Elections and referendums Flashcards
FPTP
What are 3 advantages of FPTP
- mostly results in a clear majority government
- promotes a system where 2 parties dominate
- Small constituencies are represented
FPTP
Give 3 disadvantages of FPTP
- not proportional as votes are not translated into seats
- limited choice due to safe seats
- government could be elected with a minority popular vote which does not reflect the will of the people
FPTP
Give an example of how votes are not translated into seats in FPTP
in 2015 GE the 1.4 million SNP votes were highly concentrated in scotland and gave them 56 seats whereas UKIP’s 3.8 million votes translated into 1 seat
FPTP
Give an example of how FPTP promotes safe seats
Theresa May’s constituency Maidenshead is a safe seat with conservatives winning over 60% votes in 2017
STV
Give 3 advantages of the STV system
- lots of political choice
- proportional seats won
- encourages positive campaigning as candidates want to win transferred votes from other candidates
STV
What are 3 disadvantages of the STV system
- link between members and voters are weak due to lots of members representing the same constituency
- more complicated and can take longer than FPTP to reach a final result
- could encourage donkey voting - where candidates just write the order of MP’s that appear on the ballot
Explain the Additional member system for voting
FPTP is used to vote for a representative for their constituency and then an additional ‘party list’ vote is cast to elect an additional member
additional members are then added to regional consituencies
Give an example of something that uses AMS
Scotting parliament elections
73 members elected with FPTP and 56 additional members that are allocated into regional seats
Give 2 advantages of AMS
- Strong link between MP and constituents that vote for them
- proportionality - assigning regional seats based on the number of votes for that party
- choice - can ‘split-ticket’ vote for a party and a representative they like
Give 3 disadvantages of AMS
- smaller parties are less represented as the party list system can advanatge larger parties (for example wales’s ‘top–up’ seats favour labour)
- party list candidates have less legitimacy as they are not voted inn through a personla mandate from voters
- lacks democratic transparency as the party decides the rank of representatives on the ‘party-list’
How does the Supplementary vote work (SV)
A voter has a first and second preference - if a candidate wins over 50% of the vote then they are elected but if no one does then all of the candidates apart from the top 2 are eliminated and the vote takes place again with the top two candidates
Give an example of where the SV vote is used
London Mayor elections and police and crime commissioner elections
Give 2 advantages of SV
- simple - voters only need to mark an X on their top two candidate
- encourages positive campaigning as the candidates will need the support of other parties if there is a second vote
Give an example of how the SV system ensures large majority
Sadiq Khan winning 56.6% of the vote in the 2016 London Mayor election
Give 3 disadvantages of the SV system
- votes can be wasted
- doesnt require an abolute majority only the most votes in the second round
- not proportional to the votes of the people as only one candidiate is elected rather than mutiple proportionally
Give an example of how votes can be wasted with the SV system
2012 London Mayor elections - 15% of votes wasted in round 1 and 7% in round 2
What are 3 arguments for FPTP to be replaced for westminister elections
- Doesn’t always results is a strong single-party majority government (2017 May’s gov)
- Votes are ‘wasted’ in safe-seats and smaller parties
- encourages negative or ‘tactical voting’ especially in marginal constituencies
Give an example of FPTP promoting ‘tactical voting’
in 2019 election many voters supported labour or the Lib-Dems to prevent brexit from happening
Give 3 arguments against replacing the FPTP system for westminister elections
- traditionally produced strong and relatively stable governments
- Strong link between MP and constituents
- Favours a political culture of two dominating parties which causes them to have a broad appeal (e.g. new labour moving to the center)
Factors that affect voting behavior
Give 3 factors that affect voting behavior in the UK
- role of campaign or media
- competancy of current government
- social class, gender, ethnicity
Factors that affect voting behavior
Give an example of a Labour safe seat
South yorkshire - former coalfield areas have been a safe seat since the 70s due to working class supporters
Factors that affect voting behavior
What are 4 key changes in votinng behavior since the 1970s
- class dealignment
- partisan dealignment
- more swing voters
- rise of identity voters
