Tuesday 11 December 2012

First past the post elections should be illegal

The nature of the first-past-the-post voting system is that (due to the strength of Duverger's law) over time two dominant parties will emerge. This means that because of tactical voting people will have less choice in who they are governed by and who represents them. This loss of democracy is very serious because whilst government is important to maintain property rights... if there is not sufficient government accountability this can lead to an aggressive and intrusive state. We need the government to control and define property rights but this means (by definition) the government can be aggressive because it itself defines what is and isn't aggressive. So this means that democracy is both necessary and very important. If there is not enough democracy (as with fptp) this means that an intrusive and aggressive government can emerge. So we must always have proportional representation and nothing else. We have a right to proportional representation if there is a government and to arrange any other kind of electoral system is a crime. It is a crime to arrange an election under anything other than proportional representation. First past the post elections are criminal.

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