Literature Review: Political Influence In Society

Literature review: Political influence in society

Introduction

Maurice Duverger was a French jurist, politicologist and politic. This law states that majority electoral systems to convert votes into seats lead to bipartisan systems. Robert Alan Dahl was an American politicalologist and professor at Yale University. He defines political system as any system of human relations that has authority, government and power.  

Dahl believes that political influence is distributed among the adult members of a society, this influence is distributed irregularly, this asymmetric distribution. This is due to the inequality in the distribution of resources, the different skills of the individuals with whom they use their resources in politics and the differences in which individuals use their resources for political purposes. Victor D’hondt was a Belgian jurist and professor at the University of Gante. 

Developing

The development a system of conversion of votes that was called D´Hondt Law. Dieter Nohlen is a German politics expert in electoral systems. Controversies: The D´Hont law is a system that taking into account how conversion of votes into seats generates controversies. Some Spanish political formations leaders claim that this law is very unequal, and talk about other methods such as Hare-Niemeyer and Sainte-Laguë that are more proportional methods. 

The sociologist José Luis de Zágarra made the verification applying the Hare-Niemeyer method and the Sainte-Laguë method and discovered that very similar results came out that with the D´Hont method.

At the conclusion that Zágarra arrived was that with the D´HONT method the small matches were very penalized in large constituencies. The inequalities are given by the electoral law that “they had to accept, as a commitment to the leftist parties, a proportional system.

But they tried to ensure that in their operation he always tended to privilege the majority parties and, above all, the most conservative parties ”. (From Zárraga). Electoral systems: "The electoral system refers to the components or variables of the rules of the game that exercise a fundamental political impact and allow both empirical analysis and the assessment of effective yields of the rules". (Fatima García Díez).

Proportional electoral systems: Those who receive the candidacies is proportional to the number of seats it receives. The objective of this system is to guarantee the representation of minority parties. We can distinguish five types: the proportional system in plurinominal constituencies: they are based on the size of the constituency. This system tends to produce considerable proportionalities. The Compensatory Proportional System: This system aims in the first phase a certain amount of seats in uninominal constituencies. 

In the second phase the effect of disproportion on uninominal constituencies is compensated. This causes large parties to come out successful in uninominal constituencies. The personalized proportional system with legal barrier: the award of seats in uninominal constituencies and the principle of proportional representation, the percentage of seats of each party is determined at the national level is combined. The number of seats that corresponds to each party in uninominal constituencies

It is determined by the proportional representation formula. This system is very proportional between votes and seats. The transferable vote system: this system is common in the Anglo -Saxon world. This system is used in small constituencies. This is a very disproportion system. Pure proportional representation: excludes the use of natural barriers. This system aspires to achieve the greatest degree of proportionality. Majority electoral systems: These systems are based on the willing principle of the majorities. 

We can distinguish five types: the relative majority system in uninominal constituencies: it is applied in countries with Anglo -Saxon influence, one of the most important countries where it is applied is in Britain. Its effect makes them favor the most voted party. The absolute majority system in uninominal constituencies (with second round): this system is currently used in France. This favors matches with the highest number of votes.

The majority system in patrimonial constituencies with minority representation: in multinominal constituencies the voter has fewer votes than deputies to choose. The majority system in small plurinominal constituencies: this system uses the proportional decision formula in constituencies of at most 5 seats. The majority system with additional proportional list: in this system a large part of the seats in uninominal constituencies are awarded 

And an additional number in plurinominal constituencies or in a single national constituency, using the proportional decision formula. Electoral regime: "The electoral regime refers to the set of formal electoral rules (Electoral and Constitution Law)" ". The first concept is more common in the field of political science and the second a legal field. The concept of electoral system can also refer to the process of conversion of votes into seats.

The Spanish electoral system is composed of: the vote threshold (minimum vote percentage enter the distribution of seats, in Spain it is 3%), the vote form (if the list is closed/open), constituencies (electoral subdivisions), Prorrateo (determines whether the same seats are distributed in all constituencies or proportional) and D´Hont law (with this law the conversion of the votes into scales is determined).

conclusion

D´Hondt Law: It is named after the Belgian politician D´Hondt, this law consists in the distribution of seats between different constituencies. This law is used in many electoral systems, how for example, the Spanish electoral system. The D´HONT law is much harder with the matches with a lower number of votes than with matches with a greater influx of votes, so there are parties over -present. In small constituencies, the parties that only arise from that constituency have a great weight, 

This is why we can see the case that there are parties that have been presented at the national level with many more votes and less seats than parties that only occur in a constituency in a specific community. The majority systems there are greater proportionality because they are based on the principle of will of the majority, so it makes parties of parties with a greater number of votes favored.