Campaigning and split-ticket voting in new electoral systems: the first MMP elections in New Zealand, Scotland and Wales

New electoral systems create learning problems for parties and electors: the parties have to learn how to focus their campaigns and the electors how best to use their votes. This was the case in three countries in the late 1990s where MMP was used for the first time rather than first-past-the-post: New Zealand in 1996 and Scotland and Wales in 1999. MMP involves each elector voting twice — for a candidate in a single-member constituency contest and for a party in a regional/national list contest. Survey and (in New Zealand) official data show that substantial proportions of the three electorates voted a split ticket — the candidate they supported was from a different party to that they voted for in the list contest. (Approximately one-in-five did this in Scotland and Wales and two-in-five in New Zealand.) We argue that split-ticket voting will be influenced by the amount of information received by electors regarding the candidates for the constituency seats. Using the amount of campaign expenditure by each candidate as a measure of the volume of information provided, we find strong supporting evidence for this responsive voter model in each of the three countries.     

论变性的法定条件与程序

随着社会发展,变性这个历史悠久并且长期避而不谈的术语已从幕后走向了前台,成为当今社会关注的话题。然而,如何使法律更好地保障变性人的权益,是一个值得研究的问题。本文从变性的法定条件、法定程序等方面进行研究并提出相关建议。     

中法民事审前准备程序之比较研究

我国的民事审前准备程序存在很大的问题，改革完善势在必行。对中法民事审前准备程序在法律框架、实践层面的比较，不难看出我国在制度上和实践中存在的一系列问题，这些问题的产生有其原因可寻。我国的审前程序建构不能冒进，而应该在现有法律制度的基础上，借鉴与我国法律文化相似国家的经验，根据我国的实际进行。     

消防行政处罚听证制度探析

消防执法是行政执法的一种,程序是行政法的核心,当然也是公安消防机构依法行政的核心,它直接影响到消防执法的公正和效力。消防执法中,尤其在消防行政处罚中,听证程序具有重要的功能和价值。     

In participatory budgeting we trust? Fairness,tactics and (in)accessibility in participatory governance

ABSTRACT

Participatory budgeting (PB) is a significant innovation in democracy and local development. PB provides the opportunity for citizens to engage in processes of deliberation and decision-making upon the allocation of public funds. As new critical discourse emerges surrounding this model of local government spending, a significant area warranting investigation concerns how trust, and indeed mistrust, factor into PB. Through an analysis of interviews with residents and Council staff engaged in PB processes in a county in the north of England, we highlight the ways in which issues of trust can impact on participation in these initiatives, and also strengthen relationships between voting delegates, project teams and local government. This paper argues that increasing the perceived accessibility, and reconsidering the inclusion of mass membership groups in PB, might help to create progressive, effective and trustful participation.     

Legislative Efficiency and Political Inclusiveness: The Effect of Procedures on Interest Group Mobilization in the European Parliament

This paper contributes to discussions surrounding interest group representation in the European Parliament. Drawing from conceptualizations of legitimacy, and theoretical work on information-access we argue that different procedures bestow a different type of authority to parliamentary committees affecting their legitimacy orientation, in turn impacting the balance between private and public interests mobilised. We assess a population of 10,000 accredited lobbyists, and the procedural output across the 7th legislature’s committees (2009–2014). Our analysis indicates that committees with a higher ratio of Ordinary Legislative Procedures to Own Initiative Reports see greater private interest mobilisation. Conversely, in committees where the procedures’ ratios are inverse we observe greater public interest mobilisation. Theoretically, we provide a novel approach for framing the committee’s nature from a procedural perspective, bridging discussions on interest group mobilisation and the democratic deficit. Empirically, the results overturn the premise of business dominance across the institution’s committees through a unique dataset.     

论仲裁程序与破产程序之冲突与协调

同为处理争议的程序性规范,仲裁程序与破产程序的冲突根源源于两者法本位的不同,即个人本位与社会本位的矛盾。协调两者之间的冲突,应当秉持社会公共利益具有优先性的原则,具体体现为破产程序的集中管辖制度对仲裁协议的影响、破产程序启动和进行中对仲裁程序的限制,及破产程序对仲裁裁决执行的回应。因此,当仲裁程序有利于社会公益的维护时,破产程序应当保持谦抑性,以便发挥仲裁程序的特有优势。我国立法在两个程序冲突的协调问题上法律缺位,应当结合上述协调理念,在破产法院的专属管辖权和债权人的监督权等规定上作出相应完善。     

The electoral roots of unequal representation. A spatial modelling approach to party systems and voting in Western Europe

For a number of Western democracies, it has been observed that the preferences of poor and rich citizens are unequally represented in political institutions and outcomes. Yet, the causes of this phenomenon are still under debate. We focus on the role of elections in this process, by disentangling biases towards different income groups that stem from the party system and from voters’ behaviour. Our aim is to uncover whether elections as selection mechanisms contribute to unequal representation by analysing factors of the supply and demand sides of the electoral process. On the supply side, we focus on the congruence of parties’ policy offers and voters’ preference distributions. This shapes citizens’ possibilities to express their policy preferences. On the demand side, we are interested in the extent to which citizens from different income groups base their vote decisions on their policy preferences. The empirical analysis relies on the European Social Survey and the Chapel Hill Expert Survey and covers 13 Western European countries. Our results indicate, first, that the economic and cultural preferences of poor and rich citizens differ significantly, and second, that party systems in the countries under investigation represent the lowest income groups the worst, and the middle income groups the best. This makes it difficult for citizens at both the lower and the higher end of the income distribution to voice their preferences in elections. Additionally, we show that low income citizens tend to take policy less into consideration when making an electoral choice than richer citizens. Thus, while the rich make up for their representation bias by taking policy more into account in their voting behaviour, the electoral stage poses another obstacle for the poor to overcome the representation bias. In summary it can be said that already on the supply side there is an unbalanced disadvantage in terms of representation for the very poor and the very rich, but the pattern leads to an even more asymmetrical misrepresentation of the poor due to the election act.     

What accounts for Duverger's law? The behavioral mechanisms underpinning two-party convergence in India

Duverger's Law states the single-member district plurality rules should produce two-party competition. In district-level election races where this expectation holds, what political behaviors—ranging from elites' strategic formation of political parties to voters' strategic abandonment of losing candidates—account for these outcomes? Using data from state elections in India, this article demonstrates that no single mechanism accounts for most electoral outcomes consistent with Duverger's Law. However, mechanisms related to the behavior elites, far more than voters, produce convergence on two-party competition. This article uncovers relatively little evidence of outcomes driven by strategic voting, instead finding that much of the convergence on two parties is attributable to various forms of strategic entry in which parties selectively field candidates in certain races. In particular, elite collusion—when multiple parties coordinate on where to field candidates—is especially important. Data from other countries confirm that these findings are not unique to India.     

An experimental investigation of voter myopia in economic evaluations

A prevalent assumption in the economic voting literature is that voters’ retrospective evaluations are based on very recent outcomes only, that is, they are myopic. I test this assumption by drawing on a population-based survey experiment from Turkey. Turkey presents a good opportunity to explore voters’ time horizons for economic voting: the long tenure of the same single-party government entailed periods of both good and poor performance, and its overall record to date has been better than its immediate predecessors. I find that voters can provide divergent assessments of incumbent’s performance in managing the economy over different time periods that are in line with the country’s macroeconomic trajectory. Moreover, voters’ evaluations of the incumbent’s performance during its entire tenure have a stronger effect on economic vote than their shorter-term evaluations, defying voter myopia. I provide evidence that long-term outcomes might weigh heavier in voters’ considerations than commonly assumed.