The reason we are all part of Th!nk About It! is the EJC’s desire to draw attention on the importance of the European Parliament and, consequently, to raise interest on the upcoming European elections (I hope I got it right). It is not only the EJC who realized something needs to be done to bring the European Parliament, the only directly elected institution of the EU, closer to the citizens, especially since the Parliament was created in the first place in order to bring the EU closer to the citizens. The Parliament itself realized the importance of the next elections, these being the first elections when all 27 member states of the “new” EU will vote at once, and released a communication strategy for the next elections.
On Th!nk, we all wrote about the influence of the EP or of the EU (be it a positive or a negative influence) on our lives. The Parliament and the Commission keep saying how important they are for European citizens in order to convince citizens to come and vote. However, the voter turnout at European elections has dropped constantly since 1979 and I don’t see any reason why it should go over 45%, which is the 2004 figure. However, there is an element, perhaps the most important one, which is often overlooked by all those trying to narrow the gap between the EP and the European electorate: the electoral system.
We remember Piotr Kaczynski speaking to us in Brussels about the 27 different campaigns. The current electoral system favors this fragmented electoral process. Each member state organizes internal elections, in which domestic parties put forward lists of candidates, usually at the national level. People in each country vote for a domestic party. This fosters campaigns which are oriented towards internal issues and less on the importance of the EU and on the projects of candidates in the European Parliament. This is why we don’t have “European elections”, but “national elections for the European Parliament”.
In the literature on electoral systems, there are many books and articles which mention electoral reform as a way to raise awareness on the stakes of elections. Perhaps this might be a solution also in the case of the EP. Therefore, during April I will try to put forward some proposal for a reform of the electoral system used in European elections. I am counting on your help and comments in drafting the potential new outline of an electoral system which may bring MEP’s closer to citizens and generate higher stakes for the electorate.
I will try not to make the discussion too technical. I will write in separate posts about the electoral districts (now the states), the electoral formula (now a proportional representation formula, through list voting), the size of the assembly to be chosen (736 after the June elections) or the electoral threshold (if I’m not wrong, 5% in each state). Hopefully, by the end of this month, we can draft a new electoral system that can be forwarded to the attention of relevant EU decision-makers.
It may sound ambitious, but that’s why we’re called TH!NKERS.
(36 votes, average: 3.89 out of 5)
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Two important references, available from the European Parliament, are the study on the existing electoral systems
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/eplive/expert/multimedia/20090303MLT50670/media_20090303MLT50670.pdf
and
the Duff report which envisages some reform but without a uniform electoral code
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-//EP//NONSGML+COMPARL+PE-412.180+02+DOC+PDF+V0//EN&language=EN
Sounds like a great project!
I totally agree that the voting turnout is a outcome of the system in itself. EP and its competences, national parties and the European parties, the European groups, the non existing European government, the lack of connection of EP and the Commission…. it is really hard for a voter to see WHAT you are actually voting for and of course then the motivation stays low.
I think there are especially 2 crusial reforms for the EP elections that would help to make EU more democratic and at the same time increase voting turnout (because these two things are linked).
1. Transnational party lists
Today if I wanted to vote Green I have to vote for candidates coming from the swedish Miljöpartiet (as I live in Sweden). The problem is that they are really euroscpetic and me as a federalist would clearly prefere to vote for a Green federalist as Italian Frassoni or German Cohn-Bendit. Transnational lists, with candidates from different countries, would increase the voters choice and help to overcome this problem of diverse opinions in one and the same European party. Clearly it would also create a scope for a better European dimension to the debates before the elections - and avoid the “is the government bad or good” rethorics.
2. Let us vote for the Commission President trough the European Palriament
As it is the European Parliament that has the final say on who will be the next Commission President it is strange that the European Parliament is not using this power - and above all let ME use this power as a voter. If each party would nominate their candidate me as a voter would have real choices - and real faces! - to choose between and also see a clear outcome of my vote in the new Commission President. The interesting thing is that no treaty change is needed for this to happen - it is enough that each party nominate their candidate (so far only EPP have surprise surprise sort of nominated Barroso) and that the new majority block anyone but their own candidate.
I am looking forward for other reform suggestion!
more on this debate at the federalist blog federalists.cafebabel.com
thank you for the great comment, Åsa! this is exactly the kind of feedback I am hoping for.
your proposals are excellent and tackle very relevant issues. while I don’t agree fully with the second one (I agree in principle, but I think it should be done differently), regarding the head of the Commission, your first proposal, regarding the transnational lists, is something I’ve also been thinking of myself for some time and the idea that sparked my intention to develop an entire new electoral system.
I will elaborate more on both your proposals in my following posts, precisely because they are both essential features related to a possible new electoral system.
I’m familiar with the debate on the federalist blogs and online publications and I’m glad to see we can make a connection between Th!nk and other people dealing in essence with the same topics.
I agree that the election process needs to be rethought. I also think that there needs to be more accountability: the votes of the MEPs need to be better tracked. I started a project to monitor voting patterns (www.epvote.eu). With such tools, MEPs would need to be more accountable. As an example, there are MEPs that consistently vote “abstention”… My question to them would be: what are you doing at the Parliament?
laurent, that’s a cool iniative! if you want to, i can put you in contact with someone who is doing something similar in Romania. you can send me an e-mail at george.jiglau@yahoo.com if you’re interested.
as a potential answer to your question and also as a potential excuse for MEP’s in some of the situations.. maybe they abstain when they vote something in a field to which they are not familiar with. although they do have materials to get informed before the vote and the number of abstentions is quite high, you’re right…
George,
Sorry to state this but, in general, I have very low expectations about a possible change in voting behavior concerning the EP elections due to the current institutional set up and some other factors related to voting psychology.
The fact that the results of these elections don’t lead to the formation of a government at the top level is very likely to make people feel that voting at this level is simply useless. Overall, the election results do not even make a direct impact on the policy making mechanism let alone fail it to make even an indirect impact on people’s lives. These are all widely recognized arguments in the literature and I think, rearrangements in the electoral system may affect the perceptions of only the intellectually well-equipped people.
I have some other comments on the topic as well but i’ll be posting them possibly as responses to your further posts. Yet, I truly appreciate your efforts and I’m looking forward to follow your suggestions on electoral reform.
August,
Laurent,
You the man! I’ve been looking for something like this for ages. Can I ask you to contact me? I would like to understand this better and see if it can be put in a larger framework of EU transparency.
Compliments, way to go!
mbotta
Hi M.
I was unable to find your contact information on your blog. You can contact me at “laurent at noiseinthewires dot com”.
Laurent
George,
You might be aware about this, but just in case - please check this link:
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-//EP//NONSGML+COMPARL+PE-412.180+02+DOC+PDF+V0//EN&language=EN
It is a draft report by MEP Andrew Duff on the electoral reform. It might be useful when thinking about possible reform solutions or at least as a source of information on electoral systems applied at the present.
Personally, I also tend to believe that as long as the powers of the EP remain as they are, the electoral reform should not have much impact, but maybe you prove me that I am wrong? One could say that the voter turnout has dropped when the EP acquired more powers - but in that case what was so different about the first few EP elections, in which voters turned out well?
the next comment was posted by Ralf Grahn (grahnlaw.blogspot.com, ralf.grahn@kolumbus.fi), but was not yet approved:
“Two important references, available from the European Parliament, are the study on the existing electoral systems
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/eplive/expert/multimedia/20090303MLT50670/media_20090303MLT50670.pdf
and the Duff report which envisages some reform but without a uniform electoral code
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-//EP//NONSGML+COMPARL+PE-412.180+02+DOC+PDF+V0//EN&language=EN”
thank you for the recommendations. the site administrators did not aprove the comment, so it doesn’t appear after the post, but I have access to them nevertheless and I consulted the links.
i’m hoping to get more comments from you once I start writing more in-depth posts about these issues.
Actually it is the spam filter that caught the comment. Usually every comment with 2 or more links included is considered as spam…
that’s true, but the spam messages can be approved by the site admin’s. i deal with this type of problems on my own blog on wordpress, some comments enter in spam and appear as pending and then i approve them myself.
but it’s no big deal, it’s a good thing i saw the comments.
[...] acum, am scris deja două posturi: unul introductiv, în care explic raţiunea pentru care un nou sistem electoral ar fi necesar, şi unul care intră [...]
[...] http://elections.thinkaboutit.eu/2009/04/what-about-a-new-electoral-system-as-a-solution-for-having-real-e... [...]