchanges and negotiations, if any. But external references retaining sufficient institutional power to impose their preferences, they are pessirnis-
such as electoral systems that had been used in sorne past experience of the com- tic about their electoral prospects, they will try to assure sorne partially winning
munity, imitation of neighbours or other communities, institutional import, as positions for themselves through appropriate, that is more inclusive, electoral rules
well as inventing and creative engineering, are likely to be dependent on internal, involving multiple ballots or a system approaching proportional representation.
existing criteria and choices. Certainly, existing electoral systems, even the most restrictive ones, may have
Let us now consider several hypothetical situations faced by those self-interested powerful self-reinforcing mecltanisms. On the one hand - as suggested above - not
political actors just identified. If the distribution of power in a community is such only usual winners but also perrnanent losers may adapt to play within the
that 011e single gro11p is i11stit11tio11ally domi11a11t and expects to be the semre wi1111er existing rules of the game as a consequence of the high expected costs and uncertain
witlt the existing electoral ntles and voting proced11res, these will not likely be changed - benefits of a hypothetical institutional replacement. An electoral system can be
instih1tional stability can be expected. More specifically, if the existing winners are considered to be relatively stable if, given the opportunities it provides for actors
sufficiently powerful to impose or maintain their preferred rules, and at the same to gain or share institutional and political power, none of them would find it
time they are optimistic about their future electoral chances, they will likely choose worthwhile to undertake new initiatives to change the rules of the game.
in favour of rather restrictive rules based on the majority principie and on single, However, for anticipated losers or threatened winners, instihttional c11a11ge can be
categorical ballots giving each voter a single choice. Since this type of electoral a rational strategy if tite expeáed advantages of alternative fonn11las surpass those of
rules tends to produce a single absolute winner, they can provide the dominant group playing by tite existing mies. Change can thus be facilitated by several processes,
with more opportunities to remain the winner and retain control. such as: accumulative learning from the consequences that can be reasonably
There can be, in contrast, other situations more prone to i11stih1tio11al cl1a11ge, expected from different electoral formulas, thanks to both political experience
resulting either from uncertainty or threat. One of these situations may exist and scholarly analysis; irnitation of or contagion from changes in other communities
when no single group of voters and leaders, including in particular the incumbent where alternative formulas have produced desirable effects; and reduction of risks
rulers in a well-organized political community, is sufficiently sure about its support by parallel agreements and guarantees among the relevant actors regarding sorne
and the corresponding electoral prospects in future contests - in other words, when basic statutes or rights.
there is high 1111certai11ty regardi11g the different groups' relative stre11gths. Uncertainty Under different conditions of information, two types of electoral system
can be the result of partial or confusing information regarding the different choice can be distinguished, which can be called, respectively, propositive and
groups' relative support and their subsequent inability to refine their electoral pros- reactive. The former type should better correspond to situations in which actors'
pects. Also, uncertainty may result from the enforcement of rules and procedures preferences over different rules and proced11res are clearly defined. These may lead to
producing unpredictable, rather arbitrary winners and collective decisions, thus straightforward decisions when certain actors have a well-profiled role of political
making every actor, even those with more reliable voter support, insecure about initiative and sufficient decision power to introduce institutional reforms. Cases
the likelihood of winning. fitting this type, and to be analysed in this book, include, for instance: Sweden
Another situation prone to make electoral system change enter the agenda of in 1907 with the sudden, simultaneous introduction of universal suffrage and
relevant political actors may appear when, with reasonable certainty, the incumbent proportional representation by a Conservative government under threat from
winners feel that 11ew gro11ps are emerging, gai11ing i11creasing support amo11g voters, the rise of the Socialists; the replacement of simple plurality rule with a majority-
challenging their dornination and threatening to replace them with an alternative preferential system in Australia in 1918 as a result of pressure from farmers to ,
set of candidates, values or policies as a result of elections with the existing rules and open up space for a third, agrarian party; or the establishment of proportional
procedures. Political parties' failure at coordinating their candidacies, especially their representation in Switzerland in 1918 or in South Africa in 1994, among many
inability to concentrate support under the constrictions of majority rules, may other countries, as a result of a previously existing, solid multi-partism (as
transform winners into losers and vice versa, even if social support of the interests explained, respectively, by Leif Lewin, Marian Sawer, Georg Lutz and Andrew
and opinions represented by the different candidacies has not changed a great deal. Reynolds in the corresponding chapters).
8 fosep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 9

But when none of the actors is sufficiently strong to impose its own altemative, happened, for instance, in Poland in the post-Communist period (as explained by
well-informed and well-defined preferences may also lead to formal negotiations Marek Kaminski in bis chapter).
between opposite political sides producing intermediate compromises. These can Reactive choices, however, can also forge fortunate new inventions able to produce
be, for instance, a mixed majority-proportional system as in Hungary in 1989, or widely satisfactory results which become reinforced through use or which may even
a qualified plurality rule midway between simple plurality and absolute majority be imported from elsewhere. This has happened, for instance, with qualified-
as in Argentina in 1994 (as explained, respectively, by Jobo W. Schiemann and plurality rules for presidential elections, as introduced in Costa Rica in 1936
Gabriel Negretto in the corresponding chapters). and further imitated by other Latín American countries (according to Fabrice
'Propositive' choices can, thus, reflect quite directly pressures from excluded Lehoucq), or with the personalized proportional representation system negotiated
actors, negotiations between the government and the opposition, or anticipation in Germany after the Second World War, which, thanks to its ability to reunite
of risks by incumbent rulers, but they produce, in general, changes in favour both proportionality and closeness between citizens and representatives, was also
of less risky, more inclusive electoral systems, such as those involving multiple adopted, among others, by apparently somewhat myopic political leaders in New
ballots, the combination of different principies of representation and higher Zealand in 1993 (as explained by Marcus Kreuzer and Jack Nagel in their respec-
degrees of proportionality. tive chapters). 'Reactive' choices may thus imply changes in the direction of either
In contrast, the reactive type of electoral system choice may occur in situations more inclusive or more exclusive formulas, mistakes in calculations and a higher
in which actors face more deficient infonnation regarding possible institutional alter- than usual number of unintended consequences. However, since majority rules
natives, more uncertain expectations regarding each actor's future voting support, and exclusionary formulas are more likely to create dissatisfaction among actors
stronger constitutional restrictions on more drastic reforms, or confusing and than the corresponding alternatives, changes in this direction are also more likely
entangled decision processes. Political actors can then 'react' against the negative to be cancelled and revised.
features of the actual electoral system, for instance because it may produce haz- The 'strategic' approach proposed here can thus enlighten not only the fonnation
ardous or inconsistent results (such as giving more seats to the Ieast voted party or of different actors' preferences regarding electoral systems, but also their preference c11a11ges
candidate, as in parliamentary or in presidential college elections by plurality rule), as a consequence of miscalculations under rapidly evolving relations between
or for being too rigid to transform new citizens' demands or political initiatives forces, mistaken expectations, myopic reactions to undesired features of the previous
into institutional representation. Under conditions where there is significant ignor- electoral system or unanticipated electoral results which are observed in retro-
ance, actors typically fall back on 'learning' from their own experience, perhaps spect. If, for instance, initially optimistic rulers maintaining sorne restrictive electoral
embellished as (local) 'historical lessons' (rather than learning from others' instruct- system based on majority rules tum out to be defeated in the corresponding election,
ive experiences or from scholarly work producing accumulative knowledge). they may feel induced to shift their preferences in favour of more inclusive formulas.
'Reactive' choices tend to adopt formulas 'opposite' to those in existence the Conversely, unexpected winners may be tempted to project their present strength
consequences of which have been shown to be undesirable, thus replacing, for into the future and bet for risky electoral rules producing a single absolute winner.
instance, single-member districts with multi-member districts, majority rule with Usually there may be asymmetric information among different groups' leaders
proportional representation or closed lists of candidates with open lists, and vice regarding the likely effects of electoral rules. Certain institutional reformers may even
versa, etc. Political parties with different interests and prospects may coincide in prefer difficult-to-understand electoral systems constraining the reactions or strategic
favouring changes of this type if they share rejection of the existing rules, but behaviour of rival leaders and voters. General ignorance of electoral system
they may not necessarily forecast accurately the likely effects of the new combin- experience and literature or objective difficulties in identifying factors of advan-
ations of institutional elements on which they can converge. tage or disadvantage for certain parties or groups can also lead to myopic or blind
Thus 'reactive' choices may produce patchwork electoral systems with unantici- bets for certain institutions and strategies.
pated new undesirable consequences. Cases include, for instance, the electoral But, in general, it should be expected that, in the long term, more inclusive electoral
system adopted in Spain by the new Republic established in 1931 in reaction to mies will develop stronger endogenous support titan restrictive systems and tl111s will
the previous 'monarchical' system, which induced high polarization and conflict; tend to endure more and create more solid institutional equilibria. In other words, the
the system enforced in Colombia from 1991, which destroyed the internal very leaders, groups and political parties whose political and institutional power has
consistency of its political parties; or the ltalian mixed system introduced in been made possible by the existing electoral system will support it and will resist /
1993, which did not reduce the number of parties but replaced centripetal the introduction of adverse changes. The actors' electoral participation and their
competition around moderate positions with high polarization (as explained play within the existing rules of the game tend to reinforce the rules themselves.
by the author Diego Gambetta in the corresponding chapter). Certainly, political Thus electoral rules which favour multiple winners and, for this effect, are able to
leaders and organizations can also learn from their own experience of tentative, promote actors' strategies complying with them can become relatively more
failed or mistaken decisions and progressively refine their later choices - as clearly stable, self-enforcing sets of rules.
10 /osep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 11

This reasoning can be applied to both foundational institutional choices, such Iarge groups to a greater extent than others, while voting procedures requiring from
as those made at the time of creating a new state or political community, at sorne voters a single vote for a party's closed list of candidates may also increase the
crucial moment in a process of democratization or within a general process of probability of creating absolute losers than others permitting voters to choose
political regime change, as well as to partial or 'incremental' institutional reforms both among parties and among individual candidates.
that can be promoted and implemented within more stable institutional frame- A testable implication of this reasoning is that certain electoral systems producing
works. Generally speaking, we should expect that constitutional choices in favour of a single absolute winner may remain stable for relatively long periods of time
relatively inclusive and less hazardous electoral mies and procedures, and in particular in to the extent that a single dominant group or party can expect to repeat victories
favour of proportional representation, would likely be confinned in fi1rtl1er periods. This in the future, as well as in situations in which two rather balanced groups or
tendency to institutional self-reproduction can be derived from actors' self-interest parties expect to alternate as winners with high and somewhat regular frequency.
since, once electoral systems producing multiple winners exist, it would be highly Another implication is, however, that choosing, establishing or maintaining this
risky for the latter to bet on alternative rules favouring the production of a single type of electoral system can be a mistaken or highly risky decision for ali those
absolute winner and many losers. Thus the same reasoning can be applied to groups not expecting to be secure winners in the future, whether because they are
founding or extremely innovative institutional decisions and to further stages. minority groups in opposition or because they are threatened rulers with uncertain
Restrictive rules can survive under conditions of low uncertainty among the electoral prospects. In the short term, thus, we should expect electoral system stability in
winners regarding their future capability of obtaining relatively favourable electoral many cases in which political parties are few, well organized and solidly entrenched
results. In contrast, under alternative conditions of higher uncertainty about their among voters' preferences. But in the mid or long term, electoral system change is
future electoral strength in successive elections, they may prefer to introduce add- likely to emerge.
itional institutional changes likely to produce wider distribution of spoils. The corresponding results to be found in a long-term historical perspective
The reality of this model does not always require the open revelation of ali should thus be increasing numbers and proportio11s of electoral system choices in favour
actors' preferences or even of explicit exchanges and agreements. Certain electoral of tl10se fonnulas and procedures produdng mu/tiple winners, as well as a relative reduction
reforms can be promoted by threatened incumbent rulers for self-interested motives of existing electoral systems produdng a single absolute winner. Naturally, specific deci-
even if they only anticípate their future troubles and are not forced to negotiate sions will be constrained by the set of available electoral formulas at the time -
with a challenging opposition. But even if institutional choices are made 'from although, as mentioned, new inventions are also fostered by the pressures of
above' by rulers in control of the decision process, the new rules can increase choice. Thus, within the period in which the unanimity principie was considered
the institutional strength of the opposition and favour the emergence of new to be superior - to be examined and illustrated below - different procedures were
challenging groups, which can lead the risk-averse incumbents to accept further gradually invented and adopted to make unanimous decisions feasible. These
innovative formulas producing wider distributions of power. In contrast, attempts included, in particular, the acceptance of qualified majorities, such as those formed
to make the existing electoral system more restrictive are likely to find resistance by wiser, older or more zealous people or by two-thirds or three-quarters of voters,
from those groups whose formation, activity and institutional power respond to as sufficiently compelling to make reluctant or small minorities withdraw their
the incentives provided by the existing rules. objections and acquiesce to a unanimous decision. Eventually, these artifacts were
simplified into the rule that a simple numerical preponderance would in itself
From single-winner to multiple-winner rules suffice to declare a winner or make an enforceable decision.
Roughly speaking, and according to the classification and analysis that will be Likewise, under the further dominion of the majority principie·- also to be exam-
extensively developed below, electoral systems based on the majority principie, ined in the following pages - voting procedures producing absolute victories for a
which tend to produce a single, absolute winner and subsequent absolute losers, single group, such as the bloc ballot in multi-member districts by plurality rule, were
must be considered a more risky choice than those based, say, on proportional progressively replaced with others permitting certain minorities to share power with
representation, a principie forged to create multiple partial winners and much the winners, such as the limited ballot in multi-member districts or single-member
fewer losers than majority rule. Within each of these two principies, different formulas districts. Later on, sorne of these procedures became encouraging platforms for
and voting procedures may also make a difference with regard to risk. For elections designing new, even less risky formulas able to produce proportional representation
under the majority principie, voting procedures giving each voter the opportunity for different groups. Also under the principie of proportional representation, /
to vote for only a single candidacy or multiple candidates in bloc 2 are a more risky certain formulas and procedures - which will be analysed in detail below - were
choice for self-interested political actors than those permitting multiple votes, increasingly preferred and chosen over others for their higher ability to satisfy
whether categorical, cumulative or ordinal, for different candidates or alterna- large majorities of voters and leaders and thus reduce the risks of losing.
tives. Likewise, for elections based on the principie of proportional representation, As mentioned, intermediate, mixed settings for less straightforward institutional
certain formulas may be considered more risky because they tend to favour relatively choices can also exist. If, for instance, the existing winners have to concede to
12 fosep M. Colomer Strategy a1id History of Electoral System Choice 13

disturbing opposition pressures but are still optimistic about their electoral prospects Specific analyses of electoral system choices, such as those that are presented in
in a more open competition, they will try to persuade the opposition leaders to the region and country chapters of this book, need thus to place the question in the
participate in the election with minimal institutional changes, and in any case context of the global relationship of forces among the relevant political actors in par-
with appropriate rules still giving the incumbents significant opportunities to allel settings for multiple institutional choices. The general test presented at the end
win. To the extent that they can be rather pessimistic regarding their own elect- will also select all those opportunities for enlargement of voting rights or general
oral strength, they can propase or negotiate more open and innovative electoral regime change that can be considered favourable for a new electoral system choice.
rules and procedures, but in such a way that they can find themselves among the
winners created by these more complex arrangements. lnstitutional combinations can Further reading
include, for instance, 'mixed' electoral systems in which the likely winner shapes • Bawn, Kathleen (1993) 'The Logic of Instltutional Preferences: German Electoral Law as
a high number of single-member districts by plurality rule while giving the a Social Choice Outcome', American Joumal o( Política/ Science, 37, 4: 965-89.
• Boix, Caries (1999) 'Setting the Rules of the Game: the Choice of Electoral Systems in
opposition chance to compete for a portian of seats by proportional representation.
Advanced Democracles', American Política/ Science Review, 93: 609-24.
Actually, many electoral system choices and reforms are embedded in larger sets • Colomer, Josep M. (ed.) (2001) 'The Strategy of Instltutional Change', fournal o( Theoretical
of i11stit11tio11al choices, especially regarding the enlargement of voting rights to Politics, Speclal Issue, 13, 3.
new population groups, the apportionment of seats with regard to population, • Dummett, Michael A. E. (1997) Principies o( Electora/ Refonn. Oxford and New York: Oxford
the gerrymandering of electoral districts, the establishment of electoral authorities University Press.
• Duverger, Maurice (1950) L'influence des systemes électoraux sur la vie politique, Cahiers de la
and tribunals oriented to reduce electoral fraud and other elements usually
Fondation Nationale des Sciences Politiques, 16. Paris: Armand Colin.
included in electoral laws, such as rules for candidate eligibility, restrictions on • Duverger, Maurice (1951) Les parties polítiques. Paris: Seull (English trans. Política/ Parties:
campaigning, party finance regulations, opposition access to public media and Their Organization and Activity in the Modem State. New York: Wiley, 1954).
procedures for ensuring fair voting counts. In particular, the introduction of • Elster, Jon, Claus Offe and Ulrich K. Preuss (eds) (1998) Institutional Design in Post-Communist
universal suffrage and processes of democratization have been, even since the late Societies: Re-building the Ship at Sea. New York and Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Grumm, John G. (1958) 'Theories of Electoral Systems', Midwest fournal o( Po/itical Science,
nineteenth century and in further waves, paramount occasions for incumbent rulers
2, 4: 357-76.
and challenging opposition groups to decrease the global costs of changing political • Lijphart, Arend and Bernard Grofman (eds) (1984) Choosing an Electoral System. Issues and
institutions and, specifically, <leal with innovative electoral rules and formulas. Altematives. New York: Praeger.
For this reason, the variables mentioned above as favourable to electoral system • Lijphart, Arend and Carlos H. Waisman (eds) Instit11tiona/ Design in New Democracies. Berkeley:
change - the restrictions of the existing system and a high number of effective University of California Press.
parties - do not have a deterministic effect. Under favourable conditions, electoral • Miller, Nlcholas R. (1983) 'Pluralism and Social Choice', American Political Science Review, 21.
• Noiret, Serge (ed.) (1990) Stratégies politiq11es et réformes é/ectorales: Aux origins des modés
system change will be more likely if a general political opportunity for institutional de scnitin en Europe aux XIX et XX siecles. Baden-Baden: Nomos (English trans. Politica/
change exists, as when suffrage rights are broadened, democratization is fostered Strategies and Electoral Refonn. Origins ofVoting Systems in Europe in the 19th and 20th Centuries.
or a constituent assembly is called. Baden-Baden: Nomos).
In these situations, risk-averse actors may also try to enlarge the opportunities • North, Douglass C. (1990) Institutions, Institutional Change, and Economic Perfonnance.
to compete for positions of power by creating multiple institutional levels to be New York and Cambridge: Cambridge Unlverslty Press.
• Przeworski, Adam (1991) Democracy and the Market. New York and Cambridge: Cambridge
submitted to elections, such as the separation of the presidency from the assembly, University Press.
the embodiment of regional govemments or decentralization into local units. • Riker, Wllliam H. (1983) 'Politlcal Theory and the Art of Heresthetics', in Ada Finifter
This strategy may enlarge the scope of electoral system choices, but it can also (ed.), Political Science: The State o( the Discipline. Washington, OC: American Politlcal
reduce innovativeness at the national leve!. For instance, the degree of multi- Sclence Association.
• Riker, William H. (1996) The Strategy o( Rhetoric: Campaigning for the American Constit11tion.
partism in the assembly can be constrained by the introduction of simultaneous
New Haven, CT: Yate University Press.
direct presidential elections, which are always submitted to sorne majority rule • Sartori, Giovanni (1994) Comparative Constitutional Engineering: An Inq11iry into Structiires,
and thus foster polarization - as happened, for instance, in France after the consti- Incentives, and 011tcomes. New York and London: New York University Press/Macmillan.
tutional changes introduced during the period 1958-62. As another example, • Shepsle, Kenneth A. (1986) 'Instltutlonal Equilibrlum and Equilibrium Institutions', in
federalism or territorial representation in large countries with diverse populations Herbert Weisberg (ed.), Political Science: The Science of Politics. New York: Agathon.
may work as a substitute for proportional representation by giving different ethnic,
regionally-based groups opportunities to enter institutions thus preventing a The invention of electoral rules and procedures
major electoral reform - which may explain the persistence of plurality rule elections
Human history has witnessed continuous inventions and reinventions of electoral
in multi-party systems such as in Canada and India since independence or in
formulas. A somewhat evolutionary view tradng the historical panorama of the
Lebanon and Papua New Guinea in more recent times.
14 f osep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 15

invention and choice of electoral rule and procedure in disparate parts of the world The invention of tite 11nanimity principie
in the course of several centuries will be presented below. The presentation will be More formally, regulation of decisions by unanimity may be found in the Justinian
ordered around four basic principies: wumimity, lottery, maiority and proportionality - code of Rome, which established the principie that 'What concerns similarly all
although in reality, of course, there also exist many intermediate formulas or ought to be approved by all'. Also the Christian Church adopted in the fifth century
'mixed' systems combining two or more of these principies. Each of them can be the principie that 'He who govems all should be elected by all'. These principies,
associated with different virtues and vices, has been prevalent in different periods however, entailed sorne co11~1sion between participation and dedsion, since general
and has proved more adapted to sorne specific type of collective decision. suffrage was associated with unanimous consent. As they would correspond, in
But, in fact, the adoption of each of the principies, as well as the invention of modern times, to families, business companies or other corporations of prívate
the huge variety of rules and procedures with which they can be applied in the Iaw, it was assumed that the members of those old communities had a clear common
practice of voting and electing, have been broadly encouraged by actual oppor- interest - to the fulfilment of which each of them contributed not on an egalitarian
tunities and challenges of choice. For example, the disadvantages of unanimity rule basis but according to their resources - and that a single decision in favour of the
in making effective decisions or electing a ruler - say, a pope in the high Middle common good should thus be easily identified. Of course, organized factions or
Ages, for instance - moved those embroiled in such kinds of decisions and parties were not even conceivable. Individuals' disagreements would lead to their
elections, like priests, monks and theologians, to explore, study, imitate and experi- exit, since they would reveal that the presumed common interest no longer
ment with different variants of majority rule. Likewise, the drawbacks of majority existed. Lack of unanimity could thus produce secession, split, schism or divorce
rule in new mass elections during the nineteenth century - say, in parliamentary and the formation of new units with sufficiently small size and homogeneous
elections in countries with highly divisive social or ethnic issues - led politicians, composition to be able to reach unanimous agreements.
mathematicians, lawyers and other scholars to rediscover or invent new procedures In practice, however, severa! procedures were implemented to make decisions
of voting, as well as formulas able to allocate seats and offices to different groups which could be accepted by ali participants even in communities that were not
and parties instead of admitting only one absolute single winner. highly homogeneous. These include the following: explicit acq11iescence of the dis-
As will be mentioned in the following historical presentation, many voting sidents to the collective decision; prelimi11ary voting followed by formal, public
procedures and formulas have been reinvented, even after several centuries of expression of the decision by ali the community members; acceptance of deci-
previous discoveries, under the pressure of finding new, better solutions to practica! sions made by a q11alified part of the voters to whom the others submitted (in
electoral problems. Intellectual creativity, which is usually fostered by necessity accordance to members' unequal contributions or different rank); and others.
and convenience, has been, on the matter of electoral systems, typically the work This eventually led to the replacement of the requirement for unanimity with
of actual or prospective losers with strong motivation to win. qualified- or simple-majority rules.
Regarding the need for acquiescence, minorities may consider the expression of
Unanimity their own position too costly if it requires, for instance, resisting the roar of acclam-
Approval of proposals and election of delegates by unanimity are almost instinctive ation, standing up in the middle of the assembly or leaving the room. Actually, many
procedures in relatively simple, rather homogeneous and not highly populated moral, legal or coercive devices can be implemented to force the minority to obey
gatherings and assemblies. Families, groups of friends, urban gangs, neighbour- and make the collective decision binding. In certain ancient Middle East assem-
hood meetings, corporation partners and club members tend to make collective blies, those having revealed their dissident opinion during deliberation were
decisions under conditions of general agreement. A variety of historical evidence required to kneel down in front of the assembly as a form of assent. In the medieval
also suggests that at a more general level Ancient Mesopotamian, Assyrian and German communes, after the masters of households in the commune voted, usu-
Sumerian assemblies, Athenian and Spartan agoras, early Christian communities, ally an oath of membership and obedience was taken. In Nordic law, the dissident
Germanic tribes and communes, pre-Columbus Amerindian peoples, English and minority was threatened with punishment by meaos of a fine, as in Denmark, or
American small town-hall assemblies and other comparable units usually made exile, as in Iceland. In Russian law, even physical constraints were implemented.
collective enforceable decisions and reached agreements by virtual unanimity. Also, On a more sombre note, monarchist philosopher Gottfried W. F. Leibniz, as
consuls were elected by traders, bishops by priests and believers, magistrates by far back as the early eighteenth century, accepted citizens' political participation
citizens, etc., on the basis of large consensus. Decision procedures in these disparate in public affairs only as a way to make 'the people themselves agree to what, is
communities included silent acquiescence, clashing spears against shields, shouts good for them', while preventing the arbitrariness that was found in assemblies
of commendation or acclamation, murmurs in favour or cries against the proposer, 'when cabals and animosities prevail over reason'. He praised practices, such as
rising to one's feet and other 'viva voce' expressions rather than formal voting those in the United Provinces (Dutch) parliament, by which unanimity was
sessions. reached through the force of persuasion and 'friendly coming to terms' (or
16 fosep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 1 7

'composition amiable'), but he also supported other 'practica! and quite effica- to the preferences of those voters higher up the hierarchy with stronger zeal and
cious' means to deal with 'stubbom and malevolent people' resisting the common greater seniority (including age and length of time in official capacity).
will (Leibniz, 1701). As in modem prívate communities, these different ways of Most canonists gave the interpretation that elections were valid if the 'greater
forcing explicit acquiescence of the dissidents were means to assure that they part' included the 'sounder part'. But the two parts often did not coincide, an
would obey the collective dedsion, respect the elected or contribute with their occurrence which gradually moved decision-makers to lean to the side of qualifying
corresponding effort or duties, in spite of their previous disagreements. voting results not by the dignity of voters but by numbers. lt was Pope Alexander
m who formally replaced the unanirnity principie with the rule of two-thirds
Church, empire and assemblies qualifled majorlty for electing popes and bishops after 1179 (the election of
Unanimous decisions were particularly hard to reach within the Christian bishops by the clergy was not officially abandoned until 1917). Monastic orders,
Church, especially because the principie of unanirnity was invested with a mystical including Benedicts, adopted the same rule. Alexander III probably took inspir-
and theological notion of the Church's unity. Whereas voters' unanirnity was ation from previous experiences with less-than-unanirnity rules for elections of
believed to be the way to discover God's will, any failure to obtain such a total abbots, as well as from Venice's sophisticated voting procedure to elect the city's
consensus was seen as the instigation of the devil. Dissent and disagreement were Duke (Baldwin, 1968).
dominated by passionate condemnations under the assumption that 'vox populi, Por papal elections, the requirement of two-thirds majority was initially aimed
vox Dei' (taken from the Bible: 'the voice of the people ... is the voice of the at obtaining the support of at least two of the three orders of cardinals but it soon
Lord', Isaiah 66: 6; also 1 Samuel 8: 7). became just a numerical criterion. As formulated by Pope Gregory X, 'Not zeal to
In the first centuries of the Christian era it had been customary for bishops and zeal, nor merit to merit, but solely numbers to numbers are to be compared'
other clerical bosses to appoint their successors, although a few choices by unanimous (VI Decretalium, book 1, tit. VI, chap. 9, in Alberigo, 1991). Note that once a candidate
agreement under the direct inspiration of the Holy Spirit are recorded during the is elected by two-thirds qualified majority, the losers would have to persuade
second and third centuries - including the descent of a dove to land upon the a majority of the winner's original supporters to change their mind. Paced with
head of the selected candidate. Since the fifth century bishops, abbots and abbesses, this requirement, the losing coalition could hardly have been expected to continue
and priests began to be elected, respectively, by the bishops and the clergy of the the fight. Divine inspiration of the corresponding choices was still clairned, as in
province, the monks and nuns of the monastery and the convent and the faithful Pope Pius II's words about bis own election in the mid-fifteenth century: 'What is
of the corresponding diocese, parish or other jurisdiction - 'the Christian people' - done by two thirds of the sacred college [of cardinals], that is surely of the Holy
typically by acclamation. Even the pope - actually the bishop of Rome - had to be Ghost, which may not be resisted' (Gragg and Gabel, 1959). But further canonists
elected by unanirnity of the 16 bishops of the province for a long time (Eusebius expeditiously identified the 'sounder part' with just 'the greater part' (Colomer and
Pamphilus 324, book 3, ch. 11; book 6, chs 29, 39). McLean, 1998).
The requirement of unanirnity, however, produced frequent violent conflicts, Similar problems emerged from the eleventh century on the occasion of elections
schisms and sirnultaneous elections of two (or more) different popes and anti-popes, of Prankish, Carolingian as well as Bohemian, Hungarian and Polish kings. These
even by the rnid-third century. During schismatic periods, sorne monasteries had princes were elected by their peers, usually gathered at colleges of electors formed
two abbots and two priors, sorne parishes two priests, and so on. An early attempt by dukes, marquises and counts, archbishops, bishops and abbots, at which
to replace such an ineffective electoral rule was introduced by Pope Simaccus in unanirnity was expected. Higher elections of the Holy Roman-German emperor
500 who decreed that an elected pope should have the unanimous support of the followed the same model. But they ended with a split among the electors on three
clergy or, in case of division, the support of the majority, but this provision was occasions between the end of the twelfth century and early fourteenth century,
hardly used. In fact, most of the popes from the fourth to the twelth centuries thus producing pairs of kings and anti-kings that undertook violent expeditions
were appointed or confirmed by the Emperor, who had to act as arbiter in many to affirm their respective rights. On the three occasions, the corresponding popes
electoral disputes. were called as arbiters - mirroring the role of the Emperor acting as arbiter in
More successful was the qualification of decisions though the dignity of the severa! divisive papal elections, as mentioned above. Two of the popes leaned to
voters who had supported them. Prom the eleventh century the college of cardin- the side of the candidate they considered more qualified for the job having been
als of the Roman church was given the decisive role in papal elections. In order to supported by the 'sounder', although minority, part of electors. Thus here quality
attain a unanimous decision, priority was given to cardinal-bishops who were prevailed over quantity, a principie that would be defended theoretically by
entrusted with gaining the assent of the cardinal-priests and the cardinal-deacons, Marsilius .of Padua who identified the 'valentior pars' of the princes' college as
as well as the approval of the other members of the clergy and the people. The representative of all (Defensor pacis, 1324).
principie of the sounder and greater part ('sanior et maior pars') - vaguely inspired The defeated candidate for emperor in 1257, Alphonse X the Wise, king of Castile
by Saint Benedict's rule for electing abbots - more solemnly gave qualified weight and Leon, who had received a majority of votes, remarked that the emperor
18 fosep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 19

would have authority only 'after being chosen by all those with choice power or represented. Analogous procedures to those previously mentioned for other insti-
by the major part' (Alfonso X, Siete partidas, Especulo II, 1, 2). But the winner by tutions developed. For instance, public and ordered voting rounds, starting with
both majority and soundness in 1314, Ludwig of Bavaria, insisted on the unanimity the higher or 'sounder' part, could be organized in the expectation of attracting
thesis that the elected by majority should be considered elected 'in concord, not voters from the other branches to jump on their bandwagon and forget their
in discord'. differences. The Parliament of Catalonia formally asked the king to replace the
According to successive regulations, the grand electors of the German emperor unanimity rule with that of the 'major e de la pus sana part'. Several qualified
had to commit themselves to accept a majority decision as a unanimous one. But majority rules were also introduced, such as those requiring the agreement of two
it was the Golden Bull introduced by Charles X of Luxembourg in 1356 which of the estates, for instance the nobles and the citizens, to make decisions valid
minutely regulated the election procedure, including the seclusion of the college even in the tace of disagreement or abstention by the clerical representatives. In
electors in a locked chamber along the lines of previous experiences by the general, however, majority decisions were considered a means of arriving at the
Dominican monastic order, several ltalian cities and the papal conclave. The necessary unanimity by imposing the duty of assent upon the minority (Coroleu
Golden Bull explicitly required the grand electors' unanimity, the election being and Pella, 1876; Konopcynski, 1930; González Antón, 1978; Ferro, 1987).
valid only if the minority conformed with the majority. The formal, public and Even the English parliament maintained the fiction of unanimity until very late
sophisticated ceremony of investiture of the elected was actually the moment at on. Regarding the election of representatives, by the mid-sixteenth century a judge
which unanimity was constructed when even those having voted for losing candi- sentenced that 'the election might be made by voices or by hands, or such other
dates participated in a newly created common will (Ruffini, 1925). way, wherein it is easy to tell who has the majority, and yet very difficult to know
Comparable evolutions can be identified in late medieval towns, assemblies and the certain number of them', so discarding the count of numbers and inducing
parliaments called by kings and emperors, especially in Central and Southern the acceptance of the elected by a potential but not acknowledged opposition .
Europe. From the eleventh century on, many civil assembly regulations established Within the House of Commons, even as late as the early nineteenth century, it
that decisions should be made by 'consensus and acclamation', 'approval and was commonly assumed that majority voting meant unanimity, most decisions
consent', 'unanimity', with 'no discrepancy', with 'no contradiction', by 'free veto', being made by acclamation, that is by loudly shouting 'yea' or 'nay' (as was still
and so on. In assemblies of municipalities, as well as in their leagues, such as the observed, for instance, by Jeremy Bentham in his parliamentary tracts: Bentham,
German Hanse and the Swiss confederation, since a valid decision could not usually 1834). Only the formation of modem, well-organized political parties led to the
be reached if the minority persisted in its opposition, the subsequent rhetorical adoption of more formal voting procedures requiring numerical precision.
device was that 'the minority must follow the majority'. The meaning was that
the minority should withdraw its objection and agree with the majority in order In modern times, the aim of achieving unanimous agreement has been trans-
that a unanimous common will could be formed. ferred to the more ethereal world of intematio11al relatio11s, where each of the
As mentioned, North ltalian towns also made collective decisions by very broad sovereign parties has veto rights. Sorne of the other defining features of the earlier
agreements. In Florence, Genoa, Pavía, Pisa, Siena and Venice, the general assembly settings analysed above can also be found in international organizations: corporate
of all citizens approved the appointment of the Consulate, usually by acclamation. (now state) suffrage; the search for consensus; burdens distributed in proportion
But the requirement of unanimous consent did not always produce quick, agreeable to contributions or resources; offices held by turns or lots; decision-making limited to
decisions in increasingly complex, urban settings, in contrast to easier general those issues in which a general common interest can be presumed (such as peace,
coincidences in simpler, more homogeneous, rural environments. Several mechanisrns monetary stability, environmental protection). Increasing complexity and the salience
were thus invented to produce acquiescence where a single unanimous preference of more divisive issues, however, have also led to the adoption of les-than-unanimity
did not exist. Certain ltalian communes had already adopted less-than-unanimity decision rules.
rules, such as those requiring two-thirds, four-sevenths or other qualified majorities,
together with indirect elections in several stages and other devices. But 'a major
source of political frustration' - as noted by a reputed historian - resulted from 'a belief Further reading
that unity was essential, and of an etiquette that frowned upon the exposure of • Benson, Robert L. (1968) The Bishop-Elect. A St11dy in Medieval Ecc/esiastical Office. Prinéeton,
irreconcilable viewpoints' (Brucker, 1963). NJ: Princeton Unlverslty Press.
The Aragonese and the Catalan parliaments or 'Cortes' since the thirteenth century, • Buchanan, James and Gordon Tullock (1962) 111e Calall11s of Consent. Logical Foundations
as well the Polish Diet since the sixteenth century, were outstanding examples of of Constitutional Democracy. Ann Arbor: Unlversity of Michigan Press.
• Colomer, Josep M. (2000) 'On the Geometry of Unanimity Rule', foumal of Theoretical Politics,
enduring representative assemblies working by the unanimity rule. However,
11, 4: 543-53.
unanimous decisions also turned out to be difficult to make, especially when • Colomer, Josep M. and lain McLean (1998) 'Electing Popes: Approval Balloting and Quallfted-
differentiation of social interest increased among the different corporative bodies Majority Rule', foumal of I11terdiscipli11ary Hlstory, 29, 1: 1-22.
20 fosep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 21

• Es?'ein, Adhémer (1907) 'L'unanimité et la majorité dans les élections canoniques', charge' and administrative acts be reduced as muchas possible (Rousseau, 1762,
Melanges Fitting, vol. I. Montpellier: Imprimerie Générale du Midi, pp. 357-82. book 4, ch. 3).
• Gaudemet, Jean (1960) 'Unanimité et majorité (Observations sur quelques études The choosing of public officers by lots may have, thus, two types of advantage.
récentes)', in Études historiq11es ala mémoire de Noel Didier. París: Montchrestien, pp. 141-62.
First, by holding frequent choosings and establishing short terms of office, it
• Konopczynski, Ladislas (1930) Le libetum veto. Étude sur le dévelopement du prindpe ma¡oritaire.
Paris: Honoré Champion/Warsaw: Gebethner et Wolff. can produce a high rotatio11 of members in administrative or arbitral posts, thus
• Marongiu, Antonio (1968) Medieval Parliaments. A Comparative St11dy. London: Eyre & preventing the formation and self-reproduction of a permanent, closed, rather
Spottiswoode. impermeable elite - whether in the form of an economic oligarchy or just a class
• Moulin, Léo (1953) 'Les origines réligieuses des techniques électorales et déliberatives of professional politicians. By replacing public officials very frequently and opening
modernes', Revue Intemationale d'Histoire Politique et Constit11tionelle, III: 106-48.
public jobs to very wide layers of society, no one can be blamed for making or
• Moulin, Léo (1959) 'Sanior et maior pars. Studio sull'evoluzione delle tecniche elettorali
negli ordini religiosi dal VI al XIII secolo', Studi Politici, VI, II, 1-2: 48-75. implementing unpleasant decisions - but no one can be praised either. Only the
• Petrani, Alexis (1957) 'Genese de la majorité qualifiée', Apollinaris, XXX, 1-2: 430-6. members' assembly remains ultimately responsible for the consequences of
• Rae, Douglas W. (1975) 'The Limits of Consensual Decision', American Political Science collective decisions.
Review, 69: 1270-94. Certainly, the principie of filling public offices by lots is contrary to the ambition
• Ruffini Avondo, Edoardo (1925) 'U principio maggioritario nelle elezioni dei Re e Imperatori to be ruled, in an ideal world, by 'the best'. But in comparison to other actual processes
romano-germanici', Atti della Reale Accademia del/e Scienze di Torino 1924-1925, vol. 60,
pp. 392-414,441-92, 557-74. of choosing rulers, the average quality of those chosen by lots may not be so
• Ruffini Avondo, Edoardo (1925) 'U principio maggioritario nella storia del Diritto Canonico', different in fact from that obtained with less unpredictable procedures. Officers
Arc/1ivio Gi11ridico Filippo Serafini, IX. chosen by lotteries, especially when there is a large number of candidates, are, as
• Ruffini, Eoardo ((1927] 1976) Il principio maggioritario. Profilo storico. Milan: Adelphi. a whole, 'typical' representatives of the citizens or potential candidates, in terms of
their characteristics, capabilities and values. Mediocrity, thus, rather than excellence
Lottery should be expected to prevail. But this is precisely the outcome which is aimed at with
The choosing of public officers by drawing lots is an old tradition that can be such a procedure. Only those offices requiring particularly high levels of professional
found in ancient and medieval local democracies, modern private settings and or technical skill or experience have always been excluded from selection by lots.
sorne international organizations - as has just been mentioned in the previous From this perspective, lots can be considered a clearly better and less risky
section. In ali these cases, lotteries are a device to preserve the central role of the procedure for selecting public officials than hereditary. succession, cooptation
assembly of members to make decisions on the most relevant issues, typically by by incumbent office-holders or the buying (or auctioning) of offices, by which
acclamation, assent or other forms of unanimity, on the assumption that the the probability that outliers, eccentric or incapable candidates may be appointed
identification of a common interest should not be too difficult a task. is dramatically high. Also, likely winners by lottery may not be so different - in
The most relevant historical experience of selection of delegates, representatives personal characteristics and professional skills - from those selected by certain
or public officers by lots was developed in Athens during the democratic period modem political processes involving convoluted interna) interactions of party polit-
from the mid-fifth century to the end of the fourth century BC. On the basis of ical organizations, hazardous electoral campaigns and disparate voting procedures.
this experience, the philosopher Aristotle built his concept of democracy, which This similarity, however, is usually veiled in the public opinion only by the retro-
included the possibility of 'ruling and being ruled by turns'. Aristotle introduced spective attribution of talent or merit to those elected - if for no other reason than
a sharp distinction by which 'the appointment of magistrates by lot is thought the fact that they have been able to get elected.
to be democratic, and the election of them oligarchic' (Aristotle, 325 BC, book 4, The second type of advantage to choosing by lots and the subsequent rotation
passim). By 'democratic' he meant self-governed by the people, while 'aristo- in public offices is that they produce wide dispersal o( political and administrative
cratic' pointed to the idea of government by the best - which could also lead to knowledge of public affairs among the citizens. The experience of learning and
a perverse form of oligarchy. This classical criterion was retaken, many centuries becoming familiar with the problems of satisfying collective common interests
later, by the French provincial Charles-Louis de Secondat, baron de la Brede et de can be a good platform for further occasions of participation in voting and
Montesquieu, for whom 'the suffrage by lot is natural to democracy'. According elections, such as the assembly's decision-making and the choice of sorne other
to Montesquieu, the advantages of making choices by lot are, first, that it 'is public officials. Thus a lottery can be an appropriate procedure to select public
unfair to nobody, and [second, that] it leaves each citizen a reasonable hope of officers where there is a clear identification of the common interest of the mem-
serving his country' (Montesquieu, 1748, book 2, ch. 2). Likewise, Genevan phil- bers of the community, there are relatively low technical requirements to fill the
osopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau, also in the eighteenth century, highlighted the public jobs submitted to the Jottery and there are strong instruments by which
role of lots in an ideal democracy, in which - according to his Athens-inspired, the community can make other, very important decisions, including control of
assembly-based model - public offices should be considered 'a burdensome those appointed by lots.
22 /osep M. Colomer Stmtegy and History of Electoral System Choice 23

Athens, communes and intemational organizatiollS the number of white beans equal to the number of places to be filled. In a further
Public choice by lots has never been an exclusive procedure, as mentioned. The development, Athenians also used allotrnent machines, usually a tube in which balls
Athenian democracy was based on the central role of the assembly or 'agora', could be inserted at random and released at the other end (Headlam-Morley, 1981).
open to all citizens, both to elect certain officers and to vote on war and peace The choice by lots implies the acceptance of average mediocrity as a collective
and other important decisions. The frequency of assembly meetings, which were criterion for choosing public officers, as well as sorne uncertainty regarding
called by the blast of a trumpet and the lighting of a bonfire and were attended by specific outcomes and decisions. On sorne occasions, it was, however, covered by
a few thousand citizens, increased over the years from about ten to about forty the belief that it would involve sorne divine sanction, in other words that choosing
a year. The scope of public decisions was also broadened until the assembly by lots was the way to make right decisions as directed by the gods. The Greek
became the majar legislator and decision-maker. Typically, most issues required philosopher Plato, most notably, praised lots as a way to let the gods make their
only yes-no decisions, thus permitting the formation of a clear majority. Thus in choices, especially for officers of the temples (Plato, 360 BC, book 6). The Old
different periods voting was possible mostly by acclamation but also by show of Testament also included a number of instances in which decisions by lot - as
hands or pebbles (in Greek 'psephos' - from which is coined the typically British did other events that seemed accidental-were meant to reveal God's will (Proverbs
term 'psephologist' for students of and experts in elections). In contrast, elections 16: 33). The Lord also instructed Moses to divide the land by lot among the different
to fill sorne highly specialized offices for which severa} candidates could run tribes (Numbers 16: 52-56, 33: 54). The first apostles of Jesus also drew lots to
required more sophisticated procedures, including the casting of ballots in the select the substitute for the traitor Judas (Acts of the Apostles I: 23-26). Apparently,
form of pieces of tile or potsherd or by written waxed tablets in vessels inside they were imitated by sorne early non-orthodox Gnostic Christians, who drew
a wooden enclosure. lots at each of their meetings to elect priests, bishops and other officers - only for
In order to preserve the central role of the assembly to make decisions by them to be replaced at the following meeting. This device could also be aimed at
unanimity, the Council in charge of setting the agenda for the assembly, formed preventing a sacerdotal oligarchy from developing (Goodwin, 1992: 44). But the
of 500 individuals, was appointed, first, by an electoral college elected by the Christian Church condemned such a practice as blasphemy and solemnly forbade
assembly, later by annual elections, and then by turns in order determined by lot. the choice of priests, bishops or other prelates by lot (more formally after the thir-
The Council was formed of 50 members selected by lot by each of the ten tribes teenth century).
which had evolved from military into basic administrative units. The permanent Lots have also been used for choosing public officers in other settings based on
committee of the Council and its president were also selected by lots. No citizen an open assembly making decisions by virtual unanimity, typically by acclamation,
could hold any office more than once, so it is estimated that about half of the with similar precautions to those previously referred to in arder to prevent the
citizens aged 30 or more became members of the Coundl at sorne point in their lives. formation of oligarchies and voter manipulation, and always in combination with
About 600 of the other 700 public officers were also selected by lots from among other election procedures. The Roman Republic, for instance, had used lots to
candidates previously presented. These included: the ten members of the archonship, establish the arder of voting by tribes or other political units, but most decisions
approximately equivalent to the post of the modero attorney-general, as well as were made by voting procedures involving IIiajority rules - as will be explained in
the body in charge of organizing religious ceremonies who were appointed by lots the next section.
from a pool of candidates previously selected by each tribe, also by lots; the tribunal A number of Italian communes - which were identified in the previous section
members, chosen by lots from a pool of all adult citizens, who were in charge of as examples of where decisions were made by assembly acclamation - also used
passing judgement on the legality of the conduct of public officials; and a number lots after the thirteenth century for choosing magistrates and allocating officers in
of administrative jobs, encompassing treasurers, those in charge of settling public charge of implementing assembly decisions. This was, in particular, the case in
contracts and collecting public revenues, and those supervising streets or inspecting Venice for the indirect election of the Duke (Doge) from the thirteenth century -
markets. Only a few offices requiring special technical skills and qualifications, following direct election by the people's assembly from the end of the seventh
including high military commands and financia! administrators, were excluded century. The popularly elected Great Council adopted an increasingly complicated
from lotteries and submitted to direct election. In contrast to those appointed by procedure to choose the Duke with up to nine stages of approval ballots and lots,
lots, the elected for these latter posts were, of course, not 'typical' representatives which was conceived with the aim of making manipulative manoeuvres impossible
of the citizenry, but they were also subjected to stronger scrutiny and accountability (Lines, 1986). Likewise, the Florentine republics during the fourteenth and fifteenth
at successive elections. centuries, and again in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, elected its
The procedure of selecting candidates for public offices by lots was based, initially, main governmental body, the Lordship (Signoria), chaired by the standard-bearer
on candidates drawing white and black beans from a container with an open top, of justice (Gonfaloniere), by means of a complex system of approval ballots and
the total number of beans being equal to the number of candidates and very frequent lots. Again, the aim was to prevent fraud, manipulation and the
commune's domination by a few powerful families.
24 /osep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 25

Also, in Barcelona, the popularly elected Council of 100 chose the Consuls of Assembly and the Federal Council, usually encompassing more than 80 per cent
Sea, that is the judicial body for commercial and maritime affairs, by an indirect of votes. While they make very broad consensual decisions under the threat of
procedure involving lots. Certainly in the fifteenth century, and probably earlier, revocation by referenda in the cantons, the presidency of the Federal Council -
the procedure required a child less than seven years old to distribute beans from a comparable to the republic's president - is filled in rotation among the Council
jar full of water and covered by cloth among the candidate-members from each of members by tums. Likewise, in the European Union, the European Council, which is
the estates - the 'honest', the merchants, the artists and the artisans - the number formed by the chief executives of the member states, and the Council of Ministers
of white beans being equal to the number of electors to be selected from each (officially called Council of the European Union), formed by representatives of
estate. Afterwards, the electors so chosen, together with the city councillors, the member states at ministerial level, have very important agenda- and decision-
elected the consuls by casting ballots in an urn (Carrere, 1967). making powers. While they usually make decisions by unanimity or highly quali-
Finally, lots were still being used, in combination with several stages of indirect fied majorities, the Presidency is held by six-month tums among the member
elections, in Spain and the Spanish colonies in the Americas in the early nineteenth states. Finally, the United Nations Organization (UNO) also distributes sorne high
century. First, elections called by the central junta formed to organize the resistance offices by informal rotation and tums among its member states. The Presidency of
against Napoleon's troops were held in 1809, with municipalities electing candi- the General Assembly is filled by 'symmetric rotation' among countries of the five
dates for deputies which were finally selected by lot. New elections in 1810 to form regional groups (Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean, Western Europe and
an extraordinary assembly ('Cortes'), which gathered in Cádiz and produced a new other developed countries, and Eastern Europe). The Security Council, which
constitution, were also held by a combination of indirect elections in three stages works by near-unanimity decisions of the five permanent members (France,
and a final selection of one deputy in each district by lots among the two or three Russia, China, the United Kingdom and the United States), is also formed by a
candidates previously chosen (Femández, 1992; Rueda, 1998). After the approval number of temporary members rotating in post for periods of two years. They are
of the so-called constitution of Cádiz in 1812, this type of procedure was not used formally elected by the Assembly, but they must also be distributed fairly from
again in Spain, but it was followed in sorne further elections in Spanish America. among the different world regions. (In the initial period from 1946, there were
Specifically, in Buenos Aires, indirect elections of colleges (usually called 'juntas') two for Latin America, and one for Western Europe, the British Commonwealth,
led to the final selection of members of the provincial assembly by lots, according Eastem Europe and the Middle East. After general decolonization and the subse-
to regulations enforced in 1811, while a mixed procedure of voting, lots and final quent enlargement of the UNO membership, ten temporary members have been
popular vote by plurality was used for the election of governors in 1815. In Chile distributed, since 1963, in the proportions of two for Latin America and the Carib-
a combination of lots and plurality voting was still being used in 1822 (Chiaramonte, bean, two for Western Europe, one for Eastem Europe and five for Africa and
1995). In Mexico, local elections in 1812 still involved sorne stage of selection of Asia.) Similar proportions are used for filling, by informal turns, the posts in the
candidates by lots (Emmerich, 1985). Lots remained the usual practice in indigenous Economic and Social Council and other committees (Marín-Bosch, 1994).
communities that were not politically integrated into the new independent state's
political institutions. Ironically, they became part of the supposedly traditional Further reading
'usages and customs' of the indigenous people to be preserved in the twenty- • Burnheim, John (1981) 'Statistical Representation', Radical Philosophy, 27, Spring.
first century - but were actually the most visible legacy of Spanish colonial rule • Elster, Jon (1989) Solomonic /11dgme11ts. New York and Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Gataker, Thomas (1619) On the Natrire and Use of Lots: A Treatise Historical a11d Theologjcal.
(Favre, 1986).
London: E. Griffin.
In modern times, lots are only used as a method to distribute goods and respon- • Gibbard, AUan (1977) 'Manipulation of Schemes that Mix Voting with Chance', Econometrica,
sibilities in sorne private corporations, as well as for allocating temporary jobs, 45: 665-81.
vacation periods or household tasks in other private settings. For public affairs, they • Goodwin, Barbara (1992) f11stice by Lottery. London: Harvester-Wheatsheaf.
• Headlam-Morley, james W. (1981) Election by Lot at Athens. Cambridge and New York:
are used in certain countries for such tasks as selecting jurors for jury trials, for
Cambridge Unlversity Press.
appointing election administrators, for breaking election ties or for selecting can- • Manln, Bemard (1995) Prindpes d11 go11vemement représentatif. Paris: Calmann-Lévy (Engllsh
didates for military service. trans. The Principies of Representative Govemment. Cambridge and New Yo rk: Cambridge
At the more overarching political level, certain institutional settings formed by Universlty Press, 1997).
units retaining their sovereign rights, that is co11federal or i11tematio11al organizations • Mulgan, Richard G. (1984) 'Lots as a Democratic Device of Selection', Review of Politics, 46,
making decisions by near-unanimity rules, use different procedures of rotation by 4: 539-60.
t11ms of high public offices which produce the same effect as lotteries without Majority
replacement. A paramount example is the Helvetic Confederation of Switzerland,
Ma jority rule had already been used, in combination with oth er rules and pro-
which is still mainly an instrument for preserving popular self-government of the
cedures, for collective decisions and the election of public officers in sorne
cantons. Nowadays, it is govemed by surplus multi-party coalitions in the Federal
 26 /osep M. Colomer Strategy cmd History of Electoral System Choice 27

ancient and medieval institutions. But the majority principle was rediscovered As can be seen, the most relevant features of these procedures were much later
and more explicitly invested with the power to create authority in more replicated in modero formulas for indirect elections, as in the US electoral college
modern times. to elect the president, as well as in the further processes of primary elections and
During the Roman Republic, that is for about five centuries immediately before party conventions to select presidential candidates, always organized under majority
our era, many collective decisions were made and most public officials were chosen rules. Common developments under this kind of framework included victory by
by procedures involving majority rules. As in other historical processes previously majority at later stages with a minority of popular votes, random selection of
discussed, majority decisions emerged from the truncated traditions of unani- decisive voters and the building of instant unanimity around the proclaimed win-
mous decisions, typically made by acclamation. Specifically, the 'centurial com- ner. But direct connections between ancient and modern practices of voting by
itia', organized into 193 units of 100 men each, were transformed from military majority rules are difficult to establish, since the fall of the Roman Republic and
units in the army into units of vote in a political assembly open to all citizens. Empire apparently broke the continuity with and even any memory of those earlier
The traditional show of allegiance made by the soldiers to their commanders institutional procedures.
eventually became formal voting sessions to declare war, legislate, elect consuls
and censors (in the executive), praetors (in charge of provincial governments) and T11e reinvention of majority ni le
temporary dictators, as well as to dictate capital judicial sentences. Later on, the In medieval times, decisions and elections by qualified and simple majorities were
'tribal comitia' by which the people elected its tribunes by acclamation also again gradually accepted in Germanic law and the Church's canon law as an expedient
evolved into 'councils of the plebs', organized in up to 35 large tribes, from which procedure when unanimous decisions tumed out to be impossible, as discussed in
patricians were excluded. They held frequent voting sessions to elect 'ediles', the first section of this chapter. Initially, the minority was summoned to acquiesce
'quaestors', lower offices and special commissioners promoting specific demands, to the majority will as an expression of unanimous support, as illustrated above in
to approve general legislation and 'plebiscites', and to impose sentences on crimes severa! ways. But the formation of reluctant, repeated, stable, defeated minorities
against the state and on ali those punishable by fines. eventually tended to make majority decisions acceptable and presumably enforce-
These early experiences of voting and elections with majority procedures should able even if the minority did not explicitly assent to share a unanimous common
be analysed as forms of indirect elections, having developed the same kind of biases will. Thus majority rule typically emerged asan acceptable decision rule from the
and arbitrary outcomes as when elections in two or more stages were developed experience of two-sided contests - respectively becoming the winners and the
again in more modero times. In the Roman experience, first, each 'centuria', tribe losers - rather than the other way around (that is, as if two-party systems were
or voting unit rnade an internal decision. Oral voting by acclamation was even- 'created' by majority rules). When the losers were divided among severa! sides,
tually replaced, especially in the plebeian tribes, with individual oral voting they would seek the adoption of more inclusive electoral rules, as will be discussed
before a questioner and, later, with written ballots cast into a urn made of wicker in the following section. Thus the inajority principie seems to be intrinsically associ-
or stone. When several officers had to be elected at the same time, each unit ated with the previous formation of relatively stable factions or parties within the
worked as a multi-member district with individual multiple ballots in which community, logically requiring the respect of minority will.
decisions were made by simple plurality or relative majority. Once the units had However, in a similar way to that in which certain medieval theologians had praised
reached intemal decisions, then voters were summoned to the Campus of Mars, unanimity rule for its presumed capability to revea! God's will, early modern natural-
Capitol Hill or the Forum and each unit's vote was publicly announced in turn. ist philosophers also associated majority rule with the discovery of the people's
An altemative or candidate could succeed by winning by a majority or plurality in will, that is the new presumed truth and good. Hugo Grotius, for instance, explicitly
a majority of units, that is by obtaining, for instance, as little as one-fourth of the stated in the early seventeenth century that 'the majority would naturally have
total citizens' votes. Usually, proceedings terminated as soon as an altemative the right and authority of the whole' (Grotius, 1624: book 2, ch. 5, 17). The Eng-
obtained sufficient support or a number of candidates equal to the number of lishman John Locke, by the end of the same century, formally established that, in
places to be filled had been proclaimed, thus ignoring the size of the winner's a civil society formed on the basis of every individual's rights and consent, collec-
support and the number of votes cast in favour of other alternatives or candidates. tive decisions should be made 'only by the will and determination of the major-
The decisive unit's vote was openly celebrated, usually by acclamation, as a moment ity'. In particular, he postulated that, in representative assemblies, 'the act of the
of revelation. The winner became the focal point around which to gather general majority passes for the act of the whole and determines, as having by the Law of
support. For this reason, although in the previous aristocratic 'curial cornitia' wealthier Nature and Reason, the power of the whole' (Locke, 1689: 11, 96). Likewise, the
groups had enjoyed precedence in the voting and thus in making winners, in Genevan Jean-Jacques Rousseau believed, in the mid-eighteenth century, that the
centuria! and tribal assemblies the voting unit which was called upon to vote first general will, which was supposed to be 'always right', could be discovered by voting
was selected by lot, so ensuring sorne rotation and fair distribution of decision- by majority rule, so that 'the vote of the majority always binds the rest' (Rousseau,
making power. 1762: book 4, ch. 2). Still, the French revolutionary abbot Emmanuel-Joseph
28 fosep M. Colomer Strategy and Hlstory of Electoral System Choice 29

Sieyes praised majority as an 'incontestable maxim', while daringly identifying the The Condorcet procedure requires a winner, by majority principie to be decided,
majority, that is 'the third estate', with 'ali' (Sieyes, 1789: ch. 6). to be preferred in ali pair-wise comparisons, that is by majority against every
In parallel to these honours, recourse to majority rule for simple reasons of other candidate.
expediency was also argued by other theoreticians, such as the Englishman When the candidates are perceived by the voters as ordered along a single linear
Thomas Hobbes in the mid-seventeenth century. 'lf the representative', said dimension (such as the left-right axis in modem times), the winner by Condorcet's
Hobbes, 'consists of many men, the voice of the greater number must be consid- exhaustive pair-wise voting is always the one preferred by the median voter. This is
ered as the voice of them ali. For if the lesser number pronounce, for example, so because, by definition, the median voter is the one having less than half of the
in the affirmative, and the greater in the negative, there will be negatives more voters on one side (such as the left on the ideological axis just mentioned) and
than enough to destroy the affirmatives, and thereby the excess of negatives, Iess than half on the other side (the right), in a way to be always included in any
standing un-contradicted, are the only voice the representative has' (Hobbes, consistent majority of voters. Thus the Condorcet-winner, when it exists, can be
1651: ch. 16). Thus the weight of force, rather than the search for truth, was, at considered to be highly efficient in terms of social utility, since the median voter's
least in the English and Scottish utilitarian tradition, another very good reason position is the one for which the sum of distances from ali the voters' preferences
to adopt majority rule. is minimum. However, in non-linear ideological or policy spaces, that is those
Actually, in late medieval and early modern times collective decisions were involving multiple dimensions, the Condorcet procedure may fail to produce
expeditiously made by majority in local communes, commercial organizations a winner since no candidate can be capable of winning against every other in
and other assemblies. At sorne point in time, they would come to be made not by pair-wise comparisons. The frequency of failures with the Condorcet procedure
an absolute majority rule, that is by requiring more than half of the voters to depends on the number of issue-dimensions in the policy space and the number
coincide on a single alternative, but by adopting the alternative supported by of candidates. Assuming that ali possible distributions of voters' preferences are
only a relative majority or 'plurality', that is by a higher number of voters than any equally likely (that is, a high multi-dimensional space), computing calculations have
other altemative but not requiring any particular number, proportion or threshold shown that the Condorcet procedure of voting would fail to give a winner in about
of votes. In practice, this made it possible for generally binding elections presumably 9 per cent of times for three candidates, but increasing more than proportionally,
decided by 'majority' to actually be won by only a minority of voters. Most notably, reaching, for instance, 32 per cent of times for six candidates (Fishburn, 1973).
a very long-lived statute adopted in England by the mid-fifteenth century for the Although Condorcet himself had also sketched a simplified, more efficacious
election in the shires of members of Parliament had established that the sheriff in version of bis procedure close to Lull's (Condorcet, 1787), the procedure usually
charge of electoral assemblies, after listening to the shouts of supporters of different associated with his name has never been used in mass political elections, especially
candidates or counting by heads, should declare elected those with 'the greatest on account of its ineffectiveness in producing a decision or a winning candidate.
number' of supporters. This was probably intended as a meaos not to have to However, its hypothetical results can be used as a reference for evaluating results
count votes, especially those supporting defeated candidates, as mentioned before. produced by other, more expedient rules and procedures - as will be suggested
But, while the fiction of unanimous decisions was maintained, especially within below. Specifically, we will refer to the likelihood that other simpler and more
the parliament, this regulation permitted in practice the popular election to be won effective procedures may produce the Co11dorcet-wim1er, that is the hypothetical
by a relative, not absolute, majority. winner in pair-wise comparisons against every other altemative, as well as the
Other than deciding by simple plurality, there were different proposals to make Condorcet-loser, that is the alternative which would be defeated by every other
majority rule enforceable, although many of them were not widely adopted in the altemative in pair-wise contests and can thus be considered the least socially
practice of voting and elections. Old procedures include the very early proposal of efficient.
exhaustive pair-wise voting presented in the thirteenth century by the Catalan A comparable voting procedure, currently known as rank-order c01mt, was also
philosopher Ramon Llull. By this procedure, an election was to be made by hold- designed in the late Middle Ages by another Catholic thinker, Nicholas of Cusa
ing multiple rounds of voting between pairs of candidates and declaring the win- (Nicolaus Cusanus). He had been motivated by failures in the elections not only
ner the one having won the greatest number of pair-wise comparisons. In of Christian popes but also of Holy Roman-German emperors, as discussed above.
different texts, Llull presented this procedure and sorne variants in a scholarly, gen- According to this author, his procedure would require the voter to mark 'after the
eral manner, and also with narrative illustrations, possibly taking inspiration from name [of each candidate] a clear digit - 1, 2, 3, and so on ... until he comes to the
the elections of abbots and abbesses in monasteries and convents in which such a candidate who is in his judgment the best'. The winner is the candidate having
procedure had been used (Llull, c.1274, 1283, 1299). collected the highest sum of points (Nicolaus Cusanus, 1433: book 3, ch. 37).
A similar, normatively more ambitious, but much less applicable procedure was About 350 years later, the same voting rule was devised by a member of the French
devised five hundred years later in France, under the pressures of Enlightenment Academy of Sciences Jean-Charles de Borda. He also presented his invention with
and Revolution, by Jean-Antoine-Nicolas de Caritat, Marquis de Condorcet (1785). an alternative procedure of voting similar to the one introduced by Condorcet
30 fosep M. Colomer Stmtegy and History of Electoral System Choice 31

(who, as permanent secretary of the Academy, was in charge of publishing it). An proportionality of representation very closely. But, in the Saint-Just version, it would
exhaustive pair-wise comparison of candidates would be developed, but the seores obviously have produced the highest level of 'multi-partism': likely to be only indi-
for each candidate against the others would be aggregated - the result being the vidual representation, with no collective organization of representatives at all.
same as with the rank-order count (Borda, 1781).
As in the other procedures just mentioned, the invention of Nicolaus and Borda M11lti-member distrids
thus also required from every voter a complete ordering of preference of all the In fact, many of the theoretical inventions just mentioned were not directly or
candidates. But while, as with Llull's procedure and in contrast to Condorcet's, immediately relevant for actual choices of voting systems based on the majority
the Nicolaus/Borda procedure of rank-order count always delivers a clear winner, principie in real committees, councils, assemblies and parliaments, which in general
it is highly vulnerable to insincere or 'strategic' voting - in contrast to both the tended to adopt the simplest possible devices. One of the most basic, almost
Llull and Condorcet versions of pair-wise comparisons. Those with information spontaneous, oldest and widespread procedures of voting to choose delegates or
regarding other voters' preferences can give lower points than would actually representatives from a community can be described with the following features.
correspond to their sincere preference to rival alternatives with high probabilities Ali people with a common interest in the election gather in assembly at their common
of winning thus truncating the expression of voters' preferences. This weakness place; they agree to choose a committee or council to be formed by a few individuals;
induced the two inventors of rank-order count to warn potential users with similar each voter selects one or more candidates of his or her preference (the n umber of
notes of caution. While Nicolaus stated that 'no method of election can be con- votes per voter being equal to, lower or higher than the number of posts to be filled);
ceived which is more holy, just, honest, or free ... if the electors act according to the candidates with the highest numbers of votes are elected.
conscience', Borda remarked that his procedure had been conceived 'only for This is, basically, the type of procedure that is very frequently found in elections
honest men'. at schools, universities, housing condominiums, neighbourhood associations, trade
More practica! proposals emerged during the French revolutionary Convention unions, professional organizations, corporations and sorne local elections in small
in 1793, which although they were not finally incorporated into the subsequent towns. At the broader leve!, it is also the type of procedure which has been used
constitution, were somehow reinvented or adopted later for mass political elections since the thirteenth century for elections of officers and deputies in German and
in different countries. Condorcet himself proposed two innovative procedures, both Swiss communes and cantons (Lloyd, 1907), in French municipal assemblies,
conceived as more feasible substitutes in terms of time and the enlightenment provincial Estates and the Estates-General (Babeau, 1882, 1894; Cadart, 1952), in
required of voters, for his 'rigorous method of majority judgments between the English counties, cities and boroughs to form the Parliament (Bishop, 1893), and
candidates taken two by two . . . [which] is often impracticable'. The first was a form in Virginia and other North American colonies in other periods (Sydnor, 1962;
of limited ballot by which the election of a number of representatives in a multi- Pole, 1971). This voting procedure was also used for the indirect election of assemblies,
member district would be made by giving each voter a lower number of votes parliaments and presidential colleges in most states of Europe, the United States
than seats to be filled - specifically, in primary elections for indirect formation of and Latin America during most of the nineteenth century. In sorne cases, only
the assembly, each voter would have two votes to elect between 9 and 18 repre- those candidates receiving an absolute majority of votes were initially elected and
sentatives in the district in Condorcet's constitutional project. By declaring new rounds of votes were taken for each of the remaining seats; the latter could be
elected those with higher numbers of votes, this formula would allow representation filled by requiring again a majority and, if no candidate attained such support, by
from more than one party in each district, thus introducing sorne degree of pluralism. holding a second-round runoffbetween the two most voted candidates. Voting in
The second procedure was an apparently slight variant of the first by which the sorne of these historical institutions was by show of hands, while in others voters
two votes per voter would be distinguished between first and second preferences. expressed orally their choice one by one, but secret vote in written ballots can, of
Only if no candidate obtained a majority of voters' first preferences would the course, also be compatible with this type of rule.
second votes be counted - that is the procedure currently known as supplemen- Political science has created a precise jargon which would define this basic
tary vote (Condorcet, 1793a, 1793b). procedure as consisting of multi-member distrlcts, open ballot and simple plurality
In the same setting, and as a reply to the Girondin constitutional project mostly or absolute ma/orlty rules. It can also include different forms of approval ballot,
written by Condorcet, the Jacobin constitutional project presented by Antoine- whether permitting a vote for as many candidates as wished or only for as many
Louis-Leon de Saint-Just proposed voting in multi-member districts with single indi- seats as are to be filled. We know from both logical analysis and empirical evidence
vidual votes. Specifically, he proposed to elect the National Assembly of France in a that this type of procedure can be highly inclusive and permit somewhat varied
single national district with 341 seats by giving each voter one vote for only one can- representation, since different preference groups encompassing in total broad
didate, and declaring elected all those 341 candidates having obtained the greatest proportions of voters can see their chosen candidates elected. Spontaneity in
numbers of votes (Saint-Just, 1793: ch. V). This formula, in modern times known as defining the rules - which look almost 'natural' to the unsophisticated eye - and
the single non-transferable vote, is usually considered capable of approaching inclusiveness of actual results can explain the duration over severa! centuries of this
32 fosep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 33

type of procedure in very different institutions and organizations such as those men- The consequences of this simple type of election procedure can change dramat-
tioned, as well as its frequent adoption in non-political, small-scale associations in all ically if well-organized factions or parties are formed. With this we are just referring
periods. The results of these and the following procedures by majority rules are to groups of candidates and voters with a common purpose that coordinate their
illustrated in stylized manner in Table 1.1. As can be seen in the very simple example behaviour in order to win as many possible seats in the election. In the type of
of a three-member district with one hundred voters, representation by open ballot, multi-member election previously sketched, the emergence of factional candidacies
by which each voter can vote for as many candidates as he or she wants up to the able to attract sorne voters' support may produce a set of winners corresponding
number of seats to be filled (in this case from one to three), can fall into the hands of to only one of the preference or interest groups in the community at the expense
three candidates holding different preferences (in the example in the table the seat of all the rest. To attain this result, it is not necessary that most or even many
allocation is preference x: 1 seat, preference y: 1 seat, and preference z: 1 seat). voters follow the advice of faction leaders to vote for ali the members of a list of
candidates and only for them; it is sufficient that a few people do so, since, even if
they are very few in number, they can make a difference in comparison to the
previous scenario without organized factions and make ali the candidates in the
Table 1.1 Majority rules and procedures
list winners. This is, of course, due to the fact that plurality rule does not require
Candidacies any specific amount of votes to make a winner only one more vote than the other
- Individuals: W1 W2 w3 X 1 X2 x3
candi dates.
Y1 Yz Yl z 1 z2 z3
- Parties: w X y z In tace of an organized faction able to accumulate ali the seats in contest, the
Total voters: best corresponding strategy by other candidates and voters is, certainly, the
40 30 20 10/100
organization of comparable factions able at least to neutralize the advantage
Per area: A 20 10 o s obtained by the first faction. This will eventually transform the competition from
B 20 10 o s one among individuals to one among factions. Voters then vote in bloc for a list
e o 10 20 o of candidates rather than choose their preferred individuals. In more precise
Rules Votes Three-seat allocations terms, the procedure of voting moves from open ballot to bloc ballot or closed
llst. The new distribution of seats in a multi-member district by plurality rule
M = 3, Open ballot, e.g. W 1: 40, X 1: 30, when collective candidacies are organized is also shown, by way of simple illustra-
Plurality rule Y1= 20, Z¡: 10 1 1 1 o tion, in Table 1.1. In contrast to previous results with open ballot, which was able
to produce, as in the example, an allocation of 1-1-1 seats to three different
M = 3, Block ballot, W:40,X:30, Y:20,Z: 10 3 o o o
Plurality rule preference candidates, now plurality bloc or closed list ballot produces an alloca-
tion in which all the seats are given to the candidates of the largest faction: 3-0-0,
M = 3, Block ballot, lst round: W: 40,
X: 30, Y: 20, Z: 10 even if it has obtained the votes of only a minority of voters (40 out of 100 in the
Majority-runoff rule 2nd round, e.g.: example).
W:40, X: 60 o 3 o o The introduction of absolute majority rule with a second round between the
M = 3, Limited ballot W¡: 40, Wz: 40, X¡: 30, Xz: 30, most voted candidates at the previous round may produce similar results if ali
(V= 2), Plurality rule y 1: 20, y2: 20, z 1: 10, z 2: 10 2 1 o o major candidacies induce voting in bloc for a list of candidates. Majority rule with
a second- or third-round runoff was used early on in indirect elections to multi-
M = 3, Limited ballot
member districts in France for the eiection of the Estates General in 1789, and in
(V=l single w 1: 40, X 1: 30,
direct elections to the French Assembly until 1871, as well as in at least six other
non-transferable), y 1: 20, z 1: 10 1 o
Plurality rule European countries during the second quarter of the nineteenth century. As illustrated
in Table 1.1, these rules and procedures also concentrate all the seats on a single
M=3, Cumulative w 1: 40-120, x 1: 30-90,
factional candidacy - the winner at the second round, which can be different
ballot, Plurality rule Y1= 20-60, Z¡: 10-30 1-3 0-1 0-1 o
from the winner by plurality at the first round (in the example in Table 1.1, the
M=l, Single ballot, A-w 1: 20, x 1: 10,
corresponding allocation of seats is 0-3-0).
Plurality rule Y1= o, Z¡: s
B-w2: 20, x2: 10, This perspective may shed light on why 'faction' is usually associated in classical
Yz: O,zz: S political literature with bad intentions to the disadvantage of general or at least
C - W 3: 0, x3: 10, broadly collective interests. In contrast, 'party' has enjoyed somewhat better consid-
y3: 20, Zz: 0 2 o 1 o eration in modero times - at least in academic circles. But actually early political
34 fosep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electora/ System Choice 35

parties were formed just as electoral factions and they are still so, especially if the All the authors mentioned - who were, of course, among the most influential
electoral system induces or forces voters to vote in bloc for a closed list of candidates, on constitution-making and criticism in England, the emerging United States,
despite having developed different kinds of complex organization. In sorne early revolutionary France and many other countries at the time - coincided, thus, on
modern times, when elections in relevant large-scale political institutions were of the the following observations. First, they realized that the formation of electoral
type presented above, the distinction between 'faction' and 'party' was difficult, factions or parties produced worse results than previous practices based on indi-
as witnessed, for example, by the Scottish and British David Hume who - reflecting vidual votes among individual candidates. Second, they eventually acknowledged
a general mood of the time - initially considered that 'sects and factions [should] that in large, complex societies in which the homogeneity of interests and values
be detested and hated ... [because they] subvert government, render law impotent, which had prevailed in small, simple communities during the Middle Ages had
and beget the fiercest animosities' (1741). Later on, however, he pondered that visibly decreased, the formation of political factions was unavoidable and even
'to abolish all distinctions of party may not be practicable, perhaps not desirable, necessary to make possible the political representation of a diversity of groups.
in a free government'. Very interestingly, when in a later period Hume had to tace Finally, they considered that, once parties had begun to intervene in the electoral
the undesirable but perhaps unavoidable existence of political parties, he turned to process, the existence of multiple parties was better - in the sense of re-establishing
wish that government were in the hands not of a single party but of multiple-party to sorne extent the previous capadty of elections to give representation to different
coalitions in order 'to prevent all unreasonable insult and triumph of the one party preference groups - than the existence of just a few able to provoke the concen-
over the other, to encourage moderate opinions, to find the proper medium in tration of power in the hands of a single party. In other words, if parties were
all disputes, to persuade each that its antagonist may possibly be sometimes in unavoidable, multi-partism was better than bi-partism.
the right, and to keep a balance in the praise and blame, which we bestow on Basically two different types of procedure were then devised to make organized
either side' (1758). faction- or political party-competition somehow compatible with pluralistic, inclu-
A similar evolution can be detected in the Virginian and American James sive representation, while majority was still the basic principie of decision. First,
Madison - who was actually influenced by reading Hume - who initially also several ballot procedures were invented in order to produce more-than-one-party
condemned factions but later saw them as unavoidable and even a necessary evil. representation in multi-member districts by plurality rule. Second, the alternative
Madison perceptively noted that, with organized parties, in small communities of single-member districts, whether by plurality or by majority second-round
there would likely be a single dominant party embedded in local prejudices and rules, was diffused, also in the expectation of reducing the high concentration of
schemes of injustice - and 'the smaller the number of individuals composing power in a single party produced by bloc ballot in multi-member districts.
a majority, and the smaller the compass within which they are placed, the more Of course, small, disadvantaged but rising groups favoured the adoption of these
easily will they concert and execute their plan of oppression'. In contrast, greater relatively more inclusive electoral procedures, while large, dominant and well-
political units would provide 'the greater security afforded by a greater variety of settled incumbents resisted such innovatiohs in favour of maintaining better
parties, against the event of any one party being able to outnumber and oppress opportunities for concentrating all seats.
the rest . . . In an equal degree does the increased variety of parties comprised
within the [large] Union increase this security' (1788, No. 10; see also the discussion Limited, c11m11lative ballots
in Dahl, 2002: 29-37). The two most diffused innovative ballot procedures in multi-member districts
Perhaps it was Jean-Jacques Rousseau who best realized and anticipated the dra- have been limited ballot and cumulative ballot. Lbnlted ballot - which had been
matic influence of factions in elections held in multi-member districts by plural- initially proposed by Condorcet in 1793, as mentioned above - was designed
ity rule - as used in his native Geneva. 'When factions arise', he observed in a precisely to permit at least the second minority in a district to obtain a minority
rather well known but diversely interpreted passage, 'and partial associations are of seats. By this procedure, each voter is allowed to vote for a number of candidates
formed at the expense of the great association, the will of each of these associations which is less than the total number of seats to be filled in the district, while the
becomes general in relation to its members, while it remains particular in relation candidates with highest numbers of votes are elected. With high proportions of
to the State: it may then be said that there are no longer as many votes as there limited votes (for instance, two-thirds of the seats to be filled), this procedure will
are men, but only as many as there are associations ... Lastly, when one of these give as many seats as votes per voter to candidates of the largest party while the
associations is so great as to prevail over all the rest, the result is no longer a sum remaining minority of seats will be allocated to candidates of the second party in
of small differences, but a single difference; in this case there is no longer a general votes. Only if the largest party obtains a very high proportion of votes and is able
will, and the opinion which prevails is purely particular.' Most remarkably, Rousseau to coordinate its followers' votes to be distributed efficiently among its different
also pondered that if factions or parties were unavoidable, that is 'if there are candidates can it expect to receive all the seats in the district.
partial societies, it is best to have as many as possible and to prevent them from Different forms of limited ballot with several votes per voter were used tentatively
being unequal' (1762). in a minority of districts in Britain from 1867, as well as in Italy, Portugal and Spain
36 Josep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 3 7

a few years later. More daringly, limited ballot was adopted as the general formula In fact, single-member districts can be combined with different rules, mainly
to fill all the seats in the Assembly in Brazil after 1882, as well as in Argentina, plurality, majority with a second round by plurality, and majority with a second-
Bolivia, Peru, Portugal and Spain at the end of the nineteenth century. With this round runoff by majority between the two most voted candidates in the first
procedure, as illustrated in Table 1.1, while the most voted party list obtains round. If, according to the first of the rules just mentioned, the seats of an assembly
a majority of seats, a second party can also receive sorne seats (in the example in are elected in single-member districts by plurality rule, certain global minorities
the table, the corresponding allocation of seats is 2-1-0). with relatively strong support in small local areas can see their candidates elected,
A particular form of limited ballot is the one giving only one vote per voter - as which is a more inclusive result than the one produced by multi-member districts.
was proposed by Saint-Just in 1793, as previously mentioned. This formula was Single-member districts, however, can work against large minorities with widespread
innovatively used in Spain from 1865 to 1876. In districts with more than two seats, support across the territory if they are not the largest group in any significant
this form of limited single ballot can distribute the seats among more than two area, up to not giving representation to a relatively large preference group.
parties, actually producing a really pluralistic and approximately proportional The adoption of single-member districts in elections by plurality rule apparently
representation, as illustrated in Table l. l. In modero times, this procedure has occurred, first, in the British colonies in North America and were introduced in
been called single non-transferable vote and has been used, most notably, inJapan England after 1707. They developed in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth
after 1900 and again after the Second World War. centuries for election to House of Commons in Ireland, Scotland and Wales (in
The procedure of cu mulative ballot - which had been proposed in Britain by contrast to most of England, where two- and three-member districts prevailed), as
member of Parliament James Garth Marshall (1853) - gives each voter as many well as in certain other states and the United States for election to the House of
votes as there are seats to be filled in the district, but permits the accumulation Representatives. They, however, did not become the general formula in Britain
of more than one vote on a single candidate. The results of this procedure until 1885 - at the Conservatives' demand as a protective device in exchange for a
depend on voters' information regarding the expected support of the different new enlargement of the franchise which they felt to be threatening. In the United
candidates and their ability to coordinate their accumulations. In general, it can States single-member districts expanded gradually, but it was not until 1970 that
be expected that seats will be allocated to more than one party. But only if the they finally replaced at large and other multi-member districts with bloc voting in
larger party fails to coordinate its supporters' accumulated votes while the a few states. In contrast Denmark for one had been forming its parliament using
smaller parties succeed in doing so can the allocation of seats be as pluralistic as only this formula since 1848.
with limited ballot. Cumulative ballot was used in three-member districts for As was noted by the English philosopher and politician John Stuart Mill on the
the election of the Illinois state legislature from 1869 to 1980, as well as in occasion of discussing electoral reforms in Britain, a parliamentary election in single-
Chile, Brazil and Peru during late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. member districts by plurality rule - as an indirect election with factions, as previously
Table 1.1 also illustrates sorne hypothetical allocations of seats under this proce- discussed - can give victory to 'a majority [of voters] of the majority [of districts],
dure in the simple example of a three-member district. (The incentives for stra- who may be, and often are, but a minority of the whole' (Mill, 1861). Actually,
tegic voting and the likely consequences of both limited and cumulative ballots Mili was still short in his insight since, by this procedure as implemented in
were insightfully analysed by Charles Dodgson, better known as Lewis Carroll, Britain, a parliamentary majority can be given to a relative majority, so to a minority
in 1884; see also Black, 1996.) of voters of the majority of districts, which can indeed be a very small minority of
the whole number of voters, and even smaller than sorne other groups.
Si11gle-member districts The election of a single winner by plurality rule was also implemented for the
As an alternative to these procedures oriented to permit more-than-one-party direct election of presidents in regimes with separation of powers between the
representation in multi-member districts, the division of large multi-member Presidency and the Assembly. The earliest cases were Colombia in 1853 (replacing
districts into smaller single-member districts can also produce sorne pluralistic the US-inspired electoral college) and Brazil after 1892 (replacing the Portuguese
representation. In order to show how this happens, Table 1.1 illustrates the simple monarchy). Later on, this rule was adopted for direct presidential elections in
example of a three-member district which becomes three single-member districts. many countries of Latín America, as well as in the Philippines, South Korea and
As shown in the table, a single party able to receive all seats in a multi-member sorne African countries under former British control. As can also happen in any
district may fail to become the largest party in sorne of the smaller single-member parliamentary single-member district, a plurality-winning president may be an
districts, thus permitting sorne other party to obtain representation. (In the extreme candidate receiving a strong rejection from a majority of voters that may
example in the table, the new allocation of seats, instead of favouring a single have divided their votes between severa! relatively closer, defeated candidates. In
party, 3-0-0, as produced in a three-member district, is now 2-0-1; observe that other words, the winner by plurality can be the Condorcet-loser, that is a candidate
the party with no seats has wider total support than the party with one seat, but that would be defeated by any other candidate in pair-wise contests. As has happened,
the latter is the strongest in one district.) a number of political crises and breakdowns of democratic regimes were produced
38 Josep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electora/ System Choice 39

in Latin American, Asian and African countries after the election of minority round of voting or at sorne preliminary round of counting. Even if the candidates
extreme presidents by plurality rule, especially by the mid-twentieth century. are perceived by most voters as ordered along a single linear dimension, such as the
left-right axis, the median voter's candidate, who is always able to form a majority
Absol11te ma;ority mies around him or her against any other candidate, may obtain fewer votes than two
~omparable but. re~atively less bad results can be obtained in parliamentary other, more extreme candidates and be eliminated. In other words, the winner by
smgle-member d1stncts, as well as in presidential elections, if majority rule with majority with any of these procedures may nof be the Condorcet-winner, that is
a second round is used. A first variant, requiring an absolute majorlty at the first the candidate able to win against any other candidate in pair-wise contests, but one
round and only a plurality at the second round, was adopted for the election of that could be defeated by absolute majority by some of the eliminated candidates.
the National Assembly of France in 1875 and has been used there most of the time up However, at least two caveats can be introduced when comparing the expected
to the pr~sent . This system can only make a difference with simple plurality rule if outcomes by simple plurality rule with those by absolute majority runoff rule.
the cand1dates coordinate their withdrawals at the second round in favour of Assuming a single dimension of voters' preferences irl which the median voter
those who are relatively closer in their preferences (or more willing to enter into can be clearly identified and the same number of candidates running, if no
favour exchanges) and have a higher likelihood of winning. In conditions of sub- candidate obtains an absolute majority of votes at the first round, majority runoff
?ptimal ~oordination, however, the winner may be as extreme and in the minority creates double the probability of plurality rule that the final winner will be the
m voters first preferences and provoke a similar rejection as the winner by simple candidate with the median voter's support. This is due to the fact that if the
plurality rule in a single round. median voter's candidate is present at the second round, he or she must be
Another variant requires an absolute majority at the first round and reduces the expected to win by majority against any other rival. Thus the probability for the
choice to the two most voted candidates at the second round. This system was median voter's candidate to win is equal to the probability of being one of the
used for parliamentary elections in Germany after 1871. For presidential elections, two most voted candidates in the first round, which, under the above assump-
a precedent of second-round runoff rules can be found in the procedure establish- tions, a priori and with whatever number of candidates, is double the probability
ing a first direct election round by majority and a second-round runoff in of being the single most voted candidate in the first round.
Congress between the two or three most voted candidates. This formula was The second caveat is linked to the first . While simple plurality rule can give
adopted in France in 1851, as well as in Bolivia in 1871 where it is still used now victory to the Condorcet-loser, that is the candidate that would be defeated by every
and in at least six other Latín American countries in different periods. Direct pres- other candidate in pair-wise contests as mentioned above, the winner by absolute
idential elections by majority with a second-round runoff between the two most majority runoff rule or its variants cannot be the Condorcet-loser since he or she
voted candidates has been used in France since 1965, as well as in African coun- will have been able to win at least one of the pair-wise contests or comparisons,
tries under former French control, in most countries of Latín America in the most that is the one between the two survivors at the second round of voting or the
rec~nt d~mocratic period (starting with Ecuador in 1978), and in post-Communist final round of counting. (This point was made early on by E. J. Nanson in 1882.)
reg1mes m Central and Eastern Europe since the 1990s. This means that in parliamentary single-member districts, as well as in presidential
A further variant of absolute majority rule requiring a single round of voting or other elections producing a single absolute winner, it should be expected that
w~s i.nitially devised by Harvard college professor William R. Ware in 1871 by sim- the winner by majority rule with a second-round runoff or alternative vote will
phfymg sorne of Thomas Hare's proposals (to be mentioned below) and imported be, on average, relatively more accepted and less rejected by the voters than the
by mathematician E. J. Nanson in 1882 for elections in Australia, where for election winner by simple plurality rule. Of course, specific elections can produce winners
to the House of Representatives it was adopted after 1918. Usually known as with characteristics opposite to those just mentioned, but we are just presenting
majorlty-preferential or alternative vote, this procedure requires voters to order their here a general statement regarding the results that can be expected a priori from
every electoral rule.
~references amon~ candidates. Any candidate obtairling a majority of first preferences
is elected; otherwise, the candidate with the lowest number of votes is eliminated
and his or .her supporters' votes are transferred to their next or further preferences Tite c110ice of ma¡ority mies
for success1ve rounds of countirlg until a majority candidate results. The procedure,
This classification of majoritarian electoral rules and procedures for including
thus, enables voters to indicate for which candidate they would have voted at
a variety of political groups and producing relatively acceptable winners permits
a second round if their favourite candidate were eliminated at the first round - for
the establishment of sorne basic strategic criteria for institutional choice. The choice
this reason it is usually known as instant runoffin the United States.
of procedures with relatively higher inclusiveness, such as limited or cumulative
Majority rule, whether with a second-round runoff or with alternative vote, does
ballot or single-member districts, or of rules with higher requirements of votes for
not guarantee that the winner is the candidate with the relative widest acceptance
winning absolutely, such as the majority runoff rule, implies less risk, while the
and least rejection among voters, since he or she can be eliminated at the first
40 fosep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 41

bet on exclusionary procedures, such as multi-member districts with 'bloc' closed • Staveley, E. S. (1972) Greek and Roman Voting and Elections. Ithaca, NY: Comen University Press.
lists, or for rules with no specific vote requirements for winning absolutely, such as • Taylor, Lily Ross (1966) Roman Voting Assemblies. From the Hannibalic War to tite Dictatorship
simple plurality rule, should be expected to correspond to more risk-prone actors. of Caesar. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
In the perspective supplied by the above analysis, it should be expected that a single
domi11a11t party with optimistic expeáations to remain in such a position will tend to Proportionality
prefer electoral formulas like m11lti-member districts witll 'bloc' closed lists and plurality The principie of proportional distribution of shares, burdeos and voting rights is
mle to other formulas permitting minority representation. In contrast, in situations usually adopted in private communities and companies on the basis of the number of
in which the incumbent rulers are seriously challenged by a rising opposition or by inhabitants, resources, property or contribution to the provision or finance of
new emerging parties, as well as in situations of relative ignorance or high uncertainty collective goods. Remote precedents of proportional representation for distribut-
regarding the likely support of different candidacies - for instance, when a new ing seats in more political settings can be found in ancient leagues of cities and
regime with broad voting rights is established - the relatively more inclusive electoral tribes. In early modem times, confederal unions and a number of peace plans in
formulas - that is limited or cumulative ballot, single-member rather than multi- Europe also addressed the question of fair representation. More formally, and for
member districts, and majority runoff rule rather than simple plurality rule - can be domestic political elections, the principie of proportional representation was first
less risky choices for self-interested actors and are capable at the same time of pro- formulated in late eighteenth-century France during the holding of the trad-
ducing more socially acceptable results. A further cross-country, long-term analysis itional, corporative elections which would trigger the Revolution. The basic math-
will test these implications on electoral system choice. ematical formulas that would make the principie operable were also invented about
the same time in the process of setting up the new representative institutions of
Further reading the United States of America. However, these formulas were not used in the
• Arrow, Kenneth ([1951] 1963) Social Choice and Individ11al Values. New York: Wiley. United States for the allocation of institutional seats to political candidacies but only
• Brams, Steven J. and Peter C. Fishbum (1983) Approval Voting. Boston: Birkhliuser. for apportioning seats in the House of Representatives among the differently popu-
• Favre, Pierre (1976) La dédsion de majorité. Paris: Presses de la Fondation Nationale des lated states. Proportional representation formulas were reinvented several times in
Sciences Politiques.
• Grofman, Bemard, Sung-Chull Lee, Edwin A. Winckler and Brian Woodall (eds) (1999) Europe in the second half of the nineteenth century before they began to be used
Elections in fapan, Korea, and Taiwan under the Single Non-Transferable Vote. The Comparative for the allocation of seats in modern assemblies and parliaments.
Study of an Embedded Institution. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
• Hagele, Günther and Friedrich Pukelsheim (2001) 'Llull's Writings on Electoral Systems',
Stlldia L11lliana, 41: 3-38. The i11ve11tio11 of the proportio11ality principie
• Heinberg, John G. (1926) 'History of the Majority Principie', American Political Science
Review, 20, 1. In terms of ancient confedera! leagues, the most remote precedent of proportional
• Heinberg, John G. (1932) 'Theories of Majority Rule', American Political Science Review, 26, 3. representation can probably be found in the Lycian League in Asia Minor from
• McGann, Anthony J., William Koetzle and Bernard Grofman (2002) 'How an Ideologically 168 BC to e.SO AD. It reunited 23 cities (including, for instance, Olympos and
Concentrated Minority Can Trump a Dispersed Majority: Nonmedian Voter Results for Plural- Xathros) that were represented in the governing Council with one, two or three
ity, Run-off, and Sequential Elimination Elections', American foumal of Political Sdence, 46, 1. votes each, according to their size. They also bore a proportional share of financia!
• McLean, lain and Arnold B. Urken (eds) (1995) Classics ofSocial Choice. Ann Arbor: University
of Michigan Press. responsibility. But the most considerable of the confederacies of antiquity was the
• May, Kenneth O. (1952) 'A Set of Independent, Necessary and Sufficient Conditions for Amphictyonic League, which was organized around Delphos for religious and
Simple Majority Decision', Econometrica, 20. mutual defence affairs, with 12 Hellenic tribes, including Athens and Sparta. The
• Merrill III, Samuel (1988) Making Multicandidate Elections More Democratic. Princeton, NJ: representatives of ali units met twice a year to vote on decisions which were
Princeton University Press. executed by the Senate. Although working with equal numbers of votes per unit
• Miller, Nicholas R., Bemard Grofman and Scott L. Feld (1989) 'The Geometry of Majority
Rule', foumal of Theoretica/ Politics, 1. during most of its existence, during a short period from 31 BC to 14 AD the
• Nurmi, Hannu (1987) Comparing Voting Systems. Dordrecht: Kluwer. Amphictyonic League was organized with a more proportional distribution of
• Pukelsheim, Friedrich (2002) 'Auf den Schultern von Riesen: Llull, Cusanus, Borda, votes: three cities had six votes, three cities had two votes and six cities or groups
Condorcet et al.', Litterae Cusanae, 2: 3-15. of small tribes had one vote each (which was cast by one of its components by
• Reilly, Benjamin (2001) Democracy in Divided Societies. Electoral Engineering for Conflict turns). Although not precisely distributed according to a mathematical formula,
Management. New York: Cambridge University Press.
• Riker, William H. (1982) Liberalism Against Pop11lism. A Confrontation Between the Theory of
the different numbers of votes roughly corresponded to each city's or group's
Democracy and the Theory of Social Choice. San Francisco: Freeman. population (Freeman, 1863).
• Saari, Donald (1994) Geometry of Voting. New York: Springer. In their approach to similar problems, a number of confedera! plans and attempts
• Saari, Donald (1995) Basic Geometry of Voting. New York: Springer. to unite different political units for common purposes of defence can be identified
42 fosep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 43

during the late Middle and early Modern Ages. One of the most remarkable was any council, assembly or parliament, as would be addressed later on. Three types
developed in the late seventeenth century by English colonizer William Penn, of quota were then and in further periods defined, which can be called, respectively:
whose peace plan for Europe included the formation of a Diet (also called Estates exact, s11fficient and fixed quotas. Table 1.2 shows an example of how different quota
or Parliament) at which each sovereign state would be represented in proportion to formulas can be applied.
'its value' (to be calculated not only in terms of population but also of wealth and The exact or simple quota was first defined by Alexander Hamilton , one of the
military strength). Up to 15 units were devised (from the German Empire, France, main authors and propagandists of the new United States federal constitution, for
Russia, Spain and Turkey to the smallest Swiss cantons and German ducats) with the first House elections in 1791. The exact proportional quota is the divisor
a total of 90 votes distributed in a scale with eight values from 12 to 1 (Penn, 1693). between the total number of inhabitants (or votes) and the total number of seats,
Similar problems were, of course, faced by modern confederations and federal that is l/M (where M is the magnitude or number of seats in the district) . This
states forming representative assemblies - from the United Sta tes in the late eight- formula is quite intuitive from the notion of proportionality, but has the big
eenth century to the European Union in the late twentieth century- as well as by drawback of not being decisive or complete since the distribution of inhabitants
all kinds of parliaments and assemblies whose members were to be elected in among states, or that of votes among parties, hardly comes in exact multiples of
territorial units of different sizes and populations. such a quota. Therefore, the remaining seats not able to be allocated on the basis
For the purpose of organizing popular elections, an early formulation of the of the exact quota have to be allocated by using sorne other supplementary
principie of proportional representation of the different groups of voters in política! formula which may introduce significant distortion. As this formula was initially
assemblies carne from politician and electoral candidate Honoré Gabriel Riqueti, proposed both by Hamilton and, in the context of parliamentary elections, by
Count De Mirabeau, in the very first weeks of 1789. In his address to the provincial English lawyer and politician Thomas Hare about seventy years later, the remaining
estate of Provence on the occasion to elect the delegates to the Estates-General of seats were to be allocated to those states or parties h avin g the 'largest remainders'
France, Mirabeau famously stated that 'The Estates-General are [ought to be] to of inhabitants or votes, respectively (Hare, 1859).
the nation what a chart is to its physical configuration; in all its parts, and as In actual electoral systems, however, the 'exact' or Hamilton-Hare quota has been
a whole, the copy should at all times have the same proportions as the original' used together with disparate supplementary formulas for allocating the remaining
(Mirabeau, 1789, 1: 7). In a Iesser known passage of the same speech, Mirabeau seats, such as giving preference to the larger parties, or to the smaller parties, or by
remarked that he did not aim only at obtaining a faithful or fair representation random, or by applying sorne other formula of proportional representation to the
of the different groups of society, but was also concerned with inducing socially remaining votes, or - as one of the most distinguished critics of the Hamilton
efficient outcomes from the corresponding political institutions. In this orientation, proposal voiced - 'according to any other crotchet which ingen uity may invent,
representation of all parts should prevent the two dominant estates, the aristocracy
and the clergy, from prevailing over the whole nation. He noted: 'The nation is
not there if those who call themselves the representatives have not been chosen Table 1.2 Proportional representation formulas
in free and individual elections, if the representatives of groups of equal importance
are not equal numerically and in voting power ... In order to know the will of Parties: w X y z Total/100
Votes: 40 30 20 10
a nation, the votes must be collected in such a way so as to prevent the mistake of
taking the will of an estate far one other, or the particular will of certain individuals Rules 6 seat allocations
for the general will' (Mirabeau, 1789, 1: 7-8).
Hamilton-Hare
Proportional q11otas Exact quota: 100/6 = 16.6 By quotas 2 1 1 o 4
[Vote remainders 6.6 13.3 3.3 10]
About the same time as Mirabeau formulated his principies, sorne of the Ieading By largest remainders 1 1 2
politicians of the newly created United States of America were inventing for the first Total seats 2 2 1 1 6
time the basic mathematical formulas that would make proportional representation Jefferson-d'Hondt
feasible. As suggested, they did not invent them with the intention of promoting Sufficient quota: [40/3 =] 13 By quotas 3 2 1 o 6
fair, pluralistic and socially efficient representation of different groups of voters in Webster-Sainte-Lague
the corresponding institutions, but only far the sake of fair territorial representation Modified quota: 100/6+1 = 14 By quotas 2 2 o 5
in the new federation, as mandated by the US Constitution (Article 1, section 2). By half-quota (7) 1
Total seats 2 2 6
For the first US rulers and electoral law-makers, the basic problem was to define
a q11ota of state inhabitants worth a seat in the House of Representatives - which Gergonne-Gilpin
is, formally, the same problem as to define a 'quota' of party votes worth a seat in Fixed quota, e.g. 15 votes By quotas 2 2 o 5
44 fosep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 45

and the combinations of the day give strength to carry' (Jefferson, 1792). In order Finally, what can be called the fixed quota is just an absolute number of votes
to reduce the number of seats to be allocated by a supplementary criterion, London established a priori as worthy of a seat. This was actually the basic criterion that
barrister Henry R. Droop proposed a somewhat lower quota, l/M+ 1 (rounded up); had been used in a few of the ancient and early modero leagues and confedera-
with a lower quota value, a higher number of seats can be allocated by quotas, but tions previously mentioned, in which the number of each unit's representatives
this formula would still need a supplementary one to allocate at least a few was established on the basis of sorne fixed amount of inhabitants. For political
remaining seats (Droop, 1868, 1869). elections, this formula was first proposed by French mathematician Joseph-Diaz
Logically, the combination of two different formulas for the allocation of the Gergonne in 1820. In his own words: 'At the elections the voters should group
same slot of seats may produce sorne unexpected and undesirable consequences. themselves freely according to their opinions, their interests, or their desires, and
Even the standard Hamilton-Hare formula allocating sorne seats by the exact any citizen would become a Deputy from the departrnent in the elective chamber
quota and the rest to the largest vote remainders has been found capable of who bore a mandate from two hundred voters [his arbitrarily proposed quota)'
producing sorne paradoxical allocations, such as giving fewer seats to a party (or (Gergonne, 1820). Similarly, Philadelphia manufacturer and activist Thomas
state) which has increased its proportion of votes (or inhabitants) - usually Gilpin proposed a fixed quota in a pamphlet published in 1844. The context of
known as the 'Alabama paradox'. Gilpin 's proposal, against which he tried to react, was the system previously
The second formula, which can be called sufficient quota, was first conceived discussed of multi-member districts by plurality rule by which each voter had to
by Virginian politician and later US president Thomas Jefferson in 1792 as vote in bloc for a closed list, thus producing a single dominant party. His intention
a response to Hamilton's quota - the latter being finally vetoed by president George was to prevent further successive self-reproductions of rulers in power and make
Washington at Jefferson's persuasion. Seeking support in the instructions of 'the elected body to be an exact representation of the public interests'. 'Otherwise',
the US Constitution and in the appeal of simplicity, Jefferson proposed to define he warned, 'is the virtual source of oppression and injury the cause of great
a quota able to allocate all the seats by a single criterion. Literally, he stated: 'We discontent, and when not subversive of the administration, it is subversive of the
must take, as the ratio of distribution, the common divisor which, applied to harmony and confidence which ought to be afforded to it'. Gilpin's proposal was
every state, gives to them such numbers as, added together, come nearest to 120 a fixed quota and open lists in which voters could express their ordinal preferences
[the total number of seats in the House of Representatives at the time]'. The idea regarding individual candidates (Gilpin, 1844). A similar, but more practically
of a common divisor for all allocations of seats also motivated Belgian civil usable formula, actually inspired by Gergonne, was further proposed in the United
law professor Víctor d'Hondt to reinvent this quota about a hundred years later States by J. Francis Fisher (1863). However innovative and well-intentioned these
(d'Hondt, 1878, 1882). Of course, to fulfil its aim of allocating all the seats, the proposals might be, it is remarkable that they were apparently formulated in com-
Jefferson-d'Hondt quota must be smaller than the Hamilton-Hare quota. plete ignorance of the proportional quota formulas that had been and were at the
Although it has been common to confuse the Jefferson-d'Hondt 'sufficient' time being used in the same political system for the apportionment of seats.
quota formula with sorne of the calculation methods to establish its value, the basic 'Fixed' or Gergonne-Gilpin quotas may have sorne advantages, such as encourag-
meaning of the formula should not be forgotten. In fact, there are several methods ing turnout and producing uniform distributions of seats among parties independ-
to find such a quota and produce the corresponding allocation of seats, including ently of district numbers, magnitudes and apportionment. However, they are not
trial and error, as proposed initially by Jefferson; using a series of divisors until able to establish a previously known number of seats in any district or in the total
obtaining the M-th highest quotient or 'highest average' (M being the number of of the assembly. With varying assembly sizes, this type of quota - which was
seats to be allocated), as promulgated by d'Hondt and known as the method of being used in the German La11d of Baden-Baden - was adopted by the so-called
'divisors series'; or starting tentatively with the quota l/M + 1 (rounded down) and 'Weimar Republic' of Germany in 1919 with a rather demanding quota of 60,000
decreasing it down until fitting, as suggested by Swiss physics professor and local votes per seat.
politician Eduard Hagenbach-Bischoff (1888). Of course, different quotas may produce different allocations of seats in favour
Several variants of this type of quota have also been invented. For instance, US of either larger or smaller parties and can be chosen by electoral law-makers
Senator Daniel Webster began, in 1832, to modify the quota by increasing its according to their expectations. But, as Webster established: 'The divisor may be
value to the nearest whole number and then, if necessary, giving extra seats to anything which produces accurate and uniform division'. 3
those states or parties having more than half the quota. This formula, which is There are thus two crucial elements in proportional representation electoral
known as 'major fractions', would be used for seat apportionment in the US in the systems which may produce different results to the advantage of different parties:
early twentieth century. It was later reinvented, together with another calculation tite number of seats and tire quota fonnula. With 'number of seats' we refer to the total
method based on the divisors series of odd numbers, by French mathematician number of seats or 'assembly size', as well as to the 'magnitude' or number of seats
André Sainte-Lague (1910) and has been used for parliamentary elections, in per district. The number of seats can be small if the assembly size is small or, even
modified versions, especially in Scandinavian countries. for a large assembly, if a high number of districts makes their magnitudes small.
 46 fosep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 4 7

The 'quota' as the basic ground for distributing seats among parties can be relatively large assemblies; (2) large districts; and (3) electoral formulas implying large quotas,
large, like the Hamilton-Hare 'exact' quota, relatively small, like the Jefferson- in particular those of proportional representation rather than majoritarian ones.
d'Hondt 'sufficient' quota, intermediate, like the Webster-Sainte-Lague 'major Tuese electoral system preferences and choices have been justified using different
fraction' quota, or have any value, like the Gergonne-Gilpin 'fixed' quota. Further arguments. First, faimess and social efficiency of the subsequent political decisions
modifications can be introduced by the requirement of legal thresholds to enter can be called in support of proportional representation. The Conservative Thomas
the process of allocation, whether in the form of a given percentage of votes or as the Hare, for instance, was said to have devised a system which, in contrast to the
requirement to obtain one 'exact' quota or a portian of it, actually decreasing the concentration of power created by plurality rule, would secure representation of
effective quota for the parties above the threshold. Mal-apportionment of seats with all classes, including minorities. However, he remarked that his project did not
regard to the population and, in particular, the allocation of a minimum number of aim at simply securing the 'representation of minorities' but to 'end the evils of
seats to every district, even the smallest ones, can also distort representation based corruption, violent discontent and restricted power of selection or voter choice'
on quotas of votes. (Hare, 1859). Hare's main propagandist, the liberal John Stuart Mill, also remarked
Note, however, that the smallest quota is the one which is applied with plurality that proportional representation would give all interests or classes 'protection
rule: literally, the quota can be any value higher than zero, only depending on the against the class legislation of others without claiming the power to exercise it in
number of parties or candidates. Second-round formulas also imply very small their own' (Mill, 1861). French socialist leader Jean Jaures, on his own, made this
quotas since passing into the second round is a contest by plurality rule, at which didactic presentation of the choice of electoral systems: 'This will kill that. So is
no specific threshold is required, and, in sorne of its variants, the final winner the formula of voting in [a single-member] district. These will kill those. So is the
may also be just the most voted candidate at the second round. formula of voting by list without proportional representation. These and those
The consequences of the different electoral formulas just revised can be sum- will have their fair share. So is the formula of voting by list with proportional
marized as follows. First, the smaller the number of seats (both in the total representation'.
assembly and in every district), the higher the number of votes which can be However, in addition to fairness arguments, group self-interest has also some-
sufficient for a party to receive a seat - this is the value usually called the threshold times been explidt. For instance, the leader of the German socialist party, Wilhelm
of exclusion. The smaller the number of seats and the higher the corresponding Liebknecht, addressed the annual conference of his party in 1890 with these
exclusion threshold, the more disadvantaged are, of course, the small parties words: 'Our party would derive great advantages from the introduction of this
and the more advantaged are the larger ones. Second, the smaller the quota, the electoral system [proportional representation] . . . Under the present electoral
more advantaged are the larger parties which can obtain higher numbers of system the greater part of our votes is lost - whereas under proportional representation
quotas rewarded with seats. In particular, plurality rule, whose quota is, as our strength in parliament would be doubled or tripled' (in Rustow, 1950: 121).
mentioned, whatever value higher than zero, however small, maximizes the In fact, majoritarian systems have been supported by successful actors in single
representation of the largest party. Among the basic formulas of proportional dominant or frequently alternating two-party systems - typically formed by
representation previously discussed, the Jefferson-d'Hondt 'sufficient' quota, which conservatives and liberals or, in more recent times, by conservatives and socialists.
is relatively small, maximizes the representation of those parties larger than the In contrast, proportional representation is usually favoured in emerging multi-
average. party systems by different types of actors: on the one side by incumbent conservatives
or liberals under threat of losing their privileged position, on the other side by
The choice o(proportional representation minority but growing opposition parties, traditionally including socialists, christians
This analysis may allow us to identify sorne basic strategic criteria of electoral and ethnic parties. In a summary survey it can be observed that, among the earliest
system choice. It can be expected, in short, that tite large will prefer tite small and countries to adopt proportional representation in the late nineteenth and early
tite small will prefer tite large, specifically that dominant, optimistic or risk-prone and twentieth centuries, 'Belgium had essentially a three-party system befare it adopted
would-be large parties will prefer: (1) small assemblies; (2) small district magnitudes; proportional representation in 1900, Denmark had a four-party system during
and (3) small quotas. In other words, large parties should be expected to prefer most of the period in which it employed a British-type of electoral system, Nor-
assemblies with a relatively low number of seats, apportionments creating small way had at least three major parties on the eve of the adoption of proportional
numbers of seats per district, as well as plurality rule rather than proportional representation in 1921, Switzerland had tour parties in the last elections under
representation formulas and, among the latter, the Jefferson-d'Hondt formula the plurality system, and Germany had anywhere between a six- to twelve-party
which implies relatively small quotas rather than the Hamilton-Hare formula system depending on the criterion used to define it' (Grumm, 1958: 374). A more
or other variants. Of course, high numbers of districts and high legal thresholds systematic test is presented in the following section of this chapter, showing that,
belong to the same set of preferences. Conversely, seriously challenged, pessi- indeed, multi-party systems already existed in most countries when electoral
mistic or risk-averse and would-be small parties should be expected to prefer: (1) systems of proportional representation were chosen in modero times.
48 /osep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 49

Mixed systems replaced in voters' support by the opposition, as in Italy under the tension
Less straightfoiward calculations than here generically assumed, as well as successive between the governmental christian-democrats whose popularity had worn away,
refinements in the invention and design of electoral formulas and procedures, can and the communists who were always in contention but never won, and in Japan
account not only for specific combinations of proportional representation formulas after sorne wearing away of the long-term governing liberal-democrats under pres-
and district magnitudes, but also for the choice of intermediate or mixed electoral sure from the socialists and other minority and divided parties in opposition, in
systems. Three basic categories of so-called 'mixed' systems can be distinguished, both cases since the mid-1990s.
which have been called coexistence (involving different rules for different sets of In contrast to these types of mixed systems, other combinations of rules and
voters and seats), multiple tier allocation (involving one vote per voter and two procedures are much more easily to be classified as either majoritarian or propor-
or more rules) and parallel systems (involving two votes and two rules) - although tional. The first category may include electoral systems in which an absolute
loose vocabulary is widespread. majority rule is used to allocate most seats, and only in the case where no party
Coexistence means that different rules and procedures are used in different districts obtains such a majority is a formula of proportional representation applied. This
to fill different portions of the assembly seats. This has been the case, for instance, type of system involves one vote per voter and one rule, with another rule just in
in Costa Rica since 1913, Greece in 1956 or Panama since 1983, where sorne districts reserve (or, as has been suggested, as 'supplementary' or 'conditional'). A few
are decided by plurality rule and others by proportional representation. would-be dominant parties betted on this type of system in France in 1919 and
Multiple tier allocation involves a single ballot but two or more rounds of 1951, and in Italy in 1923 and 1953 - in most cases without obtaining the majority
counting the same votes by different rules to allocate different portions of seats in representation they were expecting.
the assembly. A typical combination includes one round of counting by plurality On the other side, proportional representation systems can also be organized by
rule and another round by sorne formula of proportional representation - as in using different formulas at different tiers, that is at districts including different
South Korea in 1960 and again since 1987, Mexico since 1986 or Taiwan since distributions of voters such as national, regional and local. Cases include Belgium
1991. This type of system allows electoral law-makers to make well-tuned calcula- since 1919, Denmark and Germany since 1920, Greece in a number of experiments
tions and adjustments, since while it establishes complex and sophisticated with three tiers since 1926, the Netherlands since 1933, Italy since 1946, or Ecuador
voting counts, it reduces voters' choice to a single decision not permitting much since 1978. Finally, personalized proportional representation (also called mixed-
strategic behaviour. member proportional systems or additional member systems, among other
Finally, parallel systems give each voter two votes to select candidates for two names) distinguishes each vote as valid both for an individual candidate competing
different portions of seats which are allocated by two different rules. This type of in single-member districts by plurality rule and for a party list in a large district by
system may result from intermediate compromises, at either explicit negotiations proportional representation. In contrast to mixed systems, however, the allocation
or underlying calculations, between less-than-secure incumbent rulers which of seats is 'compensatory', which means that those seats obtained by a party at
would have preferred to be able to maintain or establish plurality or majority rules, single-member district level are discounted from those obtained from the total
and increasingly emerging but not oveiwhelming opposition groups preferring pool of the assembly seats by proportional representation. This type of system was
proportional representation systems. In contrast to the previous type of multiple-tier pioneered in Denmark in 1915. As the system was established in the Federal
allocation, parallel mixed systerns allow voters to split their ballot between candidates Republic of Germany in 1953, each voter has two votes. In fact each party receives
or lists belonging to different parties, thus permitting a rather subtle revelation of a number of seats based on its proportion of party list votes; then about half of
preferences. However, the resulting composition of the assembly can be distorted the total seats in parliament are occupied by those individual candidates with
by the use of different allocation principies and rules. Of course, the advantage of higher numbers of individual votes in single-member districts, while the rest are
the larger parties and the degree of disproportionality in representation will be selected from the party's closed lists. With this combination, a high proportionality
higher the higher the portion of seats allocated by plurality or majority rule. between a party's votes and seats and closeness and accountability of sorne individual
An early case combining plurality rule and proportional representation in 'parallel' candidates to voters can be achieved - a combination that most properly deserves
mixed systems was Brazil in 1933. A number of 'parallel' systems have also been the epithet of 'the best of both worlds'. This type of system was also adopted in
established in recent processes of democratization in which institutional formulas Bolivia, New Zealand and, temporarily, in Venezuela in the 1990s, during proc-
have been chosen under rather balanced relationships of forces between the esses to open or broaden the political system to more pluralistic party configura-
incumbent rulers and the opposition, as in Russia and severa! countries in Central tions.
and Eastern Europe in the l 990s. Likewise, parallel mixed systems have been
Ope11 a11d closed ballots
compromised in better-established democratic systems in which a Iong-term
dominant party has entered into clear decline but has not been completely The complexity of formulas such as those just reviewed suggests that electoral
systems can be chosen not only for the inter-party allocations of seats which are
 50 Josep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Clloice 51

the result, but also far their consequences on intra-party competition between Second, the single transferable ballot can also promote high intra-party individual
individual candidates. Roughly speaking, while strongly independent individual competition among candidates. Actually, this was the first type of ballot invented
candidates should be expected to prefer systerns permitting voters the opportunity to far proportional representation electoral systems. Early proposals oriented to
chose among individuals, compact, disciplined parties will prefer to establish making voters choose among individual candidates were gradually refined: by
nornination systerns of candidates by which the choice of voters will be determined English schoolteacher Thomas W. Hill in 1821 calling voters to gather in groups
by party labels rather than by their individual characters. with the same preferences, as was the subject of an experiment in the Southern
Four types of formula are revised in the following paragraphs along these Unes: Australian colony of Adelaide in 1839; by Danish conservative prime minister
(1) prlmary elections; (2) open ballot or panachage, as well as ordinal single Carl-Christopher-Georg Andrae far the election of a minority portian of seats far
transferable vote; (3) preferential vote far individual candidates, including limited the joint assembly of Denmark and Schleswig in 1855 (not the Danish parliament);
ballot in majority systems, and double vote and open lists in proportional repre- and by English lawyer Thomas Hare, first in two books published in 185 7 and
sentation; and (4) categorlcal vote, including single ballot in majority systems and 1859 with the impractical proposal of establishing a single national district which
closed lists in proportional representation. The arder in which these formulas are would require enormous computing effort, and only precisely establishing the
discussed presumably corresponds to a gradation from higher to lower opportun- procedures to transfer ballots from voters' first to second and further preferences
ities far individual candidates to campaign and attract votes. Regarding the choice in 1865.
of electoral rules and formulas, it can be expected that the more open the selection In its more elaborated form, proportional representation with single-transferable
of individual candidates, the lower tite pressure tl1at can be expected for 'opening' tite ballot requires each voter to rank individual candidates. Seats are allocated to
electoral system, as will be discussed below. candidates who have obtained a quota of voters' first preferences, while in the
First, prlmary elections, which began to be used to nominate presidential remaining ballots votes are transferred to the following candidates in voters' ordinal
candidates in the United States in 1912, are presently held in the US, as well as in preferences. Thus far sorne voters only their first preference is accounted far,
a number of other countries, to select single-winner individual candidates far while far others favouring less popular candidates and selected at random severa!
single-member offices such as president, governor and congressmen in single- preferences are taken into account. Intra-party competition among individual
member districts, or top list candidates. Primary elections can include a relatively candidates is, with this ballot, at a maximum, and should correspond to weakly
large number of candidates located at various positions along the policy-ideology organized parties. This is the form of proportional representation that has pre-
spectrum. This is in contrast to the usual restrictions in competitions far single- vailed in former British colonies, including Ireland since 1922, the Australian
member offices, which tend to focus on a couple of major candidates. In this Senate since 1949, anda number of cities in the United States, especially from
sense, a primary election can be compared to the first round in a majority the 1920s to the 1940s.
electoral system with two rounds far their role in selecting the very few candi- Third, ballots based on party lists of candidates were proposed by socialist
dates that will actually compete far office. A high number of candidates can enter Víctor Considerant and began to be used in sorne Swiss cantons after 1861, as well
the race and find the subsequent results acceptable far the opportunities that as far nationwide parliamentary elections in Belgium and Serbia after 1899 and in
have been given to compete. most of the other countries adopting proportional representation in the years
However, since, in contrast to the first round in an open election, each primary fallowing. Open lists, preferential ballot as well as personalized proportional
election is reserved to select only one political party's or coalition's candidate, representation and voting far 'lemas' (brands) and 'sublemas' allow the voter to
voters' participation tends to be much lower in the latter than in the former. In select a party candidacy and one or more individual candidates. Variants include
the United States, far example, participation in presidential primary elections far compulsory or optional preferences, the latter permitting a vote for a party list as
the two majar parties since they were generalized in 1972 has been, on average, given. The basic procedure requires ali preferential votes far either individual
about one-third of the participation in the corresponding real presidential election. candidates or party lists to be counted as votes far the corresponding party; after
All students of these experiences have noted that primary voters are non-representative each party has been allocated the number of seats corresponding to those votes,
of their parties' voters, and even less of the whole electorate. In general, primary they are filled partly with those individual candidates who have received higher
voters tend to favour more extreme or outsider candidates than the electors so numbers of preferences and partly by other candidates provided in the list. Of
distorting electoral competition in a remarkable way. The probability that non~ of course, the higher the number of individual preferences that each voter can express,
the candidates in the election corresponds to the median voter's preference, as the higher the individual candidates' competition to fill the corresponding seats
revealed regarding the candidates running in the primary election, is, thus, much can be expected to be. Open lists permitting the voter to selecta few candidates,
higher than the probability that no median voter's candidate survives at the usually from one to three, have been used in most countries of Western Europe,
second round when the first round is open to competition among all parties. presently including Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Greece and Sweden , as
52 fosep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 53

well as in Latin American countries like Brazil and Peru, while personalized • c arey, John and Matthew S. Shugart (1995) 'Incentives to Cultivate a Personal Vote: A
proportional representation is used, with double vote, in Germany, Bolivia and Rank Ordering of Electoral Formulas', Electoral Studies, 14, 4: 417-39.
New Zealand, as mentioned, and 'lemas' in Uruguay. • Colomer, Josep M. (2001) Political institutions. De1riócracy and Social Choice. New York and
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
In this perspective, the single-transferable ballot previously discussed, as well as • eotteret, Jean-Marie and Claude Emeri (1973) Les systernes é/ectora11x. París: Presses Univer-
the open ballot or 'panachage' used in Switzerland, could be considered extreme sitalres de France.
cases, beyond the opportunities supplied by open lists or double vote, since they • Cox, Gary W. (1997) Making Votes Count. Strategic Coordination in the World's Electoral
permit candidates to be selected from different parties and thus promote very Systems. New York: Cambridge University Press.
high intra-party individual competition. At the other extreme, the system of • Duverger, Maurice (1950) L'influence des systemes é/ectoraux sur la vie politiq11e, Cahiers de la
Fondation Nationale des Sciences Politiques, Vol. 16. Paris: Armand Colin.
closed lists actually restricts the voters' choice to a party's label, since it does not • Duverger, Maurice (1951) Les parties politiq11es. Paris: Seuil (English trans. Political Parties:
permit any modification in the order of candidates as given by the party. From Their Organization and Activity in the Modem State. New York: Wiley, 1954).
the point of view of individual candidates' selection, closed lists, which are presently • Farrell, David M. (2001) Electoral Systems. A Comparative Introd11ction. London and
used, for instance, in Argentina, Portugal, Spain and Venezuela, can be compared New York: Palgrave - now Palgrave Macmillan.
• Grofman, Bernard and Arend Lijphart (eds) (1986) Electoral Laws and T11eir Political Con-
to the single ballot in single-member districts, as used in Britain and the United
seq11ences. New York: Agathon.
States. None of these categorical formulas permits anything other than total accept- • Hoag, Clarence and George Hallett (1926) Proportiona/ Representation. New York: Macmillan.
ance or total rejection of the candidacy as presented by one of the parties in contest. • Katz, Richard 5. (1980) A Theory of Parties and Electoral Systems. Baltimore, MD: Johns
Regarding the choice of electoral rules, candidate selection procedures and Hopkins University Press.
ballot formulas with relative openness, such as primary elections, single-transferable • Katz, Richard S. (1997) Democracy and Elections. New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Lakeman, Enid (1974) How Democracies Vote: A St11dy of Electoral Systems. London: Faber
ballot, open lists and double vote, can have a counterweighting effect on
& Faber.
demands for replacing the existing electoral system. Tlie more open the selection of • LeDuc, L., Richard Niemi and Pippa Norris (eds) (1996) Comparing Democracies: Elections
candidates, the lower the pressure that can be expected for 'opening' tJie electoral system, ar1d Voting in Global Perspective. London: Sage.
since the latter's restrictions may be somehow reduced by the former feature. This • Lijphart, Arend (1994) Electoral Systems and Party Systems. A Study of Twenty-Seven Democrades,
relation may help to explain, for instance, the stability of such restrictive electoral 1945-1990. New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Martin, Pierre (1994) Les systemes électora11x et les modes de scmtin. Paris: Montchrestien.
rules as single-member congressional districts, single-winner presidential elections,
• Massicotte, Louis and André Blais (1999) 'Mixed Electoral Systems: A Conceptual and Empir-
plurality rule and bipartism in the United States, due, at least in part, to the openness ical Survey', Electoral Studies, 18: 341-66.
of primary elections. It may also be significant that primary elections were generalized • Penadés de la Cruz, Alberto (2000) Los sistemas elementales de representadón. Madrid: Instituto
to almost all states in the US in response to increasing pressures from new groups Juan March.
and political proposals since the 1960s. The experience of primary elections • Perrineau, Pascal and Dominique Reynie (2001) Dictionnaire d11 vote. París: Presses Univer-
in Latin America, especially in Venezuela since the late 1960s and in Argentina, sitaires de France.
• Rae, Douglas W . (1967) Tlie Political Co11seq11e11ces of Electoral Laws. New Haven, CT: Yale
Chile and Uruguay since the late 1990s also suggests that this device can be University Press.
adopted in well-established presidential regimes when they receive new demands • Reynolds, Andrew, and Ben Reilly (eds) (1997) The Intemational IDEA Handbook of Electora/
for greater inclusion from various political groups against the restrictions inherent System Design. Stockholm: Intemational Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance.
in any presidential electoral system which tends to centre competition on a very • Shugart, Matthew S. and Martin P. Wattenberg (eds) (2001) Mixed-Member Electoral
Systems. The Best of &th Worlds? New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press.
few potentially winning candidates. Conversely, and by the same kind of argument,
• Taagepera, Rein (2001) 'Party Size Baselines Imposed by Institutional Constraints: Theory
we can expect that the more open the electoral system regarding the selection of for Simple Electoral Systems', /011mal ofTheoretical Politics, 13, 4: 331-54.
individual candidates, the lower can be expected to be the pressure for primary • Taagepera, Rein and Mathhew S. Shugart (1989) Seats and Votes. The Effects and Detenninants
elections. ofE/ectora/ Systems . New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

Further reading The electoral system evolution

• Blais, André (1988) 'The Classification of Electoral Systems', European /011mal of Political
Research, 16: 99-110. According to the discussion presented in the previous sections, several general
• Bogdanor, Vernon and David E. Butler (1983) Democracy and Elections. Electora/ Systems tests of the basic propositions regarding actors' motives and electoral system
and Their Political Conseq11ences. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University changes and their observable implications will be here developed. Data are col-
Pres s.
lected in five pairs of summary tables at the end of each of the introductory chap-
• Bowler, Shaun and Bernard Grofman (eds) (2000) Elections in Australia, Ireland, and
Malta 1mder the Single Transferable Vote. Reflections on an Embedded Instit11tion. Ann Arbor: ters to the five world regions covered in this book - the Americas, Western
University of Michigan Press. Europe, Eastem Europe, Africa and Asia and the Pacific - in each case for the
 54 fosep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 55

Assembly (lower or single chamber) and for the Presidency. The relevant informa- Likewise, presidential electoral systems are classified as follows:
tion is summarized in Summary Tables lA and lB (at the end of this introductory
part). • college or indirect election;
The tables include 289 electoral systems, all those having been used in 2, 145 • simple plurality in direct elections (as in the following categories);
elections (1,601 for assemblies an 544 for presidencies) with minimally acceptable • qualified plurality (33 per cent, or 40 per cent, or 45 per cent, etc.) with a second
levels of political competition and available data in 94 countries since the early round (either by plurality, by majority runoff, or by the Assembly);
nineteenth century. Countries are selected for having more than one million • majority with a second round (either by plurality, by majority runoff, or by the
inhabitants and sorne democratic experience. The latter criterion is operational- Assembly);
ized as having appeared as 'free', or with seores of 3 or Iower out of 7, in 30 • majority with single transferable or supplementary vote.
Freedom House annual reports (1972-2002) for a period encompassing at least
two successive elections. For the countries selected, all electoral systems used in The most relevant propositions and observable implications previously presented
minimally competitive elections in any period are included (even in not fully are submitted to empírica! scrutiny in the following paragraphs.
democratic elections with restrictions on voting rights or candidacies). We
exclude only dictatorial periods and fake elections with a single candidacy or won Changes to electoral systems sltould be expected to be produced in favour of i11creasi11gly
by the incumbent with open fraud (which are alternative ways of choosing an i11cl11sive fonnulas ratlter than against. So we should find a significantly hlgher number of
'electoral system'). Roughly speaking, available data are from the early nineteenth changes from indirect to direct elections, from unanimity to majority rules, from
century onwards for most countries in Western Europe and the Americas, a few in majority rules to mixed systems, and from mixed systems to proportional repre-
Central Europe in the 1920s, since independence after the Second World War in sentation, or other changes between categories in this direction than the other
a nuniber of countries in Africa, Asia and the Pacific area, and from more recent way around. Summary Tables lA and lB summarize data of 154 electoral system
democratization periods in other countries in these latter regions and in Eastern changes. We proceed to separate analysis of the 126 assembly and 28 presidential
Europe. Data allow us to count 154 electoral system changes in 56 countries. In electoral system changes.
order to proceed to checks with complete and more homogeneous data, tests are For assembly elections, we analyse, first, all cases collected since the nineteenth
also conducted for changes only produced during democratic periods and having century and, second, only changes during the present democratic periods. For total
!asted to the present (end of 2002), including 36 electoral system changes in 29 data available since the 11i11etee11tlt ce11t11ry we have counted 82 major electoral system
1

countries. cl1anges for assemblies between the fo11r basic categories indirect, majority, mixed and
Electoral systems are classified separately for assembly and for presidential proportional in 41 countries, as shown in Table 1.3. The countries with the highest
elections. Consistent with the previous discussion, four basic categories of numbers of changes are, of course, among those with the longest periods registered,
electoral systems for the assembly are distinguished, with a few subcategories to but, within this set, they are, interestingly, concentrated in Mediterranean Europe:
distinguish between severa! formulas and procedures. From less to more inclusive, Greece with 9 major changes, France with 7, Italy and Portugal with 6 changes
they are: each, and Spain with 4 (in the rest of the world, only Brazil with 6 major changes
and Denmark with 4 are above three changes). The countries mentioned have
• indirect elections; experienced high political regime instability, of which electoral system changes
• majority rule, including three subcategories:
- majority 1 - multi-member districts with bloc ballot;
Table 1.3 Major changes of assembly electoral system
- majority 2 - multi-member districts with limited (including single non-
transferable) or cumulative ballots;
New system
- majority 3 - single-member districts;
• mixed systems, including 'coexistence', 'parallel' systems and 'multiple tier' allo- Previous system Indirect Majority Mixed Proportional
cations combining plurality or majority rules with proportional representation;
Indlrect 12 1 5
• proportional representation, including three subcategories: Majority 2 13 27
- proportional 1 - average district magnitude lower than nine, any formula and Mixed o 1 8
procedure; Proportional o 7 6 •
- proportional2 - average district magnitude hlgher than eight, with closed lists;
- proportional3 - average district magnitude higher than eight, with open lists, Note: Changes In the upper-right part are toward more inclusive systems
(66 changes), whlle those in the lower-left part are toward more exclusive ones
open ballot ('panachage') or personalized PR. (16 changes).
56 /osep M. Colomer Strategy ami History of Electoral System Choice 57

are a component, but also sorne specific inclination to electoral system manipula- Table 1.4 Changes of assembly electoral system
tion since in other countries with comparable degrees of political regime instability,
New system
particularly in Latín America, there have been fewer majar changes of electoral
system and those usually limited to fewer formulas. previous system Indirect Mali Mab Mah Mixed Prop 1 Prop 2 Pro1>3
In total, 66 changes ltave been in the expected direction taward more inclusive fonnulas,
Indirect * 7 1 4 1 3 1 1
while only 16 ltave implied reverse moves - a proportio11 of more tha11 4 to 1. More
Majority1 2 2 12 3 6 o
specifically, 18 electoral systems based on indirect elections have been replaced o o 2 2 5 1 o
MajoritY2
with direct elections, while on only 2 occasions have indirect elections been Majority3 o 7 2 8 5 4 5
re-established (in both cases also to be replaced with direct elections later on); Mixed o o 1 o 3 2 3
40 majority rule systems have been replaced with mixed or proportional rule Proportional 1 o 2 o 4 3 * 11
systems, while on only 2 occasions with indirect elections (as just mentioned); Proportional 2 o o o 1 o o 2

8 mixed systems have been replaced with proportional representation systems, Proportional 3 o o o o 3 3 2 *

while only 6 reverse moves can be identified. In total there have been 40 moves Notl!: lndlrect: indlrect electlons; Maj 1: maforlty rules In multi-member dlstricts; Malz: majority rules
to proportional representation (5 from indirect elections, 27 from majority sys- wlth Umlted or cumulatlve ballot; Mah: slngle-member districts; Mlxed: mlxed systems; Prop,:
tems and 8 from mixed systems), while reverse moves from proportional systems proportlonal representatlon, average district magnltude < 9; Prop2: proportlonal representation, average
dlstrict magnltude > 8, closed llsts; Prop3: proportlonal representatlon, average dlstrlct magnitude > 8,
number only 13 (7 to majority and 6 to mixed systems). Actually the trend may open llst or double vote.
be under-evaluated for lack of information regarding sorne countries in which Changes In the upper-right part are toward more Inclusive systems (96 changes In total), whlle those In
indirect elections or plurality rule systems were replaced in remate periods. the lower left part are toward more exclusive ones (30 changes In total).
It is interesting to note that most of the new mixed systems have been tite result of
changes from indirect or majority mle systems, while only a few have been established direction. The general trend is also confirmed for all world regions: 27 more inclusive
from previous proportional representation systems. Specifically, while 1 mixed
to 4 more exclusive changes in 13 countries of the Americas, 48 to 20 in 15 countries
system was established from indirect elections and 13 mixed systems have been
in Western Europe, 10 to 4 in 12 countries in Eastern Europe, and 11 to 2 in
the result of reforms from majority rule systems, only 6 have resulted from previous
10 countries in Asia-Pacific.
proportional systems.
When the set of electoral system changes is limited to those produced during
These findings are confirmed for all world regions. The balance between 'inclusive'
present democratic periods, major changes between the four basic categories - indirect,
and 'exclusive' moves is positive in the Americas: 19 to 2; Western Europe: 31to12;
majority, mixed and proportional - are 19, as shown in Table 1.5. Of these, 14 llave
Eastern Europe: 8 to 1; and Asia-Pacific: 8 to O. In Africa there have been a
been in tlze expected direction toward more inclusive fonnulas, wllile only 5 lzave been in
significant number of changes in the expected direction since the independence
the opposite directio11 - a proportion close to 3 to 1. The relatively less overwhelming
movements in the 1960s, but we have only registered 1 reverse change within the
proportion of inclusive changes within present democratic regimes in comparison
present democratic periods.
to all previous periods is, of course, produced by the fact that indirect assembly
Taking also into account the eight subcategories of electoral system above
elections have not been in use longer in present democracies and the proportion of
distinguished, we have counted 126 cl1a11ges in 49 countries, as shown in
Table 1.4. Again, the countries with higher numbers of changes are France with
12 changes, Spain with 10, Greece and Portugal with 9 each, and Italy with 8. In total,
Table 1.5 Major changes of assembly electoral system in
96 changes have been in the expected direction toward more inclusive formulas, present democratic periods
while only 30 have been in the opposite direction - a proportion of 3.2 to l. The
general tendency is confirmed for changes between ali pairs of systems. Within Newsystem
majority rule systems, multi-member districts with bloc ballot have been replaced Proportional
Previous system Majority Mixed
with forms of limited or cumulative ballot on 2 cases and with single-member
districts on 12, a total of 14, while opposite direction moves have numbered only 7. Majority * 8 3
Regarding proportional representation systems, in 12 cases systems based on small Mixed o 3
districts (magnitudes lower than nine) producing low proportionality have been Proportional 2 3
replaced with larger districts, while the opposite move can only be observed on
Note: Changes In the upper-rlght part are toward more Inclusive
3 occasions; finally, within proportional systems with large district magnitudes, systems (14 changes in total), whlle those In the lower-left part are
we have registered 2 changes from closed lists to open lists and 2 in the opposite toward more exclusive ones (S changes In total).
58 fosep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 59

majority rule systems has been reduced by previous changes toward more inclusive Table 1.6 Changes of assembly electoral system in present democratic periods
formulas. In spite of this, however, the number of changes from majority rule
Newsystem
systems toward mixed and proportional representation systems is still very sig-
nificant: 8 and 3, respectively, so 11 in total, as opposed to only 2 in the opposite p,evious system Mali Mah Ma!J Mixed Prop 1 Prop 2 Prop3
direction.
More interesting is the tie that can be observed in changes between mixed and Majority 1 o 2 1 o o o
Majorityz o o 1 o o o
proportional systems: 3 in each direction. But these refer to fewer countries: 2 1 o 6 1 o 2
Majority3
having moved toward proportional systems (Bulgaria and Croatia) and 2 toward Mixed o o o • o 2 1
mixed systems (Madagascar and Italy, but the latter with a total of 3 changes, back Proportional 1 o o 2 1 o 5
and forth). The total balance does not make mixed systems a focal point of attrac- Proportional2 o o o o o • 1
tion from any other system: again, most of the new mixed systems have been the Proportional 3 o o o 2 1 1

result of changes either from dictatorships or from majority rule electoral systems,
Note: Maj 1: majorlty rules multl-member dlstrlcts; Malz: majority rules, llmlted or cumulatlve vote;
while only a few have been established from previous proportional representation Maj,: slngle-member dlstricts; Mlxed: mlxed systems; Prop 1: proportional representatlon, average dlstrict
systems. Specifically, while 7 mixed systems have been established in recent pro- magnltude < 9; Prop 2: proportlonal representatlon, average district magnltude > 8, closed llsts; Prop1:
cesses of democratization from authoritarian regimes (not counted in Tables 1.3 proportional representatlon, average dlstrict magnltude > 8, open llst or double vote.
Changes in the upper-rlght part are toward more Inclusive systems (22 changes In total), whlle those
and 1.4), 8 have been the result of reforms from majority rule systems, most of them In the lower-left part are toward more exclusive ones (8 changes In total).
also in new electoral democracies or semi-democracies moving fast towards more
inclusive formulas in the 1990s (Albania, Armenia, Lithuania, Philippines, Russia,
Thailand and Ukraine, while Japan is the only case having experienced such a Table 1.7 Changes of presidential electoral system
move among older democracies). In contrast, only 2 countries have adopted mixed
Newsystem
systems from proportional representation (Italy twice and Madagascar). This suggests
that mixed systems are, in most cases, an ersatz for proportional representation in Previous system College Plurality Q.-plurality Majority STV
countries recently emerged from authoritarian regimes or restrictive majority rule
Electoral college • 6 1 4 o
systems, as well as an intermediate step towards proportional representation systems • 2 5 o
Simple-plurality rule 2
when democracy endures. Qualified-plurality rules o o • 1 o
In total, reverse changes from proportional representation to mixed or majority Majority second-round 1 4 2 • o
rule systems within present democratic regimes are very few, only 5 moves in Single transferable vote o o o o •
4 countries, while the number of new proportional systems established is still
higher: 6. The balance between 'inclusive' and 'exclusive' moves is also positive Note: Changes in the upper-right part are toward more inclusive systems (19 changes in total),
whlle those In the lower-left part are toward more exclusive ones (9 changes In total).
in Eastem Europe: 6 to O, and in Asia: 6 to O. In Western Europe it looks negative,
2 to 4, but again this is due to several changes in just two countries: France moved
twice from proportional representation to a majority rule system (in 1958 and ministerial elections in recent periods: Germany, Estonia and Israel). Ali changes
1988) with one inverse move in between (1986), and Italy followed the same but one are in Latin America (the other is the replacement of college with direct
trajectory from proportional to mixed twice (1953 and 1993) with proportionality elections in Finland).
re-established in between (1956). In summary, 11 electoral colleges have been replaced with direct elections, while
Taking also into account the eight subcategories of electoral system distinguished 2 reverse moves in Argentina and Colombia have also been replaced with direct
above, we have counted 30 changes within presently existing democratic regimes, elections later on. On 7 occasions, simple-plurality rule has been replaced with more
as presented in Table 1.6. Of these, 22 have been in the expected direction inclusive formulas (2 qualified-plurality rules and 5 absolute-majority rules with
toward more inclusive formulas, while only 8 have been in the opposite direction - second rounds). Of the 4 reverse moves registered towards plurality rule, 3 have
a proportion of 2.75 to l. also been replaced with majority second-round rules in further periods. Looking
For presidential electoral system changes, we have in total 28 cases in 14 countries, at the whole story, 13 countries have experienced changes in different periods
as shown in Table 1.7. Of these cases, 19 llave bee11 in the expected directio11, while and produced a present electoral system different from the one in the most
only 9 in the opposite - a proportion of 2.1 to l. Actually 7 countries have experi- remate period registered. Of these, 10 countries have, in the end, moved in the
enced more than one change between electoral systems (while three other countries expected direction toward more inclusive electoral systems, while only 3 have
not included in the present count have suppressed direct presidential or prime moved in the opposite direction. Again, the trend can be under-evaluated for not
60 fosep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 61

including college or plurality elections in certain countries in sorne remate periods. Table 1.10 Number of assembly electoral systems over time
With the available information, at least one country, Peru, has passed through all
the stages in the expected arder of increasing inclusiveness: electoral college in Electoralsystem 1874 1922 1960 2002
1828, plurality rule in 1896, qualified-plurality (33 per cent) rule in 1931, and
Indirect elections 6 2
majority rule with a second-round runoff since 1978. Majorlty rules, 6 2 1 2
The trend is even stronger during the present democratic period, in which Majority rules 2 3 2 1
7 changes are registered, 6 in the expected direction and 1 in the opposite as Majorlty rules3 5 7 14 18
presented in Table 1.8. Specifically, 2 countries have abandoned electoral colleges Mixed systems 2 18
Proportional rep 1 10 12 19
for direct elections with a second round (by qualified-plurality in Argentina and
Proportional rep 2 2 3 12
by absolute-majority in Finland), and 4 have replaced plurality rule with second- Proportional rep3 6 8 20
round procedures (by qualified-majorities in Nicaragua and by absolute-majority Total countries: 20 33 39 89
in Colombia, Dominican Republic and Uruguay). Only Ecuador has moved within
second-round rules from absolute-majority to qualified-plurality. 4 Note: Maj 1: majorlty rules multi-member districts; Maj 2 : majority rules, llmited or
cumulative vote; Maj,: single-member dlstricts; Prop 1: proportlonal representation,
average distrlct magnitude < 9; Prop 2 : proportional representation, average district
The 11111nber and proportion of indirect elections and ma;ority electoral systems should magnltude > 8, closed llsts; Prop,: proportlonal representatlon, average dlstrlct
decrease over time, while co1111tries adopting proportional representation should not magnltude > 8, open llst or double vote.
abandon it in significant 11111nbers. The evolution of electoral systems in the
countries selected is, in fact, the result of the processes of choice analysed in the
previous paragraphs. Results are summarized in Tables 1.9, 1.10 and 1.11. The Table 1.11 Number of presidential electoral systems over time
dates chosen - 1874, 1922, 1960 and 2002- correspond to peaks in successive waves
Electoral system 1874 1922 1960 2002
of democratization, so that the number of cases in each date is higher than in
immediately previous and following years. The number of cases increase over time Electoral college 6 4 3 1
Slmple-plurality rule 4 9 10
Qualifted-plurality rules 1 5
Table 1.8 Changes of presidential electoral system in present democratic periods Majority second-round 6 3 33
Single transferable vote 1 2
New system Total countrles: 6 14 17 51
Previous system College Plurality Q.-plurality Majority SlV
Electoral college o 1 1 o until covering ali 89 countries with more than one million inhabitants that can
Simple-plurality rule o 1 3 o be considered democratic in 2002. (Four of the countries included in the analysis
Qualified-plurality rules o o o o of past periods have no present democratic regimes - Belarus, Cuba, Nigeria,
Majority second-round o o 1 o Pakistan - and one no longer exists - Czechoslovakia.)
Single transferable vote o o o o
The data collected strongly confirm the hypothesis that exclusive electoral sys-
Note: Changes in the upper-rlght part are toward more inclusive systems (6 changes in total), tems are more easily replaced. Indirect assembly elections decreased and virtually
while those In the lower-left part are toward more exclusive ones ( 1 change In total). disappeared in the early twentieth century. Majority rule, which was the basic
formula for broadening suffrage rights, opening political competition and demo-
cratizing in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, was replaced in its
Table 1.9 Number of basic assembly electoral systems over time
appeal by proportional representation, especially after the First World War; this
Electoral system 1874 1922
trend has intensified in recent processes of democratization. Mixed systems have
1960 2002
also spread widely in the most recent periods, although - as mentioned - this has
lndirect elections 6 2 been more a result of changes from majority rule systems than from proportional
Majority rules 14 11 16 20 representation ones. In total, for assembly elections, m11cl1 more titan half of tite
Mixed systems 2 18
Proportional representation present democracies in co1111tries with more than one million inhabitants use proportional
18 23 51
Total countries: 20
representation (57 per cent), while less titan 011e-fotutl1 use ma¡ority nile systems (23 per cent)
33 39 89
and one-fi~h use mixed systems (20 per cent).
62 /osep M. Colomer Stmtegy and History of Electoral System Choice 63

The evolution can also be observed within subcategories. Within majority rule for sorne pre-eminent occasions for such changes, such as constituent assemblies,
systems, multi-member districts, which were still 43 per cent of cases in the late that have not produced a major change to already existing inclusive electoral
nineteenth century, have been reduced to 10 per cent; within proportional repre- systems. The only cases excluded are those in which a new electoral system has
sentation systems, those with small districts (magnitudes lower than nine) were been preceded by a significantly long authoritarian period without elections, thus
a majority still in the l 920s, but they are now barely a third; within those pro- making the former party system irrelevant for the new electoral system choice, or
portional systems with large district magnitudes, almost two-thirds use open lists those during the nineteenth century with unavailable data. The average number
and similar procedures rather than closed lists. of effective parties immediately befare 49 electoral system changes in favour of
For presidential electoral systems, the evolution is also very strongly in the more inclusive formulas in 36 countries is 3.8, thus making it clear that multi-
expected direction. The number of cases also increase over time up to 51 coun- party systems are a fact prior and 11ot only s11bseq11ent to the adoption of assembly
tries. Electoral college procedures, which were once popular in the Americas, mies with proportio11al representation or presidential rules with a second ro1111d. The
have been reduced to the single case of the United States. Simple plurality rule, observations collected here suggest that when the number of effective parties
which was a typical formula for new direct presidential elections in the past, is not much higher than three, one or two larger parties can expect to become
is currently used by only one-fifth of the countries. Absolute-majority rule absolute winners under the existing majoritarian rules and, consequently, they
with a second round had already been popular in the early twentieth century, will tend to maintain them, while when the effective number of parties increases,
although at the time in ali but one of the six cases registered the second round in contrast, any party can risk becoming an absolute loser under majority rules,
was transferred to Congress. Nowadays, relatively inclusive majority rule and so they may prefer to move to mixed or proportional representation systems
qualified-plurality rules (the latter a recent innovation in a few countries), securing them a fair portion of seats. 5
both with a direct seco11d-ro1md nmoff between the two most voted candidates, A sample of changes in specific regions, time periods and type of electoral
encompass together three-fourths of tite co1mtries with preside11tial elections. The systems is presented in Table 1.12. First, data for nine early, innovative changes of
single transferable and supplementary votes remain the experience of only two electoral system in Western European countries from majority rule systems to
countries in the world. proportional representation in the early twentieth century show that the average
number of effective parties in the previous assembly elections was 4.0. This meaos
The change of a11 electoral system s/1011/d be more likely the higher the 11wnber of that, just befare the introduction of proportional representation, multi-party systems
effective parties in the initial i11stit11tio11al setting. The focus of our analysis is the already existed, certainly not as a consequence of the existing majority rule
immediately previous political situation from which a decision to change the electoral system but in spite of it and as a factor for its change. As a contrast, the
electoral system may be made, including constituent assemblies, electoral support of same index has been calculated for a few failed reforms of the electoral system.
the incumbent government, and negotiation or threat power of opposition parties. The introduction of proportional representation or a mixed system in the United
The formula for the effective number of parties captures the number of parties Kingdom failed in both 1918 and 1998 in the environment of a low degree of
weighted by their size (N =l/l: p 12, where p1 is the proportion of votes for each multi-partism, which can be estimated at 2.4 and 3.1 effective parties in votes,
party i). It can be presumed that the higher the effective number of parties, the respectively (and, of course, much more reduced in seats). In particular, on the
weaker the expectation for any single party to become the sure winner, and thus the latest occasion, the Labour Party programme for introducing proportional rules
more likely its preference for an inclusive electoral system permitting multi-partism could have been encouraged by the relatively high degrees of multi-partism in
to develop. Although the party's support in votes may not be transferred to a cor- votes in the two previous elections, in 1987 and 1993, as a consequence of the
responding degree of negotiation power within the institutions as a consequence higher dispersion of votes between Conservatives, Labour and the Liberal/Social
of being distorted by the existing restrictive electoral system, it can be considered Democratic alliance. The Labour victory in 1997, however, somehow dismissed
a rough proxy for their strength and expectation of support, which is the basis of this trend and re-established a single-party domination.
the corresponding threat or negotiation power. Expectations, however, may also Reverse changes from proportional representation to majority rule or mixed
form from recent trends marked by the emergence of new, still small, but already systems have also been attempted on a few interesting occasions in countries of
rising parties or pessimistic forecasts regarding its own support. Western Europe. In Germany it was formally promoted in 1967 by the would-be
Data on the effective numbers of parties in votes have been calculated for dominant Christian-Democrats, who could find encouragement in the relatively
elections immediately prior to 49 major electoral system changes in favour of reduced and decreasing numbers of effective parties in the two previous elections
more inclusive electoral formulas, that is from indirect or majority rule systems to -3.5 in 1961 and 3.1 in 1965. But the degree of pluralism was still sufficiently
mixed or proportional representation systems for the assembly and from college high to provoke the rejection of a move towards a more exclusive electoral
or plurality rule systems to second-round formulas for the presidency, as well as system not only from the smaller parties but also from the second-in-size but
64 fosep M. Colomer
Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 65

Table 1.12 Effective number of parties and electoral system change

Dominican R. 1995 1994 As. 2.8
Country Uruguay 1996 1994 As. 3.3
Year Previous election
Average 3.9
Year Type ENP
Failed changes:
Assembly: Changes from majority mle to proportional representation Unlted States 1956 1954 As. 2.0
Belgium 1899 1898 As. 3.7 1969 1968 As. 2.0
Sweden 1909 1908 As. 2.6 Honduras 1981 1980 Ct.As. 2.1
Denmark 1915 1913 As. 3.9 Venezuela 1999 1998 et.As. 6.3
Germany 1918 1912 As. 5.9 1998 Pdt. 2.1
Netherlands 1918 1913 As. 6.6
Switzerland 1918 1917 As. 3.4 Note: ENP: Effectlve number of partles =l/l: p 12, where p, Is the proportlon of votes for
ltaly 1919 1913 As. 2.7 party l. Prevlous electlons: As. - Assembly; Pdt. - Presldency; Ct.As. - Constituent Assembly.
Norway 1919 1918 As. 3.6 Intemal factionallzation of parties has not been taken lnto account, although lt was hlgh, for
Greece 1932 1928 As. 3.4 tnstance, In Brazll and Colombia.

Average 4.0
Costa Rica 1913 1913 Pdt. 2.9
Chile 1925 1921
wary Social-Democrats. In the Netherlands the Social-Democrats promoted a similar
As. 5.6
Colombia 1931 1930 Pdt. 2.0 change in 1977, but, in the face of a very high level of multi-partism - measurable
Cuba 1940 1940 et.As. 7.5 by the 6.9 effective parties in the previous election - they blatantly failed in their
Brazil 1945 1945 As. 3.7 purpose.
Bolivia 1952 1951 Pdt. 3.3
Argentina
In two other Western European countries moves from proportional representa-
1963 1962 As. 6.7
Ecuador 1978
tion to majority or mixed systems have been more successful, as previously
1978 Pdt. 4.8
Peru 1979 1978 et.As. 4.8 mentioned. In France, as is well known, the moves in 1958 and 1988 were com-
Guatemala 1985 1984 et.As. 7.7 pleted in spite of having systems with 6.1 and 4.7 effective parties in the respective
Average 4.9
previous elections. Major institutional regime changes, initially implemented
through a co11p d'état, helped success on the first occasion, while on the second it
Failed changes:
UK implied the re-establishment of the previously existing electoral system after
1918 1910 As. 2.4
1998 1997 As. 3.1
a single election with the new one. In Italy, as also mentioned, the first change
from a proportional to a mixed system was attempted in 1953, when the governing
Assembly: Changes from proportional representation to majority mle or mixed systems Christian-Democrats were encouraged by a dramatic reduction in the degree of
France 1958 1956 As. 6.1 multi-partism in the previous two elections, from 5.6 effective parties in 1946 to
1988 1986 As. 4.7
ltaly 1953 1948 As. 2.9
2.9 in 1948. They, however, failed to obtain the 50 per cent of popular votes that
1993 1992 As. 6.6 they themselves had targeted as the condition for the majority rule component of
Failed changes:
the new system to be applied and re-established proportional representation. The
Germany 1967 1965 As.
second reform to a new mixed system was introduced in 1993 in the environment
3.1
Netherlands 1977 1972 As. 6.9 of a high degree of multi-partism, measurable at 6.6 effective parties, but under
the illusion among sorne left circles that the ongoing dissolution of the Christian-
Presidential elections: Changes from college or plurality rule to qualified-plurality Democratic party would open a new period of hegemony of the left. During the
or absolute-majority with second round
Costa Rica 1936 1932 Pdt. 2.8
first three subsequent elections in which the new system has been used the number
Argentina 1972 1965 As. 4.9 of parties has decreased slightly but not dramatically, so making the system still
1994 1994 et.As. 3.o vulnerable to further changes.
Ecuador 1978 1978 Pdt. 4.8 Consistent with the general hypothesis here discussed, for ten innovative changes
Peru 1979 1978 Ct.As. 4.8
Guatemala
of assembly electoral system from majority rules to proportional representation in
1985 1984 et.As. 7. 7
Brazil countries of Latín America during the twentieth century we also find a high average
1986 1982 As. 2.7
Colombia 1991 1990 et.As. 2.2 number of effective parties in the constituent assembly or the immediately previous
election, at 4.9, as shown in Table 1.12. Similarly, ten changes of presidential
66 fosep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 6 7

electoral systems from electoral college or plurality rule formulas to qualified- time, while more inclusive systems could only be replaced if they had not had
plurality or absolute-majority formulas with a second round have been introduced, the time to obtain endogenous support. Specifically, systems based on indirect
most recently, in nine countries in which the average number of effective parties elections or majority rules !asted for about ten elections each on average before
was 3.9, as also shown in Table 1.12. Likewise, a few formal occasions of changing they were replaced, while newer and more inclusive systems, that is mixed and
presidential electoral rules toward more inclusive formulas have failed in the proportional systems, were changed very soon: in most cases after ;ust one election (and
context of pure two-party systems: in the United States in 1956 and 1969 where after less than three or four elections on average, respectively) - in other words,
the corresponding constitutional amendments to replace the electoral college before they were entrenched in the organization and action of already existing
with direct elections passed the House but died in the Sena te, and in Honduras in political parties and electoral candidates.
1981 where the constituent assembly retained plurality rule. In contrast, plurality With regard to the presently existing electoral systems, both majority rule and
rule for the election of president was also maintained in the new constitution of proportional representation systems have endured sorne considerable time on
Venezuela in 1999, in spite of having been approved by a constituent assembly average, which would imply that most of them may be difficult to change in the
elected with 6.3 effective parties, together with other restrictive institutional future. The duration of present majority systems, however, relies significantly on
reforms concentrating powers in the presidency. This decision was encouraged by the extreme case of the House of Representatives of the United States, which
the results of the previous presidential election, won at a single round by a large accounts for almost a third of the total number of elections held with presently
coalition majority with 56 per cent of votes and only 2.1 effective parties in existing majority systems; if this is dropped from the sample, the average duration
the system. However, in spite of the very high concentration of power in the of presently existing majority systems is reduced to 11.3, only slightly higher than
presidency, the high degree of legislative multi-partism sustained further pressure those that have been replaced in the past. In contrast, most of the presently used
for opening up the political system in Venezuela. mixed systems are still recent, having been used in most cases for only two or
three elections, which may suggest that a number of them (that is, the actors
Change of an electoral system co11ld be more likely tite shorter its d11ratio11. If this playing within the existing systems) may be able to present softer resistance to
hypothesis were correct, the duration of the electoral systems that have been change than most of the majority and proportional current systems.
changed should be, as a whole, lower than the presently existing systems. Testing The available data on the duration of presidential electoral systems, as shown in
this hypothesis, however, is difficult because we do not know whether and Table 1.14, are not abie to give support to the hypothesis previously presented
when the present electoral systems will be changed in the future; their duration, regarding the longer duration of existing electoral systems. This may be partly due
as measured until the end of 2002, will thus be undervalued. The duration of the to the inherent exclusiveness of ali presidential electoral systems, which necessarily
four basic types of assembly electoral system in terms of the number of elections produce a single absolute winner and may provoke subsequent rejection by ali the
at which they have been used is summarized in Table 1.13. losers, in contrast to many assembly electoral systems permitting multiple parties
Indirect elections disappeared, as previously observed. For each of ali the to exist and share representation. It can be noted that, in the past, the average
presently existing basic electoral system types - that is those based on majority duration of presidential electoral systems was even shorter than the average dura-
rules, mixed systems and proportional representation - the data collected seems tion of assembly electoral systems that were also based upon plurality or majority
to support the hypothesis presented above: electoral systems that were replaced in rules (shown in Table 1.13). Low numbers of elections for current presidential
the past had been, on average, less durable than those presently existing. Also, electoral systems also reflect the fact that most of them exist in recent democrades
restrictive electoral systems were replaced even though they had endured a long in Latin America and are thus still necessarily short-living. Ali the current formulas

Table 1.13 Duration of assembly electoral systems Table 1.14 Duration of presidential electoral systems

Electoral system Electoralsystem

lndirect Majority Mixed Proportional College Plurality Q. plurality Majority STV

Systems replaced in tite past Systems replaced in the past
No. of electoral systems counted 17 40 9 12 No. of electoral systems counted 11 9 1 7 o
Average no. of elections/system 9.4 10.2 2.9 3.9 Average no. of elections/system 8.2 7.3 6.0 7.7 o
C11rre11t systems (end of 2002) Current systems (end of 2002)
No. of electoral systems counted o 22 18 50 No. of electoral systems counted 1 11 5 34 2
Average no. of elections/system o 15.7 3.5 11.2 Average no. of elections/system 54 6.9 5.4 4.1 6.5
68 fosep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 69

of direct presidential elections have been used, so far and on average, during Logit regression: Dichotomous dependent variable: log (X/1 -X), with X= 1 for changes
in favour of more inclusive systems or present proportional representation, mixed or
shorter periods than those that were changed in the past - in most cases, for only second-round presidential systems, and X=0 for changes in favour of more exclusive sys-
two or three elections - which may suggest that they may still be significantly tems or present indirect elections, assembly majority rules, or college or plurality presiden-
vulnerable to further changes. tial systems. Independent variable: the effectlve number of parties in the election
immediately prior to electoral system change or constituent assembly or the latest election
with the present systems before 2003. Number of cases: 142. Coefficient: 0.259. Standard
Notes error: 0.154. Significance: 0.092. Cases included: from indirect to majority to mixed orto
proportional systems - Albania 1992, Argentina 1963, Argentina 1972, Argentina 1994
l. To be fair, Maurice Duverger also subtly noted that 'the first effect of proportionality is to (presidential (P)), Armenia 1995, Belgium 1899, Bolivia 1952, Brazil 1945, Brazil 1986 (P),
maintain an already existing multiplicity ... On the whole, proportional representation Bulgaria 1991, Chile 1925, Colombia 1931, Colombia 1991 (P), Costa Rica 1913, Costa Rica
maintains virtually without change the party system existing at the time of its adoption', 1936 (P), Croatia 2000, Cuba 1940, Denmark 1915, Dominican Republic 1995 (P), Ecuador
but he did not elaborate (Duverger, 1950: 346). For an early, although also brief, statement 1978, Ecuador 1997, El Salvador 1984, France 1946, France 1986, Germany 1918, Greece
more explicitly putting the hypothetical line of causality upside down, see John G. Grumm: 1932, Greece 1936, Greece 1955, Greece 1958, Guatemala 1985, Indonesia 2002, Italy 1919,
'the generally-held conclusions regarding the causal relationships between electoral Italy 1946, ltaly 1956, Japan 1994, Moldova 1993, Netherlands 1918, New Zealand 1993,
systems and party systems might well be revised . . . . it may be more accurate to conclude Norway 1919, Peru 1933, Peru 1979, Philippines 1995, Russia 1993, South Africa 1994, Swe-
that P.R. is a result rather than a cause of the party system in a given country' (Grumm, den 1909, Swltzerland 1918, Thailand 1997, Ukraine 1993, Uruguay 1996 (P); in the oppo-
1958: 375). More extensively, Leslie Lipson developed sorne historical analysis from the site direction - France 1958, France 1988, Greece 1928, Greece 1933, Greece 1952, ltaly
premise that 'chronologically, as well as logically, the party system is prior to the electoral 1953, ltaly 1993. Present electoral systems: all 94 countries in Summary Table lA except
system' (Lipson, 1964: 343); similarly, Bo Siirlvick (1982) developed a strategic analysis of Belarus, Czechoslovakia, Cuba, Nigeria and Pakistan.
the choice of electoral systems in Scandinavian countries; Vernon Bogdanov echoed the
hypothesis that electoral systems could be the dependent variable, but he denied any
possibility of generalizing (Bogdanor, 1982: 254-61). Other authors could be mentioned References
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electoral systems, a subject deserving to be dealt with elsewhere. For sources and discussion, Alberigo, Giuseppe et al. (eds) (1991) Conciliomm Oec1unenicornm Decreta. Bologna: Dehoniane
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 74 /osep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electora l System Choice 75

Summary Table I A Assembly electoral systems • Ireland: PR 1 - 1922- 25

• Israel: PRz - 1949- 1; 1951 - 6; 1973- 5; 1992 - 3
• Albania: MaiJ-1991 -1; Mix -1992- 3 • [ta /y: Mah-1879 - 4; Maj¡ - 1882- 3; Mab-1892- 7; PR 3 - 1919- 3; Mix - 1923 - 1 //
• Argentina: Maj 1 - 1826- 1 //1853 - 9; Maj 2 - 1912- 10 // Mah- 1946- 2 // 1957 - 4 // PR3 - 1946 - 2; Mix - 1953 -1; PR3 - 1956- 9; Mix -1 993- 3
PR2 - 1963- 1//1973- 1//1983 -10 • Jamaica: Mah - 1962 - 10
• Annenia: Mah-1990- l; Mix-1995 - 1; 1999- 1 • fapan: Maiz-1946-1; 1947-19; Mix -1994 -2
• Australia: Mah- 1902- 6; 1918- 33 • Kenya: Mah - 1963 - 10
• Austria: PR 1 - 1918- 4 // 1945 - 8; PR 3 - 1970- 9 • Korea, South : Mab- 1950- 1 // Mix- 1962- 3 // 1987 - 4
• Bangladesh: Mah-1971 - 1//1979- 1// 1991 - 3 , Latvia: PR3 -1922- 4 // 1992- 4
• Belanis: Mah - 1996 - 2 • Lebanon: Maj¡ -1943- 3; 1953 - 6 // 1992- 3
• Belgium: Maj¡ -1831-17; 1877 -11 ; PR 1 -1899 - 8; PR 3 - 1919 - 7 /! 1946-18 , Lithuania: Mah-1920 - 1; PR2 - 1922 - 3 // Mah - 1990 - 1; Mix - 1992 - 2; 2000 - 1
• Benin: PR 1 - 1991 - 3 , Macedonia: Mix - 1998 - 2
• Bolivia: Maiz-1924- ?; PR2- 1952- 5 // 1966- 1//1980- 4; PR 3 - 1994 - 2 , Madagascar: PR 1 - 1992 - 1; Mix - 1998 - 2
• Bosnia-Hercegovina: PR1 -1996 - 4 • Malawi: MaiJ-1994- 2
• Botswana: MaiJ - 1965 - 8 , Malaysia : MaiJ-1957 - 3 // 1974 - 7
• Brazil: Ind- 1824 - 4 // 1860 - 4; 1875 - l; Mah - 1881 - 2; Maj 1 - 1890- l ; , Mali: Ma j1 - 1992- 4
Maj 2 -1892- 4; 1904 - 5 !/ 1927- 2; Mix -1932-1 // PR3 -1945 - 3; 1950- 3 // , Mexico: Ind- 1824- 5 // 1843 - 3 // 1857 - 2 // 1867 - 4 // Mah- 191 7 - 17;
1982- 6 Mlx - 1963 - 5; 1977 - 6; 1996- 3
• Bulgaria : Mix-1990-1; PR2 - 1991- 4 • Moldova: Mab- 1989- 1 // PR2 - 1993 - 3
• Ganada: Mah- 1867 - 2; 1874 - 25; 1972- 9 , Mongolia: Mah- 1989- 1; Maj 1 - 1992-1; Mah- 1996- 2
• Cape Verde: PR 1 -1992- 2 • Mozambique: PR2 -1993- 2
• Central African Rep.: Mab- 1993 - 2 • Namibia: PR 2 - 1990 - 2
• Chile: Maj¡ -1833- ?; Maiz-1879- ?; PR 1 - 1925 -1//1932-11//1980- 3 • Nepal: Mah- 1959 - 1//1981- 5
• Colombia: Maj 1 -1857 - ?; Mab- 1886 - ?; Maj 2 - 1910- 5; PR 1 -1931 -10; , Netherlands: Ind- 1815 - ?; Maj¡ - 1848 - ?; Mah - 1887 - 9; PR3 - 1918 - 5; 1933 - 1 //
Mix -1951- 2 // PR 1 - 1958- 6; 1970- 10 1946 - 17
• Costa Rica: Ind-1893-10; Mix-1913-15 // PR 1 -1953-13 • New Zealand: Mah- 1890- 6; 1908- 28; PR3 - 1993 - 3
• Croatia: Mix - 1995 - l ; PR 2 - 2000 - 1 • Nicaragua: PR 1 - 1984 - 4
• Cuba: Ind-1901 - 10 // PRz- 1940- 6 // • Nigeria: Mab- 1959- 2 // 1979 - 2 // 1992- 1//1999 -1 //
• Czecl10slovakia : PR 1 - 1920 - 4 // PR 3 - 1990 -1 • Norway: Ind-1815- 24; 1884- 7; Mah-1906-5; PR 1 -1921 - 6 // 1945 - 2; 1953 - 8;
• Czech Rep. : PR3 - 1992 - 3; 2002- 1 PR3 -1985- 5
• Denmark: Ind -1834- ?; Mah- 1848 - 22; 1901- 7; PR3 - 1915 - 1; PR 1 - 1920- 11; • Pakistan: Mah- 1970 - 2 // 1988 - 4 // 2002 - 1
PR3 -1953 - 18 • Panama: Ind-1916- 2 // PR 1 - 1946- 8 // Mix - 1983 - 1 // 1989- 1//1994 - 2
• Dominican Rep. : PR 1 - 1966 - 9; 2002- 1 • Papua New Guinea: Mab- 1975 - 6
• Ecuador: Maj 1 - 1895 - 6 // 1928-1 // PR2 -1946- 7 // 1978- 8 • Paraguay: PR 1 - 1993 - 2 //
• El Salvador: Maj 1 - 1886-1 // PR 1 - 1963 - 8 // 1984- 6 • Pem: Ind-1828-1 // Maj 2 -1861 - 1 // 1868- 4; PR 1 - 1933- 2 // 1950- 3 // 1963 - 1 //
• Estonia: PR 3 - 1919- 6 // PR 1 - 1989- 1; PR3 -1992- 4 1979 - 3 // PR 3 - 1995 - 1 // 2002 - 2
• Finland: Ind-1863- ?; PR3 -1906-17 // 1945-14 • Philippines : Maj 1 -1935- 2; Mab- 1953 - 5 // 1987 - 3; Mix - 1995 - 2
• France: Ind-1789-1; 1791 - 2; 1795 - 4; 1815 - 2; Maj 1 -1817 - 3; Mah- 1820- 1; • Poland: PR 1 -1918- 3 // 1928- 2 // PR 3 - 1991 - 1; 1993- 2; PR2 -2001 - 1
1824- 3; Maj 1 - 1848- 2; 1871- 2; Mah- 1875 - 3; Maj¡ - 1885 - 1; Mah-1889 - 7 /! • Portugal: Ind-1820- 1; Maj 1 -1822-1; Ind-1826- 1//1834- 3; Maj¡ -1852 -2; Mah
PR 1 -1919 - 2; MaiJ- 1927- 3 // PR 1 -1945 - 3; 1951 - 2; MaiJ- 1958- 7; - 1859 - ?; 1878- 2; 1884- 2; Maj 1 - 1895- ?; Mix -1896- ?; Maiz-1901 - ?; 19 11 - 1;
PR 1 -1986-1 ; Mah-1988-4 PRl - 1915 - ? // PR 2 - 1975 -11
• Georgia: Mix- 1995- 2 • Romanía: PR 1 -1990- 4
• Germany: Mah -1871 - 13; PRz - 1919 - l ; 1920- 8 // PR 3 - 1949 - 1; 1953 - 1; 1956 - 8; • Russia: Ind-1917-1; Mab - 1990-1; Mix - 1993 - 3
1985 - 5 • Senegal: Mix - 1992 - 2
• Ghana: Mah-1956- 2 // 1969- 1//1979- 4 • Slovakia: PR3 -1992- 4
• Greece: Ind- 1822- 3 // 1843- 1; Maj¡ - 1844- 8; 1864 - 21//1920- 2; • Slovenia: PR3 - 1990 - 4
PR 1 - 1926-1; Mah - 1928- 1; PR1 - 1932- 1; Maj 1 - 1933 - 1; PR 1 - 1936-1 // • South Africa: PR 3 - 1994 - 2
1946- 3; Maj 1 -1952-1; Mix-1956-1; PR 1 - 1958 - 1; 1961 - 2 // 1974- 4; • Spain: Ind - 1810- 1; 1812 - 1 // 1820- 3 // 1834 - l; Maj¡ - 1836 - l; Ind - 1836 - 1;
1989 - 3; 1990 - 3 Maj 1 - 1837 - 6; Mafl-1846- 4; Maj¡ - 1854- l ; Mah- 1857 - 4; Maj2 - 1865 - 2;
• Guatemala: PR 1 -1944 - 3 // 1984- 4 1868- 6; Mah-1878-2 // Maiz-1931- 3 // PRl -1977-8
• Honduras: Maj 1 -1879-1//1954- 1; PR 1 -1966- 6 • Sri Lanka : Mab- 1946-7 // 1977 -1; PR3 - 1978- 3
• Hungary: Mix - 1922 - ?; 1990 - 4 • Sweden: Ind - 1810- ?; 1866 - 15; PR 1 - 1909 - 13; 1952 - 6; PR3 - 1970- 11
• India : Mah-1950-2; 1961-3 // 1977 -8 • Switzerland: Ind-1848-8; 1872-10; 1900-6; PR 1 -1918-22
• Indonesia: PR 3 -1953- 2 // PRz-1999 - 1 • Taiwan: Mix - 1991 - 4
76 Josep M. Colomer Strategy and History of Electoral System Choice 77

Summary Table lA (Continued) sununary Table l B Presidential electoral systems

• Thailand: Maj 1 -1978-8; Mix- 1997 -1 • Argentina: Col-1853- 12 // 1931 -2 // 1946- 1; Plu -1949-1 //Col- 1955- 2 //
• Trinidad-Tobago: MaiJ - 1962 - 10 Maj - 1972 - 2 // Col - 1983 - 2; QP - 1994 - 2
• Turkey: Maj¡ -1946- 4 // PR 1 -1961-1; 1965- 1; 1969- 1; 1973- 2 // 1982- 2; • Annenia: Maj -1991 - 3
1991 - 1; 1995 - 3 • A11stria: Maj - 1945 - 10
• Ukraine: MaiJ - 1990 - 1; Mix - 1994 - 3 • Bangladesh: Plu - 1977
• United Kingdom: Maj¡ -1832- 9; 1868-2; MaiJ-1885 -15; 1949-15 • Belanis: Maj - 1996 - 2
• United States: Maj 1 - 1789- 26; Mah- 1842 - 63; 1968 - 18 • Benin: Maj - 1991 - 2
• Unig11ay: PR 1 -1918- 6 // PR3 -1934-10 // 1984- 4 • Bolivia: Maj-1899-4 // 1921- 3 // 1940-1//1947- 1 // 1951- 1; Plu-1956- 3 //
• Venezuela: PR1 -1946-1//1958- 7; PR3 -1989- 2; PR 1 -1999-1 Maj-1967-6
• Yugoslavia: PR 1 -1992- 3 • Bosnia-Hercegovina: Plu - 1998 - 2
• Brazil: Col- 1834- 2; Maj-1892-12 // Plu- 1945 - 4 // Maj -1986- 4
Notes • Bulgaria: Maj - 1991 - 3
This table summarizes the detalled flve world regional tables lncluded at the end of the openlng chapters • Cape Verde: Maj-1992- 2
to each of the parts In this book. • Central African Rep.: Maj - 1993- 2
• Chile: Maj -1925- 11 // Maj -1989- 3
- I11fonnatio11 for each co11111Ty: type of electoral system - startlng year - number of elections.
- Type of electoral system: lnd.: indlrect elections; Maj,: multi-member distdcts, bloc ballot, majorlty
• Colombia: Col- 1821 -1 // Col-1832- 7; Plu- 1853- 21/ Col- 1863- 11 //
rules; Mah: multi-member distdcts, limited or cumulative ballots, majodty rules; Maj,: slngle-member Col -1886 - 2 // 1904-1; Plu - 1910-10 // 1958- 9; Maj -1991 - 3
distdcts, majodty rules; Mix: mixed system; PR 1: average dlstrlct magnltude lower than nlne, propor- • Costa Rica: Col- 1889- 4 // 1909 - 1; Maj-1913 - 2 // 1919- 4; QP- 1936- 4 //
tional representation; PR2 : average dlstdct magnltude hlgher than elght, closed llsts, proportlonal rep- 1953 -13
resentatlon; PR 3 : average distdct magnitude hlgher than elght, open lists, open ballot or double vote, • Croatia: Maj - 1990 - 3
proportional representation. • Cuba: Col -1901- 5 // Col-1940- 3 //
- Key: The slgn / / indicates a pedod without elections or with authodtadan fake elections. Present • Dominican Repub/íc: Plu- 1962- l // 1966- 8; Maj - 1995 - 2
democratlc pedods are counted slnce the latest //. • Ecuador: Maj- 1895 - 7 1141/ Maj- 1978- 5; QP-1997 - 2
• El Salvador: Maj -1886- 81/ Maj-1963- 3 // Maj -1983 - 4
Source: See Appendix: Notes and Sources for Summary Tables at the end of the book.
• Estonia: Maj - 1992 - 1
• Finland: Col-1919 -10; Maj -1988- 3
• France: Maj - 1848 -1 // Maj- 1962- 7
• Georgia: Maj -1995- 2
• Gennany: Maj-1918- 2 //
• Ghana: Maj -1979 - l // 1992- 3
• Guatemala: Maj - 1944- 211Maj-1984- 4
• Honduras: Maj -1879- 3 // 1954- 3 // Plu - 1966 - 5
• Ireland: STV - 1937 - 9
• Israel: Maj - 1996 - 3
• Kenya: QP-1963-1//1992- 3
• Korea, So11th: Plu-1950- 3 // 1963-3 // 1987- 4
• Lithuania: Maj - 1992 - 3
• Macedonia: Maj -1994- 2
• Madagascar: Maj - 1992 - 3
• Malawi: Plu - 1994 - 2
• Malí: Maj - 1992- 3
• Mexico: Col-1824-3 // 1847-2//1857-5; Col-1874-10 // Plu-1917 - 17
• Mo/dova: Maj- 1991- 2
• Mongolia: Maj-1993 - 3
• Mozambique: Maj - 1994 - 2
• Namibia: Maj - 1990 - 2
• Nicaragua: Maj-1911- 2 // Plu- 1984- 2; QP-1995-1; QP- 1999 - 1
• Nigeria : QP-1979 - 2//QP-1993- 1//1999 -1
• Panama: Plu- 1916-4 // 1952- 5 // 1984-1//1989- 1 //1994 - 2
• Peni: Col-1828- 1 // Col-1861- 1//1866-1//1868- 3 // Plu -1896- 511
1915-1 // QP-1931-1; QP-1933-2 // 1956-1//1962-1//1963-1 // Maj-1978- 7
• Phillppines: Plu -1935- 6 // 1987 - 2
78 fosep M. Colomer

Summary Table lB (Continued)

Part 2
• Poland: Maj - 1990 - 3
•
•
Portugal: Maj -1976 - 6
Romanía: Maj - 1990 - 4 The Ame ......'"'"s
• Russia: Maj - 1993 - 3
• Slovenia: Plu - 1991 - 3
• Sri Lanka: SV - 1978- 4
• Taiwan: Plu - 1996 - 2
• Ukraine: Maj - 1994 - 2
• United States: Col - 1789 - 54
• Uniguay: Plu - 1899 - 12 // 1942 - 5 // 1984 - 3; Maj - 1996 - 1
Venezuela: Col-1830- 2 // 1847 - 3 //Col - 1874- 1 // Plu - 1946- 1//1958 - 10

Notes
Thls table summarizes the detailed five world regional tables included at the end of the opening chapters
to each of the parts in this book.
- I11fom1atio11 for eacll country: type of electoral system - starting year - number of electlons.
Type of electora/ system: Col: electoral college: Plu: Plurality rule; QP: quallfled plurallty rules; Maj:
majority runoff; STV: single-transferable vote; SV: supplementary vote.
- Key: The sign // lndicates a period without elections or with authoritarian fake elections. Present
democratic periods are counted since the latest // .
Source: See Appendix: Notes and Sources for Summary Tables at the end of the book.