Proportional Representation and the Constituency Role in Britain

212 Pages·2007·8.5 MB·English

by  Thomas Carl Lundberg (auth.)

Proportional Representation and the Constituency Role
in Britain

Proportional
Representation and the
Constituency Role in
Britain
Thomas Carl Lundberg
SPIRE
Keele University, UK
© Thomas Carl Lundberg 2007
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2007 978-0-230-00652-2
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A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Lundberg, Thomas Carl, 1967-
Proportional representation and the constituency role in Britain /
Thomas Carl Lundberg.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Proportional representation–Great Britain. 2. Representative
government and representation–Great Britain. I. Title.
JF1075.G7L86 2007 ISBN
328.41′07347–dc22 2006052030
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
16 15 14 13 12 11 10 09 08 07
Contents
List of Tables vii
Preface and Acknowledgements ix
1 Introduction: More Pluralism in Representation 1
The context of this book 4
New electoral systems 7
Citizen disengagement 9
Representatives and constituents 11
Exploring the roles of elected representatives 15
Questions asked in this book 17
Outline of this book 19
2 Proportional Representation and Constituency
Representation 24
Why choose PR? 25
PR elections in the United Kingdom 28
Combining single-member constituencies with PR 34
Mixed-member systems in comparative perspective 38
A constituency role for list representatives? 44
Shadowing 46
3 Representative Roles and Electoral Incentives 50
The constituency role in Britain 52
Questioning the link between MPs and constituents 53
Weak legislatures and strong executives 58
The British role in electoral engineering in Germany 63
Conclusion 67
4 Evidence for the Electoral Incentive 69
Methodological considerations 72
Comparing British and German MMP elections 75
Some evidence for the electoral incentive 81
Constituency service: The ‘pork barrel’ and the personal
vote 86
Learning of electoral incentives? 97
Conclusion 100
v
vi Contents
5 List Representatives and their Constituencies 102
A constituency role for list representatives? 103
New Zealand’s experience with list representatives 111
British MEPs and list PR 113
Conflict between constituency and partisan roles 115
The constituency role of list representatives in Britain and
Germany 119
Spending time with constituents 127
Learning electoral incentives? 137
Conclusion 141
6 Competition Between Constituency and List
Representatives 143
Shadowing and constituency service in Scotland and Wales 144
The constituency role of list representatives in Britain 150
The dual candidacy debate 158
German representatives’ attitudes towards each other 166
Competition and conflict between German representatives 169
The duties of list representatives in Germany 170
Conclusion 175
7 Conclusion: Coming to Terms with Pluralism 177
Conclusion 178
Coming to terms with pluralism in British politics 182
Bibliography 184
Index 193
List of Tables
1.1 The six electoral systems now in use in the United
Kingdom 7
2.1 Election results, Scottish and Welsh House of Commons
seats, 1 May 1997 26
2.2 Election results, Northern Ireland Assembly, 25 June 1998 29
2.3 Election results, European Parliament members from
Great Britain, 10 June 1999 30
2.4 Election results, Scottish Parliament and Welsh Assembly,
6 May 1999 31
2.5 Election results, Scottish Parliament and Welsh Assembly,
1 May 2003 33
2.6 Election results, Greater London Assembly, 4 May 2000 34
2.7 Global distribution of mixed-member systems for
national legislative elections, 2004 40
4.1 Election results, Scotland and Wales, 1999 and 2003 76
4.2 Election results, Brandenburg and Hesse, 1999 78
4.3 UKsurvey response summary 79
4.4 Germansurvey response summary 80
4.5 Constituency orientation: Re-election (UK) 82
4.6 Constituency orientation: Re-election (Germany) 85
4.7 Constituency service: Local promotion and the
‘pork barrel’ 1 (UK) 88
4.8 Constituency service: Local promotion and the
‘pork barrel’ 2 (UK) 89
4.9 Constituency service: Local promotion and the
‘pork barrel’ 1 (Germany) 90
4.10 Constituency service: Local promotion and the
‘pork barrel’ 2 (Germany) 92
4.11 Personal vote? (UK) 93
4.12 Personal vote? (Germany) 94
4.13 Constituency orientation (UK and Germany) 96
4.14 Time spent on local promotion and ‘pork’ (UK and
Germany) 98
4.15 Helping constituents (UK and Germany) 99
5.1 The role of list representatives (UK) 106
5.2 The role of list representatives (Germany) 108
vii
viii List of Tables
5.3 Constituency and partisan role conflict (UK) 117
5.4 Constituency and partisan role conflict (Germany) 118
5.5 Constituency orientation: Links to voters and parties
(UK) 120
5.6 Constituency orientation: Links to voters and parties
(Germany) 122
5.7 Constituency orientation: Task importance (UK) 125
5.8 Constituency orientation: Task importance (Germany) 126
5.9 Contacts and meetings with voters and interest groups
(UK) 129
5.10 Contacts and meetings with voters and interest groups
(Germany) 131
5.11 Constituency orientation: How time is spent (UK) 133
5.12 Constituency orientation: How time is spent (Germany) 136
5.13 Contact with constituents (UK and Germany) 138
5.14 Constituency and partisan role conflict (UK and
Germany) 140
6.1 Attitudes towards other representatives (UK, 2000 and
2003) 156
6.2 Attitudes towards other representatives (Germany, 2000) 174
Preface and Acknowledgements
This book critically examines the claim that those members of Britain’s
devolved assemblies who are elected by party list proportional repre-
sentation (PR) are somehow ‘second-class’ representatives. The Scottish
Parliament and the Welsh Assembly are elected by the mixed-member
proportional (MMP) system, often referred to in Britain as the ‘addi-
tional member system’ (AMS), a rather unflattering term implying that
the list-elected third of Welsh Assembly members – and almost half of
the Scottish Parliament’s members – are ‘additional’ members, while
their counterparts, elected in single-member constituencies, are more
‘genuine’ members. The term AMS, used by the Hansard Society in its
1976 recommendation of a West German-style reform of the single-
member plurality (SMP, colloquially known as ‘first-past-the-post’ in
Britain) system of electing British members of Parliament, has become
rather ingrained among not only the British media, but also among
many scholars. This is unfortunate; aside from being somewhat inaccu-
rate or unrefined (some mixed-member electoral systems are designed
to produce a proportional outcome, while others, lacking the compen-
satory element of MMP, simply combine parallel elections of con-
stituency and list representatives), AMS is actually quite a value-laden
term, as noted above.
While I, too, am guilty of using the term AMS in an early article on
this topic, I have since switched to MMP, which is now the most com-
monly used term among the international group of scholars who study
electoral systems (see Chapter 1). Furthermore, the Arbuthnott Com-
mission, established to explore changes to the Scottish Parliament’s
electoral system, strongly recommended abandonment of AMS, as well
as other colloquial terms, like ‘top-up’ members to describe regional list
members of the body. While it is perfectly legitimate to discuss the role
of list-elected representatives, and even to be critical of what they do
(or don’t do), using derogatory terms is simply unfair, and certainly
not scholarly.
As previously mentioned, MMP is an electoral system through
which representatives are elected in single-member constituencies and
from regional lists of candidates drawn up by party organisations,
with list candidates winning seats in such a way that the overall elec-
tion outcome, on a partisan basis, is more or less proportional in each
ix