And a real dilemma for reformers. State-by-state redistricting reform led to "unilateral disarmament" for Democrats. That's a warning to Pro Rep advocates
While I strongly support the concept of Proportional RCV I have some strong concerns about implementation even at the state level.
With a maximum proposed district size that I have seen so far of 5, I question whether that will really help minority voices other than large minorities like racial or ethnic communities. Twenty percent is still a large barrier for groups wishing to introduce radical new ways of doings things. And we must remember that democracy itself was once considered a radical concept. It is ideas that are initially perceived as radical that ultimately move the Overton window.
I am also concerned about how people will have to campaign in a district potentially covering 5 times the geographic area. Clearly door knocking will be a luxuary that only large organized groups with thousands of activists will be able to accomplish. Personal door walking by the candidate will become almost impossible except in high target areas. I have a friend who was recently elected to a city council by knocking on a lot of doors and build community support everywhere he did. On the other hand, the person who first introduced and promoted the concept of RCV in Redondo Beach lost his seat when that change was implimented.
So how do you think we can escape the Law of Unintended Consequences with PRCV?
Those are all good questions June. The magnitude of the district is a key dimension of any PR reform. But I don't think there is a one-size fits all. It depends a lot on the size of the polity that is moving to PR. You mention a friend elected to city council knocking on a lot of doors -- I would guess that was in a fairly small polity, yes? So that might have a particular solution to the problems of representation. Then you look at CA, where currently the state senate have 40 seats and each state senate district represents 850,000 people. So if you create a PR system out of those 40, it raises some challenging dilemmas -- go with 10 districts and 4 seats each, and a 20% victory threshold? Then each 4-seat district will have 3.4 million people in it. And a minor party will have difficulty winning a seat. Too large? Maybe, but the LA Board of Supervisors currently has districts with 2 million people each, and voters have put up with that for many years (though LA County is in the process of expanding the BoS to 9 seats). How about 5 senate districts with 8 seats each and a 12.5% victory threshold? Still too large? Or perhaps one statewide district of 40 million people and a 2.5% victory threshold, really opening the chance for a Libertarian or Green to get elected? But will Californians agree with not having "their" state senator? Or maybe the number of senate seats should be increased to allow different configurations of district magnitude, as your said moving the Overton window on number of seats? Reformers in every state have a lot to think about!
Well I certainly prefer a 12.5% threshold to a 20% one :-) but as you say there is more involved here. One big problem is that the legislature is too small for the size our populatio has become. I think it unlikely though, that voters will be sympathetic to paying for more legislators not to mention the statehouse renovations that would be required if they still need to meet in person. (Which BTW I don't neccesarily see as true anymore). Maybe it's time to split the state into 2 or three new states but I don't see a lot of support for that idea either and drawing the boundaries could be as big a fight as district boundries used to be.
My friend won in a small California city with under 50,000 voters in 5 districts with a separate mayor.
Fwiw, salaries and per diem for 40 senators costs the state of CA $9 million a year out of a $200 million budget for Senate operations. Most of the cost is staff. We could double the number of Senators with almost no budget impact. And we're in the middle of a $1 billion Capitol renovation, there's plenty of room! And as you allude to, why not let lawmakers vote from their districts, as they do in Scotland and I'm sure other places? I suppose folks may argue that we'd also need to double the size of the Senate staff, but we wouldn't have to. Senators only have so many staff because the districts are too huge! The obstacle to expansion probably isn't really cost, it's just the inevitable knee-jerk reaction that "the last thing we need is more politicians!"
Responding to Steven's main idea about unilateral disarmament, I do worry that folks will now see even state level PR as suspect because it would elect more republicans to blue state legislatures and reform just wouldn't happen in red states. (I know it's more complicated than that.)
Hi Cosmo, thanks for your thoughts. As I mentioned in my article, independent redistricting commissions still have an important role to play in redistricting for state legislative seats and for city council seats. Incumbents in party leaders should not be drawing the single-seat districts for that level of government. And it doesn't raise the issue of "unilateral disarmament" the way it does at the federal level, because all political parties at the state and local level would be subject to the same rules and requirements.
That would also apply to the pursuit of proportional representation. Doing it at the state legislative level or city council level – especially in those cities like New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore and more on the East Coast that have local partisan elections – would not encounter the problem of "unilateral disarmament" among any of the political parties. United States is a big country, so that leaves many opportunities across the nation for political reformers to target for reform.
I believe that those countries use something other than STV to get their proportionality. I don't think anything like Member List will fly in this county since we really don't have a true multi-party system here and at least in CA all local offices are non-partisan.
Not quite sure of this set of claims. I mentioned Australia only. We do use STV for every election national, state and most local, both for single member electorates and multi member. A party list is not an essential to multiple member electorates (or whole of state). Candidates can be grouped or listed randomly. The result helps both smaller parties (none are ethnic in basis) and local candidates. STV itself simply means a vote for a less likely candidate is not a waste; your later ranking will count.
The Northern Ireland PR system uses STV but I agree many others do not. Eg New Zealand has a set of first past the post local electorates matched with a party list that is then used to ensure proportionality. On a quick look eg Germany does something similar. That requires Parties to work.
Your biggest point is loss of specific local representation. At the state level in the US this is hard to see as a big issue. Eg I looked at Idaho, a smaller state. It has 70 and 35 members in its two chambers. Grouping into eg 7 districts would still have quite a local focus.
In the US context larger electoral districts would reduce capacity to draw boundaries to advantage one party. The gerrymandering requires highly polarised geographical voting to work best.
Hi Conor, thanks for your thoughts. Much to think about there. I think what June was probably thinking of was that feature in Australia's STV elections in which voters can vote "above the line" for a single political party, in which the voter is selecting only the candidates from that particular party, and essentially turning that voter's vote into one like a "party list" system. Last I heard/read, most voters actually do vote "above the line" for those states and federal elections in Australia that offer that feature. Can you confirm that?
Also, FYI, a number of cities in New Zealand use single transferable vote to elect their local governments, including the capital city Wellington. Here is a list: https://www.stv.govt.nz/index.shtml A number of cities also use a plurality system. Cities in New Zealand have a choice between the two methods.
This deep core analyses is so needed right now to help tease apart how we got here and how to navigate extracting ourselves from this tragic outcome of a road sincerely taken
You misrepresent the PR picture when you write “If a political party wins 60% of the vote in a five-seat district, it will win three of the five seats instead of all seats; if a party wins 40% it will win two seats instead of nothing”.
The correct figures are 3*1/6 or 50% plus 3 votes wins 3/5; and 2*1/6 plus 2 votes wins 2 seats. The remain 1/6 less 5 votes wins none.
While I strongly support the concept of Proportional RCV I have some strong concerns about implementation even at the state level.
With a maximum proposed district size that I have seen so far of 5, I question whether that will really help minority voices other than large minorities like racial or ethnic communities. Twenty percent is still a large barrier for groups wishing to introduce radical new ways of doings things. And we must remember that democracy itself was once considered a radical concept. It is ideas that are initially perceived as radical that ultimately move the Overton window.
I am also concerned about how people will have to campaign in a district potentially covering 5 times the geographic area. Clearly door knocking will be a luxuary that only large organized groups with thousands of activists will be able to accomplish. Personal door walking by the candidate will become almost impossible except in high target areas. I have a friend who was recently elected to a city council by knocking on a lot of doors and build community support everywhere he did. On the other hand, the person who first introduced and promoted the concept of RCV in Redondo Beach lost his seat when that change was implimented.
So how do you think we can escape the Law of Unintended Consequences with PRCV?
Those are all good questions June. The magnitude of the district is a key dimension of any PR reform. But I don't think there is a one-size fits all. It depends a lot on the size of the polity that is moving to PR. You mention a friend elected to city council knocking on a lot of doors -- I would guess that was in a fairly small polity, yes? So that might have a particular solution to the problems of representation. Then you look at CA, where currently the state senate have 40 seats and each state senate district represents 850,000 people. So if you create a PR system out of those 40, it raises some challenging dilemmas -- go with 10 districts and 4 seats each, and a 20% victory threshold? Then each 4-seat district will have 3.4 million people in it. And a minor party will have difficulty winning a seat. Too large? Maybe, but the LA Board of Supervisors currently has districts with 2 million people each, and voters have put up with that for many years (though LA County is in the process of expanding the BoS to 9 seats). How about 5 senate districts with 8 seats each and a 12.5% victory threshold? Still too large? Or perhaps one statewide district of 40 million people and a 2.5% victory threshold, really opening the chance for a Libertarian or Green to get elected? But will Californians agree with not having "their" state senator? Or maybe the number of senate seats should be increased to allow different configurations of district magnitude, as your said moving the Overton window on number of seats? Reformers in every state have a lot to think about!
Well I certainly prefer a 12.5% threshold to a 20% one :-) but as you say there is more involved here. One big problem is that the legislature is too small for the size our populatio has become. I think it unlikely though, that voters will be sympathetic to paying for more legislators not to mention the statehouse renovations that would be required if they still need to meet in person. (Which BTW I don't neccesarily see as true anymore). Maybe it's time to split the state into 2 or three new states but I don't see a lot of support for that idea either and drawing the boundaries could be as big a fight as district boundries used to be.
My friend won in a small California city with under 50,000 voters in 5 districts with a separate mayor.
Fwiw, salaries and per diem for 40 senators costs the state of CA $9 million a year out of a $200 million budget for Senate operations. Most of the cost is staff. We could double the number of Senators with almost no budget impact. And we're in the middle of a $1 billion Capitol renovation, there's plenty of room! And as you allude to, why not let lawmakers vote from their districts, as they do in Scotland and I'm sure other places? I suppose folks may argue that we'd also need to double the size of the Senate staff, but we wouldn't have to. Senators only have so many staff because the districts are too huge! The obstacle to expansion probably isn't really cost, it's just the inevitable knee-jerk reaction that "the last thing we need is more politicians!"
Responding to Steven's main idea about unilateral disarmament, I do worry that folks will now see even state level PR as suspect because it would elect more republicans to blue state legislatures and reform just wouldn't happen in red states. (I know it's more complicated than that.)
Hi Cosmo, thanks for your thoughts. As I mentioned in my article, independent redistricting commissions still have an important role to play in redistricting for state legislative seats and for city council seats. Incumbents in party leaders should not be drawing the single-seat districts for that level of government. And it doesn't raise the issue of "unilateral disarmament" the way it does at the federal level, because all political parties at the state and local level would be subject to the same rules and requirements.
That would also apply to the pursuit of proportional representation. Doing it at the state legislative level or city council level – especially in those cities like New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore and more on the East Coast that have local partisan elections – would not encounter the problem of "unilateral disarmament" among any of the political parties. United States is a big country, so that leaves many opportunities across the nation for political reformers to target for reform.
You could look at other places that use PR. Or ranked choice voting. Australia uses PR in most upper house votes.
Two states or territories use it in lower house with 5 or 7 member electorates. See https://www.abc.net.au/news/elections/tas/2025/results for one recent outcome.
And https://antonygreen.com.au/category/australia-elections-state/a-c-t/
I believe that those countries use something other than STV to get their proportionality. I don't think anything like Member List will fly in this county since we really don't have a true multi-party system here and at least in CA all local offices are non-partisan.
Not quite sure of this set of claims. I mentioned Australia only. We do use STV for every election national, state and most local, both for single member electorates and multi member. A party list is not an essential to multiple member electorates (or whole of state). Candidates can be grouped or listed randomly. The result helps both smaller parties (none are ethnic in basis) and local candidates. STV itself simply means a vote for a less likely candidate is not a waste; your later ranking will count.
The Northern Ireland PR system uses STV but I agree many others do not. Eg New Zealand has a set of first past the post local electorates matched with a party list that is then used to ensure proportionality. On a quick look eg Germany does something similar. That requires Parties to work.
Your biggest point is loss of specific local representation. At the state level in the US this is hard to see as a big issue. Eg I looked at Idaho, a smaller state. It has 70 and 35 members in its two chambers. Grouping into eg 7 districts would still have quite a local focus.
In the US context larger electoral districts would reduce capacity to draw boundaries to advantage one party. The gerrymandering requires highly polarised geographical voting to work best.
Hi Conor, thanks for your thoughts. Much to think about there. I think what June was probably thinking of was that feature in Australia's STV elections in which voters can vote "above the line" for a single political party, in which the voter is selecting only the candidates from that particular party, and essentially turning that voter's vote into one like a "party list" system. Last I heard/read, most voters actually do vote "above the line" for those states and federal elections in Australia that offer that feature. Can you confirm that?
Also, FYI, a number of cities in New Zealand use single transferable vote to elect their local governments, including the capital city Wellington. Here is a list: https://www.stv.govt.nz/index.shtml A number of cities also use a plurality system. Cities in New Zealand have a choice between the two methods.
This deep core analyses is so needed right now to help tease apart how we got here and how to navigate extracting ourselves from this tragic outcome of a road sincerely taken
You misrepresent the PR picture when you write “If a political party wins 60% of the vote in a five-seat district, it will win three of the five seats instead of all seats; if a party wins 40% it will win two seats instead of nothing”.
The correct figures are 3*1/6 or 50% plus 3 votes wins 3/5; and 2*1/6 plus 2 votes wins 2 seats. The remain 1/6 less 5 votes wins none.