Impact of electoral systems on the political process
- Author(s):
- Parliamentary Assembly
- Origin
- See Doc. 8871, report of the Committee on Parliamentary and Public Relations, rapporteur: Mr Lekberg. Text adopted by the Standing Committee, acting on behalf ofthe Assembly, on 9 November 2000.
- Thesaurus
1. The electoral system is one of the most
fundamental elements of representative democracy. A crucial moment in
representative democracies is how elected officials are elected.
2. Within the member states of the Council of Europe several electoral
systems are in use. These different systems can be categorised into three main
types: plural-majority systems, semi-proportional systems and proportional
systems. Thirty member countries apply various proportional electoral
systems.
3. The impact of electoral systems on the political process and on citizens’
commitment to the political process is an important topic to be taken into
consideration.
4. A large turnout at elections is an important element of democracy.
5. The proportion of women parliamentarians is increasing in western
democracies. According to several studies the list-proportional representation
system provides the best opportunity for women to take their place in
parliament.
6. The electoral system can also have an effect on the way ethnic,
linguistic and religious minorities are represented. It is important to
guarantee that minorities are not discriminated.
7. The Assembly considers that citizens’ participation – notably that of the
young – in the political process is a topic of fundamental importance and
should be debated recurrently by the Assembly in order to stimulate a broader
European debate.
8. The Assembly proposes to set up statistics and to keep them updated,
possibly within the framework of the International Institute of Democracy, in
order to be able to compare turnout at elections in the member states and
factors characterising the elected members, such as women’s representation,
length of parliamentary service, age and profession, thus evaluating the
development of democracy.
9. The Assembly suggests that the parliaments of member countries pay
attention to issues regarding the effects of the electoral systems on the
political process.
10. The Assembly, as well as national parliaments, should promote research on
how to stimulate citizens’ participation in the political process.
