Iceland applies for EU membership | 63 comments (63 topical, editorial, 0 hidden)

Re: Iceland applies for EU membership (4.00 / 3)

By that argument, why have national lists at all?

Because there is actually an advantage to the combination of smaller local constituencies with a global list for overall proportionality. Electing 46 seats in Germany by proportional representation leads to someon on the #20 slot of one of the big parties being elected. Who actually votes with the #20 candidate in mind? An EU-wide list of 250 candidates has the same problem - someone in position #100 of the EPP or PES list is likely to get elected. Also, I would say that you want to have representation from all combinations of nation+party, even if it is only one from each. That's for giving views a voice. The vote is the overall proportionality.

Also, what do we do with sub-national constituencies: apportition seats according to the Penrose law, or proportionally? I would abolish them. Or institute a similar EU-wide rule where if a country wants to have subnational constituencies they have to use the same Penrose + country-wide scheme as is used in the EU as a whole.

And won't this make elections in the smallest countries overly focused on the direct seats, as opposed to the largest countries?

As opposed to making the votes from the smallest countries all but irrelevant? Iceland will have 1/1500 of the EU's population. Why vote in the EU elections if there are only 750 seats to be filled?

The peak-to-trough part of the business cycle is an outlier. Carnot would have died laughing.

by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Jul 19th, 2009 at 11:52:48 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Iceland applies for EU membership (4.00 / 4)

Also, as was pointed out in my silly question about Iceland and Japan, "culture tends to follow geography and people." Even the very homogeneous USA has a Senate where regional differences are represented without regard to population.

by asdf on Sun Jul 19th, 2009 at 12:45:58 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Iceland applies for EU membership (none / 0)

However, the Senate is a separate body from the House. Just like the European Council or the Bundesrat is separate from the European Parliament resp. the Bundestag.

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Sun Jul 19th, 2009 at 02:09:50 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Iceland applies for EU membership (none / 0)

Also, I would say that you want to have representation from all combinations of nation+party, even if it is only one from each.

That still won't apply for Malta. But, you could prescribe something like that for the parties.

As opposed to making the votes from the smallest countries all but irrelevant?

By that argument, why vote in any single voter district in a national election? For disproportional national representation, we could reform the European Council.

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Sun Jul 19th, 2009 at 02:18:06 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Iceland applies for EU membership (none / 0)

That still won't apply for Malta.

No, not in the "every combination" sense. But 4 seats is better than 2 in that respect. For Germany, it is not clear how 99 seats is better than 49.

The peak-to-trough part of the business cycle is an outlier. Carnot would have died laughing.

by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Jul 19th, 2009 at 02:23:56 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Iceland applies for EU membership (none / 0)

Not "for Germany". For the single voter. Similar weight of vote and all that.

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Sun Jul 19th, 2009 at 02:25:39 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Iceland applies for EU membership (none / 1)

Similar weight of vote comes from the additional member system. If your vote is overrepresented at the constituency level it is underrepresented at the additional-member level.

Let's start from the opposite end. I would vehemently oppose 736-member E_ wide party lists. People would usually vote paying attention to at most the top 2 people in each party's list, or the top one and the top compatriot. It really makes a lot of sense to have constituencies with a small number of seats (using transferable votes to ensure proportionality). But to insist on even-sized constituencies leads to redistricting nonsense including gerrimandering. So you want

small constituencies with STV
a sizeable number of seats elected on overall party lists

The Penrose method evens out the size of the constituencies.

The peak-to-trough part of the business cycle is an outlier. Carnot would have died laughing.

by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Jul 19th, 2009 at 02:38:28 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Iceland applies for EU membership (4.00 / 2)

If your vote is overrepresented at the constituency level it is underrepresented at the additional-member level.

Why do you think that doesn't make a difference? I haven't made this angle explicit before; but there is also the issue of ideological weights within EP-parties.

It really makes a lot of sense to have constituencies with a small number of seats

What about using the 97 second-level NUTS regions rather than nation states?

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Tue Jul 21st, 2009 at 05:40:41 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Iceland applies for EU membership (none / 1)

...I of course mean first-level NUTS regions.

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Tue Jul 21st, 2009 at 05:49:09 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Iceland applies for EU membership (none / 1)

But the point of having additional members assigned at the EU level is that it will force the state-level parties to take a serious look at what their "fellow party members" in other states are like. If it works that way, it should force EP parties to form around political conviction instead of relative position in their domestic politics. That should prevent having EP parties that are total ideological crapshots.

- Jake

Friends come and go. Enemies accumulate.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Tue Jul 21st, 2009 at 06:05:22 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Iceland applies for EU membership (4.00 / 2)

I'm sceptical that that alone would achieve such a change. The 'national delegations' would act like party wings and old boy networks do in any party, and positions on the all-EU list would be haggled for.

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Tue Jul 21st, 2009 at 06:26:22 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Iceland applies for EU membership (none / 1)

DoDo:

It really makes a lot of sense to have constituencies with a small number of seats
What about using the 97 second-level NUTS regions rather than nation states?

I would like that, but good luck getting the Member States to agree to it.

The peak-to-trough part of the business cycle is an outlier. Carnot would have died laughing.

by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Tue Jul 21st, 2009 at 07:05:43 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Iceland applies for EU membership (none / 1)

I think significant resistance would come more in nationalist tones, than for practical reasons. For Belgium, France, Spain, Poland or Italy, the first-level NUTS regions would more or less correspond to the current sub-national EP election regions -- only the number of seats contested would change. For Germany, the NUTS regions are the federal states, thus the new system would bring it closer to what they have in federal elections -- also, much to the liking of the regionally strong CSU, I suppose. (Though, 18 million strong Northrhine-Westphalia still stands out -- the most populous NUTS area, unless I missed one of the Italian ones.) Many of the small countries are a single NUTS area, so again a potential change only in number of seats only. It would make a significant difference in the mid-sized countries, from Sweden to Romania (minus Belgium).

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Tue Jul 21st, 2009 at 08:21:48 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Iceland applies for EU membership (none / 1)

DoDo:

For Belgium, France, Spain, Poland or Italy, the first-level NUTS regions would more or less correspond to the current sub-national EP election regions

Except Spain or Italy don't do constituencies in the EP elections.

The peak-to-trough part of the business cycle is an outlier. Carnot would have died laughing.

by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Tue Jul 21st, 2009 at 08:48:44 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Iceland applies for EU membership (4.00 / 2)

I was mistaken about Spain, then, so the comment about Germany applies; however, Italy does have EP election sub-national regions.

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Tue Jul 21st, 2009 at 02:57:56 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Iceland applies for EU membership (none / 0)

I would abolish them.

With what argument? (Not that I wouldn't want to abolish them myself, but what is the rationale in your system?)

Or institute a similar EU-wide rule where if a country wants to have subnational constituencies they have to use the same Penrose + country-wide scheme as is used in the EU as a whole.

But a national level Penrose (apportitioning a number of seats as given by Penrose for the whole country), instead of EU level? With that, you are strenghtening the national character of the elections further.

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Sun Jul 19th, 2009 at 02:24:38 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Iceland applies for EU membership (none / 1)

I'm saying, if a country wants to have constituencies they have to have an additional-member system in order not to distort overall proportinality of the national delegation. The penrose-apportinment of the national constituencies is a footnote, but it is necessary when apportionment proportionally to population would lead to extremely large disparities in numbers of seats per constituency (as would be the case in Spain). It is actually an advantage of the Penrose system that it limits the size of the largest constituencies.

The peak-to-trough part of the business cycle is an outlier. Carnot would have died laughing.

by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Jul 19th, 2009 at 02:28:46 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Iceland applies for EU membership (none / 0)

But, again, if that is your choice, you fix the system to countries, perpetuating "national delegations".

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Tue Jul 21st, 2009 at 05:27:15 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Iceland applies for EU membership | 63 comments (63 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)

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