Economist Ranks Canada 5th in Global Democracy

[Samonadreau]

No surprise, we have a good democratic system, biggest drawback is the lack of proportional representation. Example being Last election where the Conservatives won the the popular vote and the Liberals still formed government based on seats won. It could be a lot worse, but it's also not close to perfect. Doesnt help that over a third the countries votes come from half (geographically) of one province and a Kindergarten teacher keeps getting elected.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Originally Posted by jayswin

US democracy is failing and is appropriately ranked in this article, not every country is failing just because current governments suck.

I would suggest that when the current government sucks, particularly on governmental issues like interfering in the judicial system and using political power to funnel money to your supporters and friends, that is one thing. When you have those factors in place and it simply doesn't matter to anyone anymore, such that the party in charge can keep doing these things with impunity and their supporters will hand-wave and excuse them and the voters won't do anything about it, that's when you're on the precipice of a failing democracy.

Obviously the behavior of the Republicans in the USA is considerably worse, but... they lost. Granted, narrowly, which is highly concerning, but at least that government is no longer in power. Does anyone think the LPC is going to lose next time? Hell, they might gain seats.

[Manhattanboy]

Originally Posted by Samonadreau

No surprise, we have a good democratic system, biggest drawback is the lack of proportional representation. Example being Last election where the Conservatives won the the popular vote and the Liberals still formed government based on seats won. It could be a lot worse, but it's also not close to perfect. Doesnt help that over a third the countries votes come from half (geographically) of one province and a Kindergarten teacher keeps getting elected.

A PR system would cement minority coalition governments where fringe parties have too much say. The Greens would rule Canada.

Look at Israel which has elections every three months it seems.

[Ozy_Flame]

Anyone down for a ranked ballot system?

[flamesfever]

Triple E Senate anyone?

[GGG]

Originally Posted by Ozy_Flame

Anyone down for a ranked ballot system?

The permanent liberal victory option? No thanks.

I do wonder what would happen with the parties. The goal would to become the least offensive choice rather than the best choice.

On the positive side that should weed out toxic positions on the negative side I don’t think you would get any vision it would be about not offending.

I’m also anti senate reform, I like that it’s an appointed body that could step in and fix things in the event of anti democratic behaviour but knows that if it try’s to intervene as an unelected body it would lead to its end. The idea of an Equal by province representation in the senate would lead to huge distortions giving effective veto power to the maritimes.

[JohnnyB]

Originally Posted by GGG

The permanent liberal victory option? No thanks.

I do wonder what would happen with the parties. The goal would to become the least offensive choice rather than the best choice.

On the positive side that should weed out toxic positions on the negative side I don’t think you would get any vision it would be about not offending.

I’m also anti senate reform, I like that it’s an appointed body that could step in and fix things in the event of anti democratic behaviour but knows that if it try’s to intervene as an unelected body it would lead to its end. The idea of an Equal by province representation in the senate would lead to huge distortions giving effective veto power to the maritimes.

Sounds pretty Canadian.

[craigwd]

Originally Posted by Manhattanboy

A PR system would cement minority coalition governments where fringe parties have too much say. The Greens would rule Canada.

Look at Israel which has elections every three months it seems.

But at least those that vote Green would finally get some meaningfull representation and could perhaps grow the party.

[Envitro]

Originally Posted by jayswin

Our parties all kind of suck right now and with social media being big on "everything's corrupt and ****ed!!!" it's created a perfect storm of ever industrialized nation thinking that their democracy is failing.

US democracy is failing and is appropriately ranked in this article, not every country is failing just because current governments suck.

I'm pretty sure it's not Social Media itself creating the storm, more like Russia and China using it against us to push that narrative every chance they get.

To be fair, the feds are doing a horrible job with self-inflicted wounds all over the place too, but it is what it is.

[Ozy_Flame]

Originally Posted by GGG

The permanent liberal victory option? No thanks.

Weird, but OK. It would actually strengthen the non-Liberal voting in central Canada.

[Samonadreau]

Originally Posted by Manhattanboy

A PR system would cement minority coalition governments where fringe parties have too much say. The Greens would rule Canada.

Look at Israel which has elections every three months it seems.

Im not saying go full PR. I dont think there is a perfect way to do it.

Also NZ has a lot more success with MMP then Isreal does with PR. Plus Israel has other issues.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by Ozy_Flame

Weird, but OK. It would actually strengthen the non-Liberal voting in central Canada.

When I looked after the first Trudeau election the liberals would gain seats if you assumed that conservatives would not vote NDP or Green and NDP would vote Green second then liberal. Is this a poor assumption?

How do you see it hurting the liberals in central Canada? Do you think the anyone but conservative effect is strong enough to cause that much disruption?

[Sylvanfan]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

Obviously the behavior of the Republicans in the USA is considerably worse, but... they lost. Granted, narrowly, which is highly concerning, but at least that government is no longer in power. Does anyone think the LPC is going to lose next time? Hell, they might gain seats.

There was a time when it maybe looked like that might be the case. Most states did what they usually do, and the swing ones went to the Dems. The final result wasn't really that close. It really was two putridly awful candidates for the second straight election so I can see why Americans would not be too impressed with the state of their Democracy.

[Ozy_Flame]

Well one version of ranked voting would have seen Trudeau negatively impacted by his minority government in 2019, assuming the same voter preferences held. With the NDP shooting themselves in the foot and the scandals around Trudeau at the time, it would have worked. In the circumstance that there is no majority winner (no candidate receives more than 50% of the total votes in a given area), then one application of it could come down to the top-two choices, and such votes may not have been syphoned off to the NDP (and probably the right time to do that too). Andrew Scheer probably ruined for himself though by being a ####ty, unlikeable candidate. NDP was on crazy train and the opportunity could have been there to clean up.

Then in the general popular vote, such a system would have likely transferred the almost 300,000 People Party votes over to the Conservative as well.

My point is, I think a ranked system would have actually benefited the Cons, especially since the majority of the Liberal ridings were not won with majorities - many in that 35-48% era. Ranked ballots would have meant a better chance for the Cons to tilt in favor as the 2nd candidate.

There are various methods to ranked voting, but generally speaking ranked votes would have given Cons a "second chance" in central and eastern Canada.

[driveway]

Yeaaahhh Taiwan! Take that ... *checks notes* ... Switzerland!!

[Sylvanfan]

Chile, is an interesting case. I wonder how they would have rated it back in 1973 before Pinochet and the Junta took over. Certainly a horrific person, but there are some that note that because there was no opposition or debate that regime was able to invoke some of the economic policies from the Chicago boys which may not have been as easy with opposition and lobbying interests. I believe after they went back to free elections they adopted more of these that help reduce poverty thru some social programs and it's been by far the most stable economy in the region. Most of the growth being since it went back to free elections in 1990. Today's USA likely isn't as likely to back a coup d'etat as it was 40 years ago, but I wonder if something similar might eventually happen in Venezuela.

[Mull]

As someone who likely will vote Conservative, removing the FPP scares me, it scares me the Cons will no longer get a ruling party again.

And the left scares me, I think they have disasters that are a real threat to Canada's very ability to keep our current standard of life.

That said, I look at the republicans down south who appear to 'cheat' because the other side can't be trusted to govern. They themselves have the answers and therefore the ends justify the means in terms of doing whatever must be done to ensure they win.

FPP ignores the will of the majority. I can't see how keeping FPP is any different then what I accuse the republicans in the USA doing, no matter how scared I am of the results.

Get rid of it.

[Roughneck]

An MMP to me seems to align most with how we vote in the country, and looks to have a much better balance of stable and effective government and more accurate representation of the electorate compared to other proportional systems.