this post was submitted on 01 Nov 2024
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Goodness no, things would be even worse!
Many PR systems end up having a variety of smaller single issue parties. Our system has flaws but it tends to produce majority governments to which it is easy to ascribe blame as well as praise.
In a coalition of 4 differenr parties as government, whom should be blamed for what gets really difficult.
For a practical demonstration, look at Israel which is conducting an unpopular war in part because Netenyahu is beholden to a small group of extreme right wing parties to maintain power.
Stop fearmongering about a fairer system that increases voter choice and accountability in politics.
Israel’s situation is very complicated and is a terrible comparison to make.
You’re forgetting about what is happened in Zimbabwe. First past the post still produces extremists parties such as the B.C. conservatives and US republicans.
People can easily tell if 4 political parties screw up in government. It is classist and quite insulting to be assuming the public cannot handle more than 3 political parties.
Denmark uses pr and they’re one of the strongest democracies in the world.
Denmark does use PR and in a small, fairly homogeneous country it has basically worked.
But look at say, Germany which is now dealing with the rise of the AFD, or Italy which has been a mess for the last 20 years and recently elected a hard right Christian anti immigrant party, or the Netherlands where the parry of banning the Qur'an is now in charge of immigration policy, or Greece which has been so woefully run that it's required three bailouts from the IMF between 2010 and 2015.
Like, it's adorable to assume there would only be 4 parties but almost no PR system in the world keeps that few parties, there is a huge incentive to be a single issue party and try to play kingmaker.
And Zimbabwe? That's your comparison for BC? Really?
PR is one of those things that sounds nice until you really dig into the mechanics, which end up as consolidating power in political elites (they generally control the list of candidates) sketchy backroom deals and almost zero accountability.
Homogenous really? Are you really going to pull that racist dogwhistle…
PR makes even more sense for diverse countries because there is more representation for different voices in the country.
PR increases the amount of electable parties because people’s votes aren’t wasted.
That’s already happening with first-past-the-post where often only the rich and powerful can win the most seats because they have all the funding forcing people with only 2 choices in races.
Also that’s false because accountability increases with pr because people can literally fire the 2 most popular parties in favour of the smaller ones to force the dominant parties to do better. Do you really want Pierre Poilievre and Justin Trudeau to get away with having control of most of the seats? Instead of 7 or more parties.
Competition always leads to better incomes.
Oh for fuck's sake. If you'd done any reading whatsoever on the subject, you'd know regional/ethno/religious fault lines tend to pop up (and get reinforced) in PR systems. (Germany with the East West divide, Spain has Catalan/Basque, Israel has well, everything and so on.) Even here, you might have noticed the massive urban rural divide in the last election?
Edit: Denmark is also overwhelmingly urban, some 80+% live in urban centres.
Which diverse countries are you thinking of that have done or are doing well under PR without issues that would be terrifying to see in Canada (the rise of the AFD, for example.)
I think you mean outcomes, and in a lot of cases, sure but in politics, it doesn't seem to.
I've given you a murderer's row of countries that are having huge problems with PR. While the theory is nice, the reality of how it plays out hasn't been particularly great. Under FPTP, it's hard to imagine a single issue (say, anti trans) party ever gaining any sort of traction, whereas in PR, you could easily see them get some 10% of the votes and become a force to be reckoned with.
Not particularly but I'd rather one of them or Singh than some murky backroom dealings deciding the nation. And frankly, the reason we can point to Trudeau is because he and his party are accountable for their actions in government!
I'm kind of stunned that you are so unconcerned that the system for which you are advocating has been fostering Far Right parties that are increasingly gaining power and are almost unworkable in a First Past the Post system.
First off keep it civil, there’s no need to swear. Every region in the country should be represented.
Political parties can ram through legislation with only 37% to 39% of the vote under first-past-the-post, that means AFD would only need to win 37% of the vote instead of 51% in order to gain all the power. That’s not safer for our democracy.
You do realize if we had an election today the Conservative Party of Canada who have striking similarities to the AFD would win a super majority and be able to ram through legislation without accountability with only 42% of the popular vote. The party has already been hijacked by extremists who are anti-vaxx, racist, sexist, anti-worker, homophobic.
When there are parties that too far outside the mainstream the other parties can work together to exclude them. That 10% cant do anything with the majority of voters being politically centre and progressive in Canada electing a government that represents them under proportional representation.
Like I said before if a party has poor leadership the voters can vote out them out. We wouldn't have to tolerate the policies of establishment parties who often refuse to listen to the average person.
Here you’re ignoring the countries where pr performs well like in Norway, Switzerland, Denmark. You have been cherry picking the dysfunctional countries to suit your flawed reasoning.
Italy and Israel have quite a few systematic issues with their democracies.
The Pierre Poilievre Conservative Party is literally the anti-trans party and your suggestions of keeping the same electoral system in place would give him a much easier time of winning all the power with only a minority of the vote.
But If we had an election with proportional representation we would have a coalition government of the Liberals, NDP, Bloc, Greens and Independents who would have to work together to enact policy being the voice of 53% of the electorate, that's fairer.
You have also ignored the phenomenons of first-past-the-post:
Where candidates have to attack their opponents to win their races that increases polarization.
Policy lurch where the policies of the previous government are cancelled out by the new government where nothing gets done.
The NDP supports mixed member proportional byw.
Yeah no Justin Trudeau isn't being held accountable like he should be under our current system as he still enjoys 24.9% of all the political donations in the last quarter almost matching the liberal's public support at 23%. His party may be voted out in the next election but only to be replaced with a fascist party that promised to use the notwithstanding clause to suspend the charter of rights and freedoms, do you realize how dangerous and undemocratic that is. I don't see how cutting off our nose is the best thing we can can do for ourselves. Instead we have a better alternative, so lets do that.
Backroom deals already happen with first-past-the-post and the far right had no issue hijacking big tent parties such as the BC Conservatives, the Republican Party, the United Conservative Party and the Conservative Party of Canada.
When your first line is all but accusing someone of being racist, you're going to engender a reaction. Especially when that accusation is levelled for the crime of using a word in its* exact correct context*. (Though, I'm curious, what word would you use to describe the socio demographics of Denmark?)
That's an insane comparison. You're really comparing the Conservative party to the mass deportation, anti Islam, anti gay marriage party? I get that you probably don't like the Conservative's positions but that's at best, childishly ignorant.
Wait, it's cherry picking when I give you a boatload of examples, but when you give two examples of small homogenous countries and one of the richest countries in the world (gotta love that moral flexibility around Nazi gold!) that's just as things should be? And are the Netherlands, who are pretty similar to Denmark and Norway just not worth looking at, even though Geert Wilder's party is now in charge of immigration?!? Do we not want to look at that because it's damaging to your argument or because you don't feel immigrants deserve protection?
This is the sort of silliness that tells me you haven't looked at the issue or how PR tends to affect issues like this. First, the Conservative positions are generally well within mainstream Canada's e.g., some 47% of Canadians are not comfortable with kids under 18 accessing gender affirming treatment. When I say a radical anti-trans group, that means one that would go much further, say those who believe transgender folks are a threat to children and would maybe seek to ban them from positions of authority around them or bar gender affirming care all together or at the very least make it a privately funded thing. You could see such a party pull support off the Bloc, maybe some Liberal/NDP economic voters, as well as some Conservatives. But the concern is a party like that could pull enough support from the other parties and end up teaming up with the Conservatives. (Hey folks, you get all your economic policies, in return, some bad things happen to a group you're already "meh" on. That's a pretty damned appealing deal.)
What do you think the word accountability means? In a political context, it usually means that a party has to answer for what they've done. And yes, if the Conservatives win, they'll have a 4 year track record on which to be judged. The same thing that is happening to Trudeau and the Liberals. And after those years, the voters consider the record, consider the promises for future governments and make another decision. That's how the system is designed to work and why Canada isn't mired in the same dysfunction as America. (Please don't be so silly as to say we're doing exactly the same, please.)
PR in no way mitigates or solves these problems.
I think it's clear you haven't really thought about these things. You just feel that Conservatives are fascists (which is another wildly childish claim) and that PR will somehow stop them, presumably because you think all the good parties will band together to stop them. Which is a fairly ignorant assumption on how things work. Much more likely is someone like the Bloc cuts a deal or a few new fringe parties do.
I doubt you're old enough to remember but about 16ish years ago, BC looked pretty heavily at adopting a form of PR (MMP was the recommendation if I recall correctly) and there were some really interesting books written about the pros and cons at the time. If you'd like to actually learn about the concerns and possibilities, I'll try and dig up one of those for you. I can't help with the widespread ignorance, like calling the AFD similar to the Conservatives but at least on the mechanics and examples of PR. (The really interesting part is of course that this happened just at the start of the wild bifurcation we've seen in the decades since.)