The
United Kingdom’s electoral system in the House of Commons is run on a system of
single member district plurality (SMDP).² This means that the country is
geographically separated into districts of relatively equal population. Each
district is represented by a single official who is elected based off of the
plurality rule (the winning candidate is the one who just receives the most
votes, not necessarily a majority).³ District magnitude denotes the number
of legislative seats allotted to each district within a legislative system.⁴
The district magnitude of the House of Commons in the United Kingdom is one;
there is only one official, or one legislative seat, per district, hence the
single member district part of SMDP. The allocation of seats from the popular
vote is governed by the formula of plurality. This means that whoever wins the
most votes will win the seat. It is a winner-takes-all system. Another aspect
of an electoral system is the list structure. An open, or preferential, list
means the voters choose the order in which candidates of a party are elected,
contrasting a closed list where other officials choose this order.⁵ The
United Kingdom has an open list structure, in that voters can vote for the
specific candidate they want to hold the legislative seat. There is no threshold
in the United Kingdom, meaning that the political parties do not have to get a
minimum percentage of votes for those votes to count or for that party to
maintain its party registration. Any party can have candidates run for office
no matter its size. The United Kingdom’s electoral rules tend to favor larger
parties, making Duverger’s law very plausible.
In looking at the last legislative
election in the House of Commons in 2010, the Conservative Party received 36%
of the votes, but got 47% of the seats. The Labour Party had 29% of the vote and
received 40% of the seats. However, the Liberal Democrats closely followed with
23% of the votes and only received 9% of the seats.⁶ Just this shows that the
United Kingdom has two main parties, but it can be seen mathematically as well.
With a formula using the percentage of legislative seats held by every party,
it is found that the country has 2.57 effective parties. This means that there
are two main parties, but there are several others that very marginally affect the
country’s politics.
The two effective parties of the
United Kingdom are arguably a result of its SMDP system. Because the seats are
allocated based on plurality rules, larger parties are favored and two main
parties emerge. The Conservative Party and the Labour Party clearly dominate
politics in the United Kingdom. Because of these SMDP rules, the percentage of
votes for small parties translates into a smaller percentage of seats, whereas
the opposite occurs for the two larger parties, thus giving those two parties a
considerable amount of political power.
The study of the United Kingdom
supports the claim of Duverger’s law. As it predicts, this country has single
member district plurality and also has two effective political parties.
Your blog is, first off, very easy to read and well written. It presented the information in a clear, detailed manner without going into too much of the nitty gritty. It's very interesting that in the United Kingdom has two effective parties but other parties still receive what seem to be large percentages of the vote.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Caroline. I don't know if its very fair that one party receives 23% of the vote yet only 9% of the seats. A little unjust for those who voted for that party in my opinion.
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