The Politics of Electoral Systems

Foreword; PART 1: INTRODUCTION: ELECTORAL SYSTEMS AND ELECTORAL SYSTEMS RESEARCH; 1. Introduction to Electoral Systems; 2. Comparative Electoral Systems Research: The Maturation of a Field and New Challenges Ahead; 3. Why are There so many (or so few) Electoral Reforms?; PART 2: SINGLE-MEMBER CONSTITUENCY SYSTEMS; 4. Australia: The Alternative vote in a Compliant Political Culture; 5. Canada: Sticking to First-past-the-Post, for the Time Being; 6. France: Stacking the Deck; 7. India: Two-Party Contests Within a Multi-Party System; 8. United Kingdom: Plurality Rule Under Siege; 9. United States of America: Perpetual Campaigning in the Absence of Competition; PART 3: MIXED SYSTEMS; 10. Germany: Stability and Strategy in a Mixed-Member Proportional System; 11. Hungary: Holding Back the Tiers; 12. Italy: A Case of Fragmented Bipolarism; 13. Japan: Haltingly Toward a Two-Party System; 14. New Zealand: The Consolidation of Reform?; 15. Russia: The Authoritarian Adaptation of an Electoral System; PART 4: CLOSED LIST SYSTEMS; 16. Israel: The Politics of Extreme Proportionality; 17. South Africa: One Party Dominance Despite Perfect Proportionality; 18. Spain: Proportional Representation with Majoritarian Outcomes; PART 5: PREFERENTIAL LIST SYSTEMS AND PR-STV; 19. Austria: A Complex Electoral System with Subtle Effects; 20. Belgium: Empowering Voters or Party Elites?; 21. Chile: The Unexpected (and Expected) Consequences of Electoral Engineering; 22. Denmark: Simplicity Embedded in Complexity (or Is it the Other Way Round?); 23. Finland: One Hundred Years of Quietude; 24. The Netherlands: The Sanctity of Proportionality; 25. Ireland: The Discreet Charm of PR-STV; PART 6: CONCLUSION; 26. Conclusion; Appendix A - The Mechanics of Electoral Systems; Appendix B - Indices of Fragmentation and Disproportionality; Appendix C: Effective Threshold and Effective District Magnitude; Appendix D: Values of Indices for 22 Countries at Most Recent Election; Appendix E: Web Sites Related to

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