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Representation and Electoral Systems

capital Legislative bodies should reflect the diversity of the electorate they seek to govern. When the broad spectrum of political views, personal characteristics and experiences, and interests of Americans are not reflected in our elected institutions, groups in the minority lose their voice. Furthermore, governing bodies that do not reflect the diversity of the general public do not benefit from the full breadth of views, insights and talents of the community.

Electoral systems—the rules and structures that govern the way votes are cast and counted—have a large impact on the quality of representation.

This page summarizes findings about electoral systems and representation.

Winner-take-all

Currently, most federal, state, and local governing branches are elected using electoral systems that fail to produce quality representation because they are based on the "winner-take-all" principle. In a winner-take-all system, the candidate with the most votes wins, regardless of their vote share, and no other candidates are elected.

Winner-take-all can be used in single-winner and multi-winner forms:

Winner-take-all systems that use single-winner districts include plurality (or "first-past-the post") and two round systems (where there is a runoff if no candidate gets a majority vote in the initial election).

Block voting is the most common type of winner-take-all system in multi-winner districts.

Block voting was used heavily in the South to keep African-American candidates from winning office. As a result, Section II of the Voting Rights Act prohibits use of block voting where its use in certain districts would drown out the opportunity of African-Americans and other minority populations to win office.

The historical use of winner-take-all in multi-winner districts to disenfranchise African-Americans groups notwithstanding, winner-take-all elections can produce quality representation in homogeneous single-member districts that consist of one overwhelmingly dominant political group—whether an ideological group or a racial minority group. In 1967, Congress even mandated that members of the House of Representatives be elected from single-winner districts, with the intention of ensuring minority groups, who mostly lived in concentrated urban communities, could gain descriptive representation.

However, single-winner districts can produce skewed representation in diverse, heterogeneous societies. In diverse places, such as the United States, there are many groups in a district that need representation and only one person to represent everyone in a single-winner district.

For more information, see:

Cox, Gary. 1997. Making Votes Count: Strategic Coordination in the World's Electoral Systems. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Farrell, David. 2011. Electoral Systems: A Comparative Introduction. New York: Palgrave MacMillan Press.

Gerber, Elisabeth, Rebecca B. Morton, and Thomas A. Rietz. 1998. "Minority Representation in Multi-member Districts". The American Political Science Review 92(1). 127-144.

Norris, Pippa. 1997. "Choosing electoral systems: proportional, majoritarian and mixed systems." International political science review 18, no. 3: 297-312

Trounstine, J., & Valdini, M. E. 2008. "The Context Matters: The Effects of Single‐Member versus At‐Large Districts on City Council Diversity". American Journal of Political Science, 52(3), 554-569.

One potential improvement to winner-take-all without abandoning single-winner districts is to use the single-winner form of ranked choice voting (RCV). In single-winner RCV, voters rank candidates in order of choice. Initially, every ballot counts as a vote for its highest ranked candidate. Then, the weakest performing candidates are eliminated one-by-one, and ballots counting for them are added to the totals of their highest ranked candidate still in the race.

Single-winner RCV is used in many localities across the United States, including four cities in the San Francisco Bay Area in California, Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, and Portland, Maine. Because American cities began turning to RCV only in the early 2000s, there jury is still out on how single-winner RCV improves the quality of representation. To investigate the impact of single-winner RCV, FairVote is currently undertaking an ambitious project examining the impact of single-member RCV on the election of women and people of color in the Bay Area in California.

Proportional Representation

Proportional representation describes multi-winner systems in which winners are allocated in proportion to their vote shares.

Proportional systems must elect candidates at-large or use multi-winner districts. The more winners in each district, the more proportional results can be.

Whereas winner-take-all systems allow the single largest group in a district to win representation, PR produces legislatures that better reflect the overall preferences of communities.

In European models, voters often vote for political parties rather than individual candidates. In a closed list system, political parties choose their candidates and the order in which they will be elected, while voters vote for a political party. In an open list system, political parties still choose their candidates but voters influence the order in which those candidates are elected by voting for the candidate from their party they most prefer.

Although European party-centric proportional representation is typically seen as out of step with American political traditions, there is a substantial history of candidate-based forms of proportional representation in the U.S. These systems have increased the quality of representation where they have been used. Systems currently in use include:

Cumulative Voting
Limited Voting
The single vote
Ranked Choice Voting in Multi-Winner Districts

Cumulative Voting (CV) is a semi-proportional method of election in which voters have a number of votes equal to the number of seats to be elected. Voters can assign as many of their votes to a particular candidate or candidates as they wish. In a three-seat district, for example, a voter could give all three of their votes to one candidate, two votes to one candidate and one to another, or one vote to three different candidates. CV is used in over seventy different localities in the United States, mostly in southern states like Alabama and Texas as part of settlements in Voting Rights Act cases.

In Limited Voting (LV), voters have fewer votes than there are seats to be elected and may cast only one vote for each candidate. This system allows a majority group to control the majority of seats, but not all seats. The greater the difference between the number of seats and the number of votes, the greater the opportunities for proportional type representation. Versions of limited voting are used in Washington, D.C., Philadelphia (PA), Hartford (CT) and many jurisdictions across North Carolina and Alabama. Like Cumulative Voting, Limited Voting has been used successfully to resolve several Voting Rights Act cases.

Single Vote (SV), also know as single non-transferable vote (SNTV), is a form of limited voting. In SV, voters have one vote in a multi-winner district election. Counting is similar to plurality models of voting, where the top vote recipients win seats. However, the model is semi-proportional because the most popular candidates earn seats but, like LV, a majority block of voters can not win all the seats. While this does not ensure highly proportional representation, it prevents minority groups from being locked out from the system.

Studies by Greg Adams (1996), S. Bowler, T. Donovan, and D. Brockington (2003), Richard Engstrom (2011), and Charles Wiggins and Janice Petty (1979), to name a few, have found that cumulative, limited and single voting enhances representation of not only racial and ethnic minority groups and women, but also political or ideological minority groups as well. The drawback, however, is that for minority groups to gain representation under CV or LV, there needs to be a sizable population of that group and the group must vote coherently so that their votes count towards electing the same candidate(s). Another form of proportional type representation that requires less strategic voting by minority populations is Ranked Choice Voting in multi-seat districts.

In Ranked Choice Voting in Multi-Winner Districts, also known as the Single Transferable Vote, voters have one vote but are able to rank candidates in order of preference. Initially, every ballot counts as a vote for its highest ranked candidate. Those candidates who have enough votes to win are elected and the weakest performing candidates are eliminated. For instance, in a five-seat district, a candidate is elected if they receive more than 1/6 of all votes cast, as this threshold ensures that they will be one of the top five finishers. If not enough candidates as number of seats reach the threshold to win, then voters' second choices come into play.

Multi-member RCV is currently used for state elections in Malta, Ireland, and Australia. Domestically, however, it is only used in Cambridge, Massachusetts (and has been for forty years). Work by S. Bowler and B. Grofman suggests that multi-winner Ranked Choice Voting should increase the quality of representation by increasing the proportion of women and people of color elected to public office. Work by other scholars including Douglas Amy (2002) Kerstin Barkman (1995), and Susan Welch and Donley Studlar (1990) also suggests RCV in multi-member districts should increase descriptive representation.

Women's Representation and Electoral Systems

Women are over 50% of the population of the United States but make up only about 20% of Congress. Only one state, New Hampshire, has reached gender parity in elected office, and no states have reached parity in both chambers of their state legislature. Women have served in the U.S. Senate in 27 only states. These statistics reflect the fact that women have a diluted presence in government.

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Based on the percentage of women in the House of Representatives (19.3%), the Inter-Parliamentary Union ranks the United States 94th out of 188 countries in the world for representation of women (as of November 2015). Countries ahead of the United States include Rwanda, Cuba, South Africa, Vietnam, Pakistan, China and Bosnia.

infogram_0_world_rankings_of_womens_representationWorld Rankings of Women's Representation//e.infogr.am/js/embed.js?OOltext/javascript

Many women in government, advocacy groups, and scholars observe that the number of women in office needs to increase. While many look at social reforms to address gender disparity, FairVote's work examines the structural barriers to representation, specifically single-winner electoral systems.

The Problem of Single-Winner Districts

Studies by Douglas Amy (2002), Jennifer Hayes Clark and Veronica Caro (2013), James King (2002), Richard Matland and Deborah Brown (1992), Michael Minta (2012), Heather Ondercin and Susan Welch (2009), Lilliard Richardson, Brain Russell, et al (2004), and Jessica Troustine (2008), to name a few, find that winner-take-all elections in single-winner districts are a barrier to women in office.

Numerous comparative studies, by American and international scholars, conclude that women are best represented in proportional systems with multi-winner districts (Welch (1990), Studlar and Welch (1996), Welch, Clark, and Darcy (1985), Zimmerman (1994), Kaminsky and White (2007)).

These findings hold even when we take into account the cultural expectations about the role of women. So while ingrained social attitudes might be a significant barrier to gender parity, our current electoral system also plays a large role. The bottom line is that use of single-winner districts and winner-take-all have allowed little opportunity for women to do more than squeeze in at the edges.

The Advantage of Multi-Winner Districts

In their studies of U.S. jurisdictions, Matland and Brown (1992) and Hughes (2013) find multi-winner districts create better opportunity for women’s representation over single-member districts.

Numerous studies reach similar conclusions. For example:

In their seminal analysis of the issue Clark et al (1985) found that in the 14 states that used both multi-winner districts and single-winner districts to elect their state legislatures, a greater proportion of candidates in multi-winner districts were women. Furthermore, changing to single-winner districts from multi-winner was associated with in a noticeable decrease in women’s representation (947). James King (2002) found similar results.

King (2002) found that states that switched from multi-winner districts to single-winner districts experienced a decrease of women's representation of between 1 and 6 percentage points per election cycle. This decrease, King argues, has implications for women's representation in higher office because state legislatures tend to act as spring boards for state executive positions (like governor or treasurer) or federal level office.

Clark and Caro (2013) found that use of multi-winner districts in state legislatures affected the legislative process. Comparing Arizona’s state house, which is elected from multi-winner districts (using block voting), to its state senate, elected in single-winner districts, the authors found that there was more cross-partisan collaboration on “women’s issues” in the House than the Senate. Additionally, bills emerging from the state house were more likely to be cosponsored.

Multi-winner districts increase women's representation for two key reasons: voters tend to balance their tickets; and political parties seek to appeal to as many voters as they can. Amy (2002), Zimmerman (1994), and Troustine (2008) find that in the multi-winner environment voters are more likely to vote for male and female candidates to balance their choices. Therefore, in multi-winner systems parties have greater incentives to run more female candidates. As much of the scholarship finds, parties run more female candidates in multi-winner systems because parties diversify their candidates to appeal to more voters (Barkman, 1995). This leads to more recruitment of female candidates and, consequently, more women in elective office.

The Promise of Ranked Choice Voting in Multi-Winner Seats

Moving from single-winner, winner-take-all districts to multi-member proportional representation models has the best chance of increasing women’s representation (King, 2002). Of all the systems, party-list types of proportional representation, common in Europe, tend to be the best for women's representation.

While the U.S. is unlikely to adopt European model of proportional representation, it has a long history of using candidate-centered forms of proportional representation like cumulative voting districts or ranked choice voting in multi-winner districts. In particular, ranked choice voting in multi-winner districts should increase the number of women elected. The international use of multi-winner RCV provides clues as to its likely impact in the United States. The Australian Senate, which is elected using multi-winner RCV, has relatively high proportions of women members as does Malta's legislature (also elected using multi-winner RCV). In Ireland, however, the Dail Eireann, elected using multi-winner RCV, has below average proportions of women. But many scholars posit that Ireland's lack of parity has more to do with its conservative political culture and recruitment of women in local governments than electoral mechanisms (Bowler, S. and B. Grofman (2000), Buckley, Fiona, Mack Mariana, et al (2015), McElroy, Gail and Michael Marsh (2010)).

In the United States, multi-winner RCV is only used in Cambridge, Massachusetts. FairVote is currently working to further examine the effect of ranked choice voting, in both its multi- and single-winner forms, on representation.

Representation 2020: Representation, a program of FairVote, works to raise awareness of the under representation of women in elected office and to help highlight the structural barriers to achieving gender parity in American Elections. Along with advocating for more changes to electoral mechanisms, specifically adoption of Ranked Choice Voting, Representation2020 also advocates for more fair party recruitment practices, gender-neutral rhetoric of women in office, and reforms in legislative rules, such as child care and telecommuting procedures, that take the tension out of being a mother and a legislator.

Women and Minorities in Cities and Counties Project: The Women and Minorities in Cities and Counties Projects is an extensive, multi-level research project that explores the impact of electoral systems on descriptive representation in the United States. The project consists of two parts. First, it examines the effects of single-winner RCV on the representation of women and minority groups at the city level in the Bay Area in California. Second, it explores the impact of electoral systems, including cumulative voting, term limits and multi-winner districts, on the representation of women and minority groups in county government. We anticipate completion of this project in July, 2016.

Racial Minority Representation and Electoral Systems

Many racial minority groups are severely underrepresented in local, state, and federal government. All discussions of improving descriptive racial minority representation in the United States are guided by the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and a later 1967 law that legally embeds the notion that single-winner districts are better for minority representation than multi-winner districts, especially block voting (Carroll and Sanbonmatsu, 2013).

Contemporary scholarship supports the idea that minorities are most fairly represented in well-drawn single-winner districts only when the minority population in question is politically homogeneous and geographically concentrated. In recognition of these problems, inherent in single-winner districts, judges increasingly uphold multi-winner proportional electoral systems, like Cumulative Voting and Limited Voting, as legitimate alternatives to majority-minority single-member districts under the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

The literature shows:

Men are the greatest beneficiaries from single-winner plurality districts, with these districts disadvantaging women of color (See: Troustine and Valdini, 2008).

The observed increase in descriptive representation of minorities under single-winner districts has not translated into proportional increases of substantive representation, as the voices of minority policymakers are drowned out by non-minority policymakers (See Rocah, et al, 2010). Both Richard Engstrom (2011) and Elisabeth Gerber et al (1998) observe that courts increasingly rule that racially gerrymandered districts dilute votes or reduce overall minority influence by limiting minority representation to a few majority-minority districts. These districts make up a small proportion of districts, meaning that the voices of minority legislators, and the constituents they represent, can be drowned out in the aggregate.

In single-winner districts, Hispanic populations are disadvantaged because they tend to be more evenly distributed and spread-out. Single-winner districts are notoriously bad for minority groups that are evenly dispersed across an area (See: Welch (1990) and Casellas (2009)).

When more than one minority population lives in a district, plurality ensures that vote splitting can ensure that neither minority group is represented. For example, in a district with sizable Black and Latino populations with a candidate from each group running, vote splitting can ensure that neither candidate wins (See: Paru Shah, 2009).

Proportional representation in multi-winner districts is a valid means by which to increase fair representation of racial minority groups (Amy, 2002, 138).

As Douglas Amy (2002) notes, one of the biggest advantages to multi-winner proportional systems such as cumulative voting, is a change to the power structure. In a proportional system, power is shared between representatives representing different groups, rather than held by just the largest group. Thus, an election does not need to lead to one group winning all the representation in a district with all others feeling that they lack representation.

Similarly, Shaun Bowler et al (2003) observe that multi-winner proportional systems allow various groups to share power instead of creating the dynamic of power-winner versus power-loser that is so common in plurality systems. The authors argue that, when power is shared, minorities and non-minorities are responsible for the same district, which may foster cross-cultural communities instead of perpetuating a system of separate communities.

As long as minority voters continue to vote in a racially polarized manner (for an in-group descriptive candidate), then both women and minorities should both benefit from cumulative voting and other proportional systems (Zimmerman,1994, 674). David Brockington et al (1998) come to a similar conclusion, noting that proportional systems have potential to increase minority representation if minority voters turnout at rates comparable to majority voters.

RCV and the representation of racial minority groups

CBCF

Because multi-winner RCV is not yet widely used in the United States, and single-winner RCV has gained popularity recently, we do not yet know much about the impact of RCV on minority representation.

There is good reason to expect that multi-winner RCV will fairly represent ethnic and racial minorities, for the same reasons other proportional systems do (Amy, 2002).

Early, anecdotal, evidence shows that RCV in single-winner districts has been accompanied by high levels of representation for ethnic and racial minorities. Currently (2015), three of the four mayors of the Bay Area cities using ranked choice voting in their elections are female. Women hold half or more of the offices elected by RCV in the Bay Area in three cities: Oakland, Berkeley and San Leandro. Women and people of color hold 47 of the 52 elected offices filled using RCV.

To explore the link between RCV and the representation of ethnic and racial minorities FairVote has launched two ambitious projects:

RCV and the Representation of Women and People of Color in the Bay Area: In this project, FairVote is quantifying the impact of RCV on the representation of women and people of color in the Bay Area. We use an extensive database of candidates dating back to 1992 and a rigorous difference in differences method. We anticipate our project to be complete by June 2016.

Electoral Systems and Customs and the Representation of Women and People of Color at the County Level: The Who Leads Us databases, created with the assistance of the Women Donors Network, record the gender, race and ethnicity of candidates and elected officials from the local county to national level of public office in 2014. Utilizing these extensive databases, FairVote is exploring the impact of different electoral systems and customs on descriptive representation. For example, we will explore the relevance of term limits to the representation of women and people of color. By the end of 2016, we will publish an interactive tool ranking each county as well as publish a report highlighting what structural reforms are associated with more equitable representation of women and people of color.

We anticipate completion of these projects in 2016.

Representation of Third-Party and Independent Voters

The effects of alternative electoral systems such as Ranked Choice Voting on third-party and independent representation in the United States is a major topic of FairVote's research. Although there are examples from abroad (for instance, the multi-winner use of RCV in the Australian Senate is thought to slightly increase the representation of minor parties (Bowler and Grofman, 2000), the unique two-party, candidate-centered system of the US makes extrapolating the overseas experience difficult.

Voting Australia While RCV might not increase the election of third party or independent candidates in the US, as candidates must clear a threshold of the total vote (a threshold that decreases the more candidates that are being elected), RCV allows supporters of third parties and minor candidates to sincerely rank their preferred candidate first without feeling like their votes are wasted (Lewyn, Michael (2012)). RCV also minimizes the spoiler effect of third party votes. Under RCV, third party and independent supporters can rank their most preferred party or candidate first. If their candidate is eliminated, their votes immediately transfer to their second choice preference. Third parties supporters are thus free to elect their favorite candidate with minimal chance that that support will spoil the election outcome (Bartholdi III and Orlin,1991, Bowler and Grofman, 2000).

Along with preventing spoilers, RCV may also help keep the major parties more accountable to the electorate. Candidates are incentivized to court a broader range of voters than they normally would, including asking for second and third choice rankings from minor-party supporters.

In multi-winner RCV, it also becomes possible for Democrats or Republicans that live in a district with the opposite majority to gain representation. As long as the Democrat or Republican population is equal to or greater than the threshold to win, people can gain representation where they currently feel left out.

Representation

Representation and Electoral Systems

Winner-take-all

Proportional Representation

Further reading

Women's Representation and Electoral Systems

The Problem of Single-Winner Districts

The Advantage of Multi-Winner Districts

The Promise of Ranked Choice Voting in Multi-Winner Seats

Further Reading

Racial Minority Representation and Electoral Systems

RCV and the representation of racial minority groups

Further Reading

Representation of Third-Party and Independent Voters

Further Reading

FairVote Democracy

Representation

Representation and Electoral Systems

Winner-take-all

Proportional Representation

Further reading

Women's Representation and Electoral Systems

The Problem of Single-Winner Districts

The Advantage of Multi-Winner Districts

The Promise of Ranked Choice Voting in Multi-Winner Seats

Further Reading

Racial Minority Representation and Electoral Systems

RCV and the representation of racial minority groups

Further Reading

Representation of Third-Party and Independent Voters

Further Reading

FairVote Democracy

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