But its still atleast a democracy, something that russia iran china ect lack. Other countries may have way better ways, but us way is good enough atleast.
@@RealMailou Yeah you named few countries that have it worse, now you can start naming the majority of countries, with better systems. The faact, that someone have it worse, doesn't mean it's not an issue.
There are a lot of rich Jews, but not all Jews are rich, actually, most of them aren't. There are a lot of rich Christians (oh the irony), but most Christians aren't rich. And proportionality doesn't necessarily make this proportion all that better if you have a fractured religion anyway, look at Israel's parliament. Judaism is also having a large number of people opposed to Zionism, saying that the kingdom of Israel should only be reestablished with the presence of a Messiah. Judaism isn't a unifying force nearly as much as people tend to think, just the same way that being Christian didn't stop a huge number of wars between Catholics and Protestants on religious doctrinal grounds. But the other arguments do make sense.
Yousef Imran i do agree with most of you points except the jews part. ( obviusly there are rich jews that have money but there are many more Christians)
Translation: Yes, you are absolutely right. In Germany - as in other European countries - we have a real choice between many different parties and the reality of the last 40 years demonstrates that three further parties - two of them indeed newly established parties - represent their voters in the federal parliament (Bundestag) and - in the case of the Green Party - even in all regional parliaments since 1980. At the moment there are six parties in the German federal parliament and they really differ in many political convictions and aims.
@@paulhk2727 I as a German myself think that this would be great in some points and horrible in others. Direct democracy can work in small communities when the majority of voters cares about the subject but some decisions are better made by experts. Too bad that politicians tend to gain positions where they aren't experts either 😅
@@Pyxlean No credit for partial answers. Do we require a third party? We already have that, and they fielded a Presidential candidate (Johnson) that I've voted for. What amendment do we write? What does it do? How is it enforced? (Notice there was no penalty for the Senate not holding a hearing for Obama's nominee to SCOTUS, and Boscow Mitch just smirked and gloated.) We need an amendment with teeth...but how do we write it so it can be effective?
I think Main already did it recently. Change happens when the people demand change and are willing to fight for it. In a lot of places they might be able to implement this via a ballot initiative without going through the parties anyway. Don't be so Eeyore.
In Maine we voted ranked voting in. Only Republicans are being obstructionist and fighting the bill, because they are anti progress. Democrats aren't perfect but at least they don't fight progress tooth and nail. Vote Democrat and support a third party future:)
Well that sucks. I guess this is the system we are stuck with forever. Or atleast for the next 10^100 years untill the Dark Era of the universe. Too bad this system is unbreakable by anything other that the literal heat death of the universe. We are stuck with it forever./s
Normally I have different views than Vox, but this video is on an issue we all probably agree on. A 2 party system just leaves most people unsatisfied (I.e. Not all republicans wanted Trump, not all democrats wanted Hillary, and no one wanted either).
Joshua Sauder - How would you have a candidate in office that only a small percentage voted for? In Canada we have a 5 party system, which ends in two outcomes: either a"majority" government, where the winning party holds >50% of seats in the senate, or a "minority" government, where due to fractured votes the winning party holds
Joshua Sauder - It does make sense, and to someone who has only ever had two-parties it's a very logical way to think. But I grew up never expecting the winner to be the one with over 50%. To me, democracy is the person the *most* people chose, not necessarily the person the *majority* of people chose. :) Also, we have our favourites to win - usually there's a forecasted "Opposition" party, which is the one that's most likely to be the strongest challenger to the party in power. Last election, it was Trudeau's liberals, who won a majority of seats. To break down the results of the last election, it was: Liberal Party (Trudeau): 184/338 seats (54%) Conservative Party (Harper): 99/338 seats (29%) New Democrats (Mulcair): 44/338 seats (13%) Then the other parties basically sharing whatever scraps were left. A 20/20/20/20/20 split (or anything even remotely close to that) is very rare. We in Canada are actually starting to worry about only having a 3-party system, because it's always the Liberals or Conservatives winning, with the NDP sometimes coming close.
Joshua Sauder - and to speak to your "decision ruled by the minority" comment - minorities are heavily reliant on compromise with other parties, because a government that did only hold 30% of parliamentary seats would never be able to pass legislation without help from other parties.
Joshua, you should check out CGP Grey's videos on different voting systems, specifically the ranked choice systems (which Vox didn't mention in this video). Basically you can rank candidates from multiple parties if there are multiple candidates you'd be happy with, and when candidates get knocked out of the race for having too low % support, votes that were placed to those candidates get transferred to your second or third choice. For offices like the president, this highly encourages people to vote for 3rd party candidates and not feel like their votes are wasted, since your votes don't just disappear if your first choice doesn't win.
All the party system does is tear us apart. It's not even political anymore, it's gotten so personal. Everyone is so nasty, rude and short with each other. No one respects anyone's opinion no matter what, people jump to conclusions and name call. It's everywhere we look. Beating an opponent isn't about just getting the most votes, it's about ending their career through subjective and irrational attacks, and associate any supporters with the same negativity, whether accusations are true or not. It's basically gossip... we've become children. I say get rid of the party system all together or change the way politicians campaign. Like, all they can say are nice things about their opponent
I’ve never seen a democracy with no political parties. From my observation, countries that use proportional representation have debates that focus on issues that the public wants to hear. In countries that use first past the post (where you get elected through a plurality), only two parties have a chance to govern and they hardly have to offer anything to the voters.
I don't expect why some in America expect so much change. When two parties take turns being in charge there is obviously only going to be two different styles of government with some random uncertainty. And the only reason this voting method still exists is because it benefits the very parties in charge. They are not gonna change it unless there is huge pressure to do so.
@@m.c.martin if you have ranked choice, its pretty obvious where the sentiment is and wholl thus win out (you still need a 50% majority preference). if its proportional, they all win exactly the amount that theyre representative. if you have both, you could have a very successful german/australian fusion system where each locality is represented by a >50% preference AND the parties seats are more or less exactly representative, with no chance that any seat will be retained by someone whom the majority would not prefer there.
We have 9 parties in the Norwegian parliament, I love that the parties has to work together to get things done. You need support from 2-3 other parties to become a prime minister and make a new government. Edit: we have 9 parties, not 8
then u would surely know how ugh time it took them to just make a coalition.it's actually possible in multiparty system that a party that gets just 10percent votes gets a majority
TheJaredtheJaredlong issue is, those candidates would likely be unable to get a decent chance of winning without the new system that they would need to be in office to implement.
Well in Maine Democrats aren't fighting the ranked voting bill THAT WE VOTED IN but the Republicans are. There is a difference :p. If you want third parties in the future vote Democrat today.
@@ClayShentrup One of the flaws with IRV is that because the "top two" candidates (in the initial round of _any_ given election) are never eliminated from runoff rounds, their own alternative votes cannot affect the final result (though they may nonetheless receive alternative votes from other, eliminated candidates). Of course, IRV is still much less flawed than FPTP....
I think score voting (mark all and any candidates that you approve of) will make it so that candidates are as vague, handsome and charismatic as possible. People pleasers so that they get as many meh votes
@@yucol5661 Technically "score" voting is distinct from approval, with "score" voting being e.g. "rate each candidate independently from 0 to 10" -- which allows a lot more nuance than simple approval voting, but it's also more complicated to weigh the final result.
You'll probably not read this after two years, but: This will all happen on its own once the system is changed. The only thing needed is some time (several election cycles) in which that system is not changed back to the current one. Third parties do exist already, but they are really small and don't have big supporter bases. With a system that encourages to vote for smaller parties, this will change.
@@karlmachnow4961 I feel as if that time will soon arrive hopefully. I believe Bernie could be decisive in this if he would choose to run with and/or endorse a third party. Even if not, I still see this to come very soon.
@@boombox2099 If the rules of elections remain unchanged there is no chance of a third party playing a major role in US politics. And let's be realistic, Bernie does not have the strength to beat and replace the whole Democratic Party. If Bernie ran or supported independent in the upcoming election this will only manifest a Trump victory. And another republican presidency will only mean: the GOP will go rogue and destroy democracy, appoint more ultra-conservative judges who will rule in their favor, all in all things that even the worst Democrat would not do.
@@karlmachnow4961 While I agree the rules need to be changed, most Bernie supporters are already switching to vote for Trump or simply abstaining at this point. Bernie was able to unite so many independent, as well as a lot of republican, and democratic voters that I do believe endorsing a third party and running with them could severely change the landscape, that's just my opinion though. As for the destroying democracy thing, both the DNC and GOP have been systematically doing that for years now.
@@tepesobrejac4360 - No its worse, he's a corporate shill. Which tbh is exactly the problem with most politicians in the 1st place. Different labels, same problem.
Honestly even if Greens, Libertarians, or another “third” party never won the presidency but at least had representatives and senators, I’d be so happy. Like in Canada with the NDP and Bloc Québécois, or Australia with the Greens
eyescreamcake Maine’s new system is not that good, however it’s a start. Rank Choice Voting (RCV) or instant run off (IRV) is only just slightly better than the first past the post (FPTP). The good thing about IRV is that it gets rid of the “spoiler effect.” Candidates can run for office without being a spoiler, and it allows voters to vote the way they really want to. More cities have started using RCV for their local municipal elections. Ideally I’d like to see legislative races being conducted in the Single Transferable Vote (STV) method. Under STV, a legislative district would elect 3, 4, sometimes even 5 members to represent a certain area. It combines proportionality with local representation.
For the love of god stop with this "but it's a republic not a democracy" bullshit. A representative democracy is still a democracy, and even if it weren't, what does it matter how you call it?
Yes - people that say Representative Democracy is not democracy are pseudo-intellectuals that really have no clue as to what they're asserting. Whenever I read this assertion what I hear is "Oh please, Daddy. Please put a feather in my cap." You are wasting every knowledgeable person's time by commenting. Someone should create a bot just to combat this idiocy.
> U.S. could update Yes, but the best solution isn't even discussed because it's so new - Score Runoff (aka STAR Voting). If you're interested in knowing what Vox will be talking about a year and half from now when they get their act together watch this video: ua-cam.com/video/aiQ9Z5sME00/v-deo.html
And It is better to propose an amendment to the Constitution to reform the unchecked unitary executive presidential power or to provide for vesting the executive power in one executive council, instead of vesting the executive power in a President alone.
@@powerfulstrong5673 There are many constitutional amendments we need, however it is now functionally impossible to get a constitutional amendment. That is why I don't endorse any constitutional amendment until we amend Article V of the constitution to make it easier (but not easy) to amend the constitution and offers the people an alternative and direct way to amend the constitution. If we are going to put a lot effort and time to get just one amendment because of how hard it is to amend the constitution, then that should be the amendment.
@@powerfulstrong5673 I also love the idea of an executive council. I first heard the idea from Parag Khana. He has lots of good ideas, even though I find his brand of technocracy and radical centrism to be too capitalist and elitist.
ArticBlueFox96 I just worry Article V Convention may become a run away convention. Because there is no specification of that Convention in Article V. I am afraid that such Convention may rewrite The Constitution. There is checks and balances about that Convention.
I would say, the problem with the "American" voting system is that it is based in the past and how things used to work. Now with all the technology we have today and other things. It is time for USA to update and renew the entire system in order to bring it into the 20th century. If I am not mistaken a majority of the countrys in Europe have multi party systems, and not the old two party system. It seems to work better than a two party system but we have our problems too, no system is perfect. If California switched to a "party list system" it could change everything, at least for the local election system. If this is possible I do not know but at least it could be a start to change the whole system in America.
This is very solid political science. Majority vote systems over time almost always lead to a two party system (it's called Duverger's law), and poportional systems always create openings for more candidates. I'm in Sweden, we have 8 parties in the national parliament and 9 parties in the EU representing a population of 10 mil. So yeah, it works.
The biggest problem is, that people, politicians included, don't realise that they need to work together but while doimg so also need to control eachother. Now people have the "us versus them"-mentality and look how that's working out for the US...
1. How can we treat this tribalistic "us versus them"-mentality in the political arena? 2. What do you mean by "also need to control eachother"? Much rather have you spend more time answering 1. if you're going to pick one.
^This. So much this... As long as Americans think of politics as a war with a clear winner and loser, nothing's going to happen. Running a multi-party system with proportional representation requires a certain level of compromise - something that Americans seem pretty bad at.
+Koninkrijk der Nederlanden Yeah. Dutch politics have left-wing progressive vs right-wing conservatives. Some can work together fine, others are against the party-cartel. Rather amusing, those stand-alones who only try to fight with the other instead of trying to make changes which fits the Dutch society as a whole.
The German system is actually a combination of a party list system and a district-based system. There are candidates getting a seat by directly winning a district, But in addition to that, people also have to vote for a party, and the percentage of votes parties get there determines the percentage of parliamentary seats by adding additional candidates from party lists. It also means both votes don’t necessarily have to go to the same party. If you like the local candidate running for party A best and want them to get a seat, you can vote for them, even if you don’t like their party as a whole and would rather like party B to get more seats. The downside of this is that it can result in a very large parliament. The upside is that is actually democratic while also maintaining representation from all parts of the country.
I wouldn’t say that it works so well. Also here 25% of the people don’t go to vote at all and even more are feeling unsatisfied and left out by politics. Even many of those who actually go voting are not happy with the way it works
@@Aliasn433First of all, it indeed works very well. There was a reason why the German Bundestag was structured like that after WW2. It protects the democracy and represents different parties and therefore different opinions of citizens. Also Germans has a very high voting rate in comparison to its European neighbors. In countries like Spain less people actually vote. I believe Germany has infact one of the highest vote/ non-vote ratios in the world, which is a great thing. So you are totally wrong mate
in Germany every one gets an letter 2 weeks before the votingday and then he can go to the poling station with this letter and vote. totally easy. In the US you have to register fist and then apply to vote before being allowed to. think about this regarding participation problems
I don't think compulsory voting would work in the US. I get the impression that Americans have a very pro-freedom "don't tell me what to do" sort of culture when it comes to anything regarding the government. Just consider the attitude towards universal healthcare and gun control debates. Imagine if the government started *forcing* people to vote!
We are not without our own instances of corruption, political issues and controversies, but I do think our political system is more fair and representative.
It feels like Americans treat their politics like it's a sports game. You cheer for the side of your choice, boo at the other side, fight amongst each other, and the actual players get ridiculous pays while they just play a game.
Yes, those who play game are laughing at their mansion because it is easy to fool the voters and make them fight for nothing. The politicians will get richer in both sides, people get nothing.
As a Republican, if THEORETICALLY I didn't like the Republican Party Anymore, I would join the Libertarian Party! But I just REALLY wish they could ACTUALLY win Elections! I STILL Definitely Don't like the Democrats, & starting to loose faith in Republicans, because both Parties are so Bad in a lot of ways, & people need to see that! HOPEFULLY there WILL be a day were people WILL hate Both Parties! & Start Voting Third Parties! 😆✊🇺🇸
It's not a very effective way, but if one of the parties establishes a dictatorship by the consequences of the indirect vote, but do that before a impeachment attempt, the country will demands for direct elections and multiple parties. It worked at least in Brazil
I live in New Zealand and voted for the first time this year. And yeah, I 100% think that our systems feel valuable and important, it seems to really take everything into account.
I live in Ireland and we have a ranking system. I was shocked when I learned that in Northern Ireland you can only vote for one candidate. It is such a terrible system for Northern Ireland specifically because Northern Ireland’s two main parties are terrorist groups. So if you want your vote to count, you are forced to vote for a terrorist related candidate. Most people do not support either party. One of my friends who lives there had to vote for a brexit supporter (my friend DESPISES Brexit), so that another politician that was a terrorist wouldn’t get elected 🤦🏼♀️.
Robert Jarman haha I don’t think he had any alliance candidates in his constituency. Or at least none that had a chance. I’m not sure though If they had the ranking system he would have been able to give them his vote without worrying that he can’t vote for the other.
Paco Ramirez I thought all countries used a ranking system. I just think NI really needs a ranking system as it’s causing more division in a place that really doesn’t need more division.
SirNate cause a constitutional amendment would happen when a huge majority of those in the federal and state governments are members of the two parties that would have only to lose from it
In the UK we had a vote on whether to make the voting system more proportional. And people voted against it. So, I'm not sure what to make of that. It didn't help that the two largest parties obviously opposed doing so.
Exactly. You can't get the parties in power to change the voting system, but you also can't entrust it to a referendum vote meticulously designed to produce the result favoured by the parties in power.
My understanding is that Labour has agreed that the voting system needs changed now so it stands a better chance. Plus the whole "it'll allow the lunatics to take power if we change the voting system" won't work so well now that the most popular politician is Pound Shop Darth Vader
some body It wasn't ideal, no. But I believe AV tends to produce more proportional results than FPTP, because it mostly eliminates the need for tactical voting.
👏👏👏 well done. Surprised I didn't see this sooner. A few pointers, ranked choice voting did pass in Maine and there are movements to put similar ballot initiatives in other states. You should do a follow up video with people working on those. Single Transferable Vote is one way to keep local representation with a proportional system. There's a great video series called "Politics in the Animal Kingdom" that explains all these voting methods really clearly.
When I went to vote for the first time I didn’t realize that they ask you “democrat or republican” at the poll station before they even hand you a ballot. That’s discouraging enough for republicans in democratic states who might now want to be judged... But can you imagine democrats in republican states? If a democrat pulled up to a poll station with a bunch of trump supporters and said he wanted to vote democrat he would be ATTACKED. I don’t understand why they give you a democratic ballot or a republican ballot. Why not just give you one ballot with all of the candidates from both parties so that you can keep your vote a secret ? Very discouraging system...
Wait, what? That's in clear negation of the confidentiality of vote law. I thought at least this law was respected in the USA? BTW, could some American please explain why do you need like a million different elections? Poland has 4, and it seems enough: - President - two houses of the Parliament - Regional Officers - Europarliament It's not perfect, but it's just so much simpler and straightforward. I just don't understand the American system. Can you explain?
@@wojciechmuras553 The thing where you get either a Democratic or Republican ballot isn't an election. It's a primary in which you're voting, as a party member, to choose who will be your party's candidate in the election. You don't have to vote in the primary in order to show up and vote in the election and you don't have to declare a party in the election. And it is a secret ballot.
@@wojciechmuras553 We elect more positions. President federal representative, federal senator, state representative, state senator, governor, mayor, city council member, etc. Basically there is 3-4 layers of government we vote for. Typically those are all the same day if the given term is up. The other "elections" are typically primaries run by parties rather than the actual government itself, and these primaries are not required to be democratic or remarkably fair as they are extra-governmental.
Totally agree, 2 party system is just Duopoly with no incentive to change or to satisfy "customers" (voters). Basically political cartel (in main topics like military spending, no social benefits, protection of multinational corporations etc.)
I hope that this is a symptom of the toxicity of the political climate and once this flaw is fixed and the polarization is mitigated good / qualified people will step forward and offer their assistance.
The US should indeed switch to a system with proportional representation on all levels, that true - but I can imagine the US moves to the metric system before that happens.
In the 70s or early 80s the United States tired to go metric. It didn't work because it would have costed way to much money to reeducation the whole nation. On top of changing all street sign, product labels, Cars, ect. I think there is even a VOX video about it.
Peleg Bar Sapir Well, maybe they can adopt the UK method; Keeping units at gas stations, pubs, road distances and velocity in imperial units while moving the rest towards metric. Shouldn't be that hard.
Why should America use metric, that is like saying why can't other nations use our system, why waste time and money putting things in metric when the majority of the country doesn't even use the system to begin with, If you have an issue learn imperial, its easier than overhauling a whole education system.
Because metric is much handier for mathematics. By the time you get to college physics and things, metric is the standard. At my school, we were expected to convert units before starting if a problem was given in Imperial.
If you enjoy stuff like this, as I do, check out another creator named CGP Grey. He has done a plethora of videos on voting systems and they are all great IMO. You’ll have to scroll back a bit on his channel though lol.
Same subject, but in different contexts and using completely different styles and presentations. In fact, alot of points (and I mean ALOT) of points in here are pointed out that are missing in the CGP video you mentioned. I gained alot from watching both. I think CGP is great for those who require the "explain it to me like I'm 5" option. Vox gave me a better synopsis overall and is great for those who might feel overwhelmed watching all of CGP's Voting Systems Playlist, and who require the "explain it to me like I've got dementia/short on time" option.
I live in Switzerland and we have a direct democracy. The people here have much to say (especially if you consider the small size of our country): After 4 years we vote the parliament of our country and the parliament of the country part where we live. The parliament then votes the government, which contains 7 persons. Each of these 7 persons is responsible for one department. Additionally we can make a petition for a referendum if we don't agree with a law change. When enough people sign the petition we can vote for or against the change. Everyone of us has the right to create a party if we wanted to, therefore there are many parties. There are however 8 parties, which are powerful and well-known. They pretty much cover every position you could have: There's a right-conservative party, a right-liberal party, two left-liberal parties, a small left-conservative party and three parties in the centre. At the end I want to say that I'm really proud of my system and wish more countries would have such a system.
Here in Finland last parliamentary election was 2015. 15 parties got votes. 8 parties got into parliament. 3 parties with most members of parliament formed government,they controlled 124 MP's of 200. This summer (2017) one of the government parties split into 2 and one of them left the government but they still barely have majority of the seats so they remain governing Finland. Sometimes i envy the american 2 party system because more parties = more compromises which doesn't really guarantee the best result. Current government is pretty unpopular but i don't really know is it more unpopular than previous ones.
So many Americans are libertarian and many more are social democrats, but their views are not represented at all. The two parties may pretend to appease multiple blocks, like Republicans pulling in libertarians and evangelicals, but they really work for oil barons. Our system sucks and you don't want it.
I really like the idea of the Single Transferable Vote that we tried to implement parts of Canada (though the referendum failed). It's sort of a hybrid between the proportional representation and the traditional one representative per district.
Gerrymandering will still skew the Alternative Vote System (as happened in Queensland in the late 20th century). It also happens on a national scale in the federal house of representatives in Australia. The National party received 642,223 first preference votes nationwide and have 10 seats. The Australian Greens received 1,482,923 first preference votes and only have 1 seat in the house of representatives. The MMP system used in New Zealand would go a long way to address the imbalance in Australia (modified to keep the Alternative vote at the electorate level, rather than the First past the post method used at the electorate level in New Zealand).
As a compromise, we keep the current system, but multiply the House of Representatives to make it twice the amount as before, with one half of the House being the current system, while the other half of the house is based on proportional representation. 435 seats for our current system, with 435 more for proportional representation, plus one more to break ties.
1:48 Says Alternative Vote then Describes Single Transferable vote. Alternative Vote is NOT proportional, STV is. STV is used in Ireland and in the Australian Senate. Alternative vote is used for the Australian House of Reps
2:10 Ireland has something called "Single Transferable Vote" which has multimember districting. AV gets rid of the spoiler effect, but it means nothing if you don't have multimember districting.
Hey there, Vox: thanks for this video; very interesting! But it left me wanting to know more. For instance, how do these other systems combat the so-called "Tyranny of the Majority"? Am I right to assume that the only remaining value to the Electoral College system is being able to give (in theory; I know that, in reality, it isn't the case) lesser voices more weight?
Im not entirely sure if this is an adequate answer to the "tyranny of the majority" but for example here in Germany no political party usually manages to reach 50% of the votes. Therefore you will have to form coalitions of two or more parties to govern. This way there is an exchange of ideas and plans at least in between the coalition parties.
This is why we should have a multi party ranked system. The two party system either makes u liberal or conservative, and moderates have to choose one of the two for their vote to matter.
It isn't really but kindof. You break it by changing the voting system (as stated), but how you do that when both parties are against it (because they loose power) isn't explained
Iris, nextpkfr, that's not really true. Both Canada and the UK use plurality voting and they both have three major parties, not two. The key is all those safe and unopposed districts: it would be pretty easy to win some seats for a third party by just running someone in those districts. They're designed to be safe against the other party, not a third party.
+Vox The challenge in public commentary is not in setting a goal, but in mapping the path to it. The critical question is: Why hasn't this been done already? So you land on the issues of campaign finance, good governance, and civic education. If you want to make a difference, Vox, you need to go deeper... as do we all.
man im australian and learning about US voting systems blow my mind! absolutely absurd that america still uses first past the post voting in 2017 (we stopped using that system almost 100 years ago!!!). party representation and diversity especially in bicameral parliaments is essential wtf (hope you get proportional and/or preferential voting soon!)
Thank you so much. I love Australia and New Zealand and if it doesn’t get better in my country than I will move to Oceania or Ireland or up to my northern brother Canada or something. Canada is basically the us but better
I used to agree with the idea of a proportional system until I entered AP US government. I highly recommend u go take a course on it or buy a textbook on AP US government because this system they r proposing is a bad idea even thought it sounds very appealing; however, there is a lot more they aren't telling u because it takes a long time to explain. Simply put the current US plurality system is a very good system; however, to be clear it can still be tweaked for better representation and still avoiding a gridlocked government. Like the "Top-Two" primary system. It basically allows for all candidates from every party, including third party candidates, to have a more equal chance at winning. It also includes the open primary method of allowing members of any party, including independents, to vote for a candidate of any party they wish regardless of their party registration. Then the top-two candidates, regardless of party affiliation, will be the final presidential candidates. The twist is that because the candidates are picked based off of being the ones with the most votes and are not restricted by party affiliation you can have two nominees from the same party. For example, if u had the top-two candidates in the country being Republicans then u would have two Republican nominees running against each other. But the benefit of this system is that it allows for Republicans and Democrats to vote for an independent or third party candidate, and for independents to vote for Republican or Democratic candidates. Also, u this system means that third party candidates have a much higher chance to win due to the open primary aspect of this and the top-two aspect.
Easier said than done I’m afraid. How is it possible for the two leading political parties to relinquish their control over their dominance upon the US political scene?
There isn't a left wing party in america. There are the republicans who are conservative/neo conservative and the democrats who are centrist/neo liberal.
Amazing but most countries showed don't show as much difference as say, As rural Alaska and Miami, this vote on the federal level wouldn't not represent each places individual needs, yet for day the presidential election this would work quite well.
The biggest issue we'd have to worry about if such a system was put into place would be wether or not the government would get anything done with the major division between the parties
Indeed. Created modern democracy, was the first country to refer to its leader as ‘president’, and is the reason as to why most of the globe besides the UK and her common wealth are democratic imitations.
JRufu you're about 70 years too late... America was the beacon of democracy after they fixed up the world mid 20th century. A lot of countries followed suit and improved the ideas of representation. America isn't the golden child it once was but it's the one you got
You do have a very good system. It does have one huge problem though. Most voters don't take advantage of the system. You've got millions of people who just vote for their favorite candidate or worse who vote for the person who they think is most likely to win defeating the purpose of the thing. Y'all need to start teaching some more civics in school.
Its not because we don't teach civics. Its because our politics have been a joke for the last few years. There is also often very good reasons not to like certain people based on whatever values they hold and how they present themselves. Tony Abbott for example, I don't think he got voted in because people like him. Honestly I don't know how he got in, he's a joke.
Relying on politicians to decrease their own power is a fast track to inaction, I don’t know how, but if we ever want to see these changes, we’re going to have to force them.
New Zealander here, I can confirm that our system is way better, but switching to it won't solve the issue of people complaining about the system. After our recent elections the losing party started to complain about how badly the system represents voters. Losers will always look to blame others for their hard-earned loss. They need to learn to accept responsibility.
Sort of like Clinton supporters blaming the elctoral college when the whole point of it is to prevent someone from winning just a small heavily populated region.
The electoral college makes sense: if the majority of your state (51%+) votes for x, then your state as a whole puts all its points towards x, you don't split your points. Same when you vote as an individual: if you prefer x by say 60% to y's 40%, then you put your vote towards x, you don't want to split your vote. Even though you like y by 40%, you don't want 40% of your voting power to be usurped by y. The same goes for how states vote.
You can also combine the two electoral systems - majority and propotionate - in order to mitigate their disadvantages.Here in Japan, we cast two ballots in each general election, one for district based on majority system and the other based on propotionate system.
Germany and New Zealand uses MMP. It has the first-past-the-post districts, which takes up half of the seats in Parliament, but also uses a list system, which takes up the other half. A difference though with MMP from a system like in Japan, which is just a parallel system, is that the percentage of the party vote must always match the total number of seats, including the FPTP seats. If the party vote and the district vote doesn't match, that may sometimes lead to overhang and balance seats to keep the numbers proportional. It's quite complicated, there are many video on YT about this.
When you starts to dig into the US democratic system, you realized just how undemocratic it is.
That's the point
But its still atleast a democracy, something that russia iran china ect lack. Other countries may have way better ways, but us way is good enough atleast.
@@RealMailou Yeah you named few countries that have it worse, now you can start naming the majority of countries, with better systems. The faact, that someone have it worse, doesn't mean it's not an issue.
@@stickjackstudiocz6852 I live in finland and yes, we do have a better system... What do you want?
There's a reason why George Washington didn't want political parties.
This is very logical and reasonable, thus it will not work in the U.S.
Joshua Sauder I agree that the change should not be swift. Nice talking to you :)
There are a lot of rich Jews, but not all Jews are rich, actually, most of them aren't. There are a lot of rich Christians (oh the irony), but most Christians aren't rich. And proportionality doesn't necessarily make this proportion all that better if you have a fractured religion anyway, look at Israel's parliament. Judaism is also having a large number of people opposed to Zionism, saying that the kingdom of Israel should only be reestablished with the presence of a Messiah. Judaism isn't a unifying force nearly as much as people tend to think, just the same way that being Christian didn't stop a huge number of wars between Catholics and Protestants on religious doctrinal grounds.
But the other arguments do make sense.
Yousef Imran i do agree with most of you points except the jews part. ( obviusly there are rich jews that have money but there are many more Christians)
Yousef - Your initial post sounds like a copy and paste comment about the metric system.
ok you lost once you mentioned Zionist Jew control.
Trust me, in Germany the system he mentions works. People, feel represented and like their vote matters.
geht so
Translation: Yes, you are absolutely right. In Germany - as in other European countries - we have a real choice between many different parties and the reality of the last 40 years demonstrates that three further parties - two of them indeed newly established parties - represent their voters in the federal parliament (Bundestag) and - in the case of the Green Party - even in all regional parliaments since 1980. At the moment there are six parties in the German federal parliament and they really differ in many political convictions and aims.
Spain too!
I as a German push for direct democracy as it is maintained in Switzerland
@@paulhk2727 I as a German myself think that this would be great in some points and horrible in others. Direct democracy can work in small communities when the majority of voters cares about the subject but some decisions are better made by experts. Too bad that politicians tend to gain positions where they aren't experts either 😅
It honestly never occurred to me that breaking the US' two-party system would have such a relatively easy solution
Now we just need to call our representatives and tell them this is what we want.
@@bluesshooes we wouldn't get anyone because they're more focused on the Presidents than on what matters.
Yes, but *how* do we implement it?
@@stevejordan7275 constitutional amendment
@@Pyxlean No credit for partial answers. Do we require a third party? We already have that, and they fielded a Presidential candidate (Johnson) that I've voted for.
What amendment do we write? What does it do? How is it enforced? (Notice there was no penalty for the Senate not holding a hearing for Obama's nominee to SCOTUS, and Boscow Mitch just smirked and gloated.)
We need an amendment with teeth...but how do we write it so it can be effective?
This is never going to happen because neither party wants to give up their power.
Oguzzz123
Exactly.
I think Main already did it recently. Change happens when the people demand change and are willing to fight for it. In a lot of places they might be able to implement this via a ballot initiative without going through the parties anyway. Don't be so Eeyore.
In Maine we voted ranked voting in. Only Republicans are being obstructionist and fighting the bill, because they are anti progress. Democrats aren't perfect but at least they don't fight progress tooth and nail. Vote Democrat and support a third party future:)
Well that sucks. I guess this is the system we are stuck with forever. Or atleast for the next 10^100 years untill the Dark Era of the universe. Too bad this system is unbreakable by anything other that the literal heat death of the universe. We are stuck with it forever./s
Steven Cope yeah but the conservatives here want to take it away (isn't even in effect until 2018...) because they know they'd never win again :/
Normally I have different views than Vox, but this video is on an issue we all probably agree on. A 2 party system just leaves most people unsatisfied (I.e. Not all republicans wanted Trump, not all democrats wanted Hillary, and no one wanted either).
Joshua Sauder - How would you have a candidate in office that only a small percentage voted for? In Canada we have a 5 party system, which ends in two outcomes: either a"majority" government, where the winning party holds >50% of seats in the senate, or a "minority" government, where due to fractured votes the winning party holds
Joshua Sauder - It does make sense, and to someone who has only ever had two-parties it's a very logical way to think. But I grew up never expecting the winner to be the one with over 50%. To me, democracy is the person the *most* people chose, not necessarily the person the *majority* of people chose. :)
Also, we have our favourites to win - usually there's a forecasted "Opposition" party, which is the one that's most likely to be the strongest challenger to the party in power. Last election, it was Trudeau's liberals, who won a majority of seats. To break down the results of the last election, it was:
Liberal Party (Trudeau): 184/338 seats (54%)
Conservative Party (Harper): 99/338 seats (29%)
New Democrats (Mulcair): 44/338 seats (13%)
Then the other parties basically sharing whatever scraps were left. A 20/20/20/20/20 split (or anything even remotely close to that) is very rare. We in Canada are actually starting to worry about only having a 3-party system, because it's always the Liberals or Conservatives winning, with the NDP sometimes coming close.
Joshua Sauder - and to speak to your "decision ruled by the minority" comment - minorities are heavily reliant on compromise with other parties, because a government that did only hold 30% of parliamentary seats would never be able to pass legislation without help from other parties.
Joshua, you should check out CGP Grey's videos on different voting systems, specifically the ranked choice systems (which Vox didn't mention in this video). Basically you can rank candidates from multiple parties if there are multiple candidates you'd be happy with, and when candidates get knocked out of the race for having too low % support, votes that were placed to those candidates get transferred to your second or third choice. For offices like the president, this highly encourages people to vote for 3rd party candidates and not feel like their votes are wasted, since your votes don't just disappear if your first choice doesn't win.
Just Make Compulsory Voting, I just fixed the problem about diversity and not everyone voting.
All the party system does is tear us apart. It's not even political anymore, it's gotten so personal. Everyone is so nasty, rude and short with each other. No one respects anyone's opinion no matter what, people jump to conclusions and name call. It's everywhere we look. Beating an opponent isn't about just getting the most votes, it's about ending their career through subjective and irrational attacks, and associate any supporters with the same negativity, whether accusations are true or not. It's basically gossip... we've become children. I say get rid of the party system all together or change the way politicians campaign. Like, all they can say are nice things about their opponent
yup
Like that's ever going happen!
You nailed the point. Perfectly said
I’ve never seen a democracy with no political parties. From my observation, countries that use proportional representation have debates that focus on issues that the public wants to hear. In countries that use first past the post (where you get elected through a plurality), only two parties have a chance to govern and they hardly have to offer anything to the voters.
Welcome to the new multi cultural reality my friend. We can thank our Boomers for that.
I don't expect why some in America expect so much change. When two parties take turns being in charge there is obviously only going to be two different styles of government with some random uncertainty. And the only reason this voting method still exists is because it benefits the very parties in charge. They are not gonna change it unless there is huge pressure to do so.
@The Keeper of the High Ground lol, 13% for 5 different Parties even makes for an interesting election
@The Dark Lord of the Sith I think I already know who gonna win
@@m.c.martin if you have ranked choice, its pretty obvious where the sentiment is and wholl thus win out (you still need a 50% majority preference). if its proportional, they all win exactly the amount that theyre representative. if you have both, you could have a very successful german/australian fusion system where each locality is represented by a >50% preference AND the parties seats are more or less exactly representative, with no chance that any seat will be retained by someone whom the majority would not prefer there.
DId you not see the graph in the video that shows 61% of Americans would prefer a 3rd party system, and id bet they'd like a 4/5/6th... too
We have 9 parties in the Norwegian parliament, I love that the parties has to work together to get things done. You need support from 2-3 other parties to become a prime minister and make a new government.
Edit: we have 9 parties, not 8
Well actually that doesn't really help in a huge country like USA.It actually slows down decision making and results in political instability
*parties _have_ to work...
u gotta consider that norway has a population that is half of new York
In the Netherlands we have 14 parties in our parlement, with our government consisting of 4 parties of various ideologies
then u would surely know how ugh time it took them to just make a coalition.it's actually possible in multiparty system that a party that gets just 10percent votes gets a majority
The politicians in power are of the two parties, why would they want to change what has worked for them?
Taurius Burke and that is the true problem here.
Vote for new candidates that promote a new system
TheJaredtheJaredlong issue is, those candidates would likely be unable to get a decent chance of winning without the new system that they would need to be in office to implement.
Well in Maine Democrats aren't fighting the ranked voting bill THAT WE VOTED IN but the Republicans are. There is a difference :p. If you want third parties in the future vote Democrat today.
8bitmagic uh no
Easy answer:
CGP Grey.
Long answer:
Watch his videos on voting systems
Jay well there are problems in that video
@@ClayShentrup One of the flaws with IRV is that because the "top two" candidates (in the initial round of _any_ given election) are never eliminated from runoff rounds, their own alternative votes cannot affect the final result (though they may nonetheless receive alternative votes from other, eliminated candidates).
Of course, IRV is still much less flawed than FPTP....
@@Stratelier good point but I'll take ranked voting over FPTP in a heartbeat anyday.
I think score voting (mark all and any candidates that you approve of) will make it so that candidates are as vague, handsome and charismatic as possible. People pleasers so that they get as many meh votes
@@yucol5661 Technically "score" voting is distinct from approval, with "score" voting being e.g. "rate each candidate independently from 0 to 10" -- which allows a lot more nuance than simple approval voting, but it's also more complicated to weigh the final result.
So I must have missed the part exactly HOW to break the hold of the 2 party system, this just explained how other systems work.
that's Vox, they're always just dancing around
You'll probably not read this after two years, but: This will all happen on its own once the system is changed. The only thing needed is some time (several election cycles) in which that system is not changed back to the current one. Third parties do exist already, but they are really small and don't have big supporter bases. With a system that encourages to vote for smaller parties, this will change.
@@karlmachnow4961 I feel as if that time will soon arrive hopefully. I believe Bernie could be decisive in this if he would choose to run with and/or endorse a third party. Even if not, I still see this to come very soon.
@@boombox2099 If the rules of elections remain unchanged there is no chance of a third party playing a major role in US politics. And let's be realistic, Bernie does not have the strength to beat and replace the whole Democratic Party.
If Bernie ran or supported independent in the upcoming election this will only manifest a Trump victory. And another republican presidency will only mean: the GOP will go rogue and destroy democracy, appoint more ultra-conservative judges who will rule in their favor, all in all things that even the worst Democrat would not do.
@@karlmachnow4961 While I agree the rules need to be changed, most Bernie supporters are already switching to vote for Trump or simply abstaining at this point. Bernie was able to unite so many independent, as well as a lot of republican, and democratic voters that I do believe endorsing a third party and running with them could severely change the landscape, that's just my opinion though. As for the destroying democracy thing, both the DNC and GOP have been systematically doing that for years now.
Corporate Democrats: "Bernie isn't even a real Democrat"
Normal people: "Uhh yeah, that's a good thing"
Continiuing:
Corporate Democrats: You're racist sexist bigot trumptards vote for Hillary
Normal People: YAAAS QUEEEN SLAAAAAYYY
TheCompulsiveWinner corporate republicans said basically the same about Trump. Which shows that the neo cons and neo libs are basically the same.
Clasical conservatives: "Trump isn't even a real Republican not even a real politician !"
Normal people: "Uhh yeah, that's a good thing !"
This is what this ellection should have been about. It should have been at least Trump vs Bernie. Then Americans would had a real choice.
@@tepesobrejac4360 - No its worse, he's a corporate shill. Which tbh is exactly the problem with most politicians in the 1st place. Different labels, same problem.
The two party system is broken.
I think that implies that a two party system has ever worked well.
Not 'broken' at all, it is working exactly as intended.
Wow, what a thoughtful and intelligent comment that no one has ever heard before.
Wait till you see a one party system
Royce Muzic i agree Communism is the way to go
Honestly even if Greens, Libertarians, or another “third” party never won the presidency but at least had representatives and senators, I’d be so happy. Like in Canada with the NDP and Bloc Québécois, or Australia with the Greens
I was hoping this video would actually say how to get electoral reform in place
Pretty much everything has to happen in the state legislatures first.
Maine switched voting systems just by putting it on the ballot. That's all you have to do. (The system they chose is not a very good one, though.)
eyescreamcake Maine’s new system is not that good, however it’s a start. Rank Choice Voting (RCV) or instant run off (IRV) is only just slightly better than the first past the post (FPTP). The good thing about IRV is that it gets rid of the “spoiler effect.” Candidates can run for office without being a spoiler, and it allows voters to vote the way they really want to. More cities have started using RCV for their local municipal elections. Ideally I’d like to see legislative races being conducted in the Single Transferable Vote (STV) method. Under STV, a legislative district would elect 3, 4, sometimes even 5 members to represent a certain area. It combines proportionality with local representation.
erickofspirit one start would be for both of a state’s senate seats to be up for grabs in the same year and use STV for those races.
All of my college essays and projects have been on this topic. It's seriously a huge problem.
America please fix your "democracy"
constititional republic =/= democracy
For the love of god stop with this "but it's a republic not a democracy" bullshit. A representative democracy is still a democracy, and even if it weren't, what does it matter how you call it?
Yes - people that say Representative Democracy is not democracy are pseudo-intellectuals that really have no clue as to what they're asserting. Whenever I read this assertion what I hear is "Oh please, Daddy. Please put a feather in my cap." You are wasting every knowledgeable person's time by commenting. Someone should create a bot just to combat this idiocy.
All I meant to say is that the U.S. could update it's current system which is a bit flawed in our modern world.
> U.S. could update
Yes, but the best solution isn't even discussed because it's so new - Score Runoff (aka STAR Voting). If you're interested in knowing what Vox will be talking about a year and half from now when they get their act together watch this video: ua-cam.com/video/aiQ9Z5sME00/v-deo.html
Pass the Fair Representation Act, For the People Act, and American Anti-Corruption Act, as a starting point to build our democracy.
And It is better to propose an amendment to the Constitution to reform the unchecked unitary executive presidential power or to provide for vesting the executive power in one executive council, instead of vesting the executive power in a President alone.
@@powerfulstrong5673 There are many constitutional amendments we need, however it is now functionally impossible to get a constitutional amendment. That is why I don't endorse any constitutional amendment until we amend Article V of the constitution to make it easier (but not easy) to amend the constitution and offers the people an alternative and direct way to amend the constitution. If we are going to put a lot effort and time to get just one amendment because of how hard it is to amend the constitution, then that should be the amendment.
ArticBlueFox96 Yes. Article V convention on the applications of particular subject matter of two thirds of state legislatures.
@@powerfulstrong5673 I also love the idea of an executive council. I first heard the idea from Parag Khana. He has lots of good ideas, even though I find his brand of technocracy and radical centrism to be too capitalist and elitist.
ArticBlueFox96 I just worry Article V Convention may become a run away convention. Because there is no specification of that Convention in Article V. I am afraid that such Convention may rewrite The Constitution. There is checks and balances about that Convention.
I would say, the problem with the "American" voting system is that it is based in the past and how things used to work. Now with all the technology we have today and other things. It is time for USA to update and renew the entire system in order to bring it into the 20th century. If I am not mistaken a majority of the countrys in Europe have multi party systems, and not the old two party system. It seems to work better than a two party system but we have our problems too, no system is perfect.
If California switched to a "party list system" it could change everything, at least for the local election system. If this is possible I do not know but at least it could be a start to change the whole system in America.
Hopefully CA will lead the way
I absolutely agree
Yeah this will surely happen just after they adapted the metric system and tightened their gun laws.
yeah, it should happen any day now...
As an American even I have to say Metric is better
Don't forget to provide basic healthcare and get rid of their nukes.
stuckupcurlyguy
Getting rid of nukes? Only if Russia promises to get rid of theirs. And even then, there's still North Korea to deal with.
This is very solid political science. Majority vote systems over time almost always lead to a two party system (it's called Duverger's law), and poportional systems always create openings for more candidates. I'm in Sweden, we have 8 parties in the national parliament and 9 parties in the EU representing a population of 10 mil. So yeah, it works.
The biggest problem is, that people, politicians included, don't realise that they need to work together but while doimg so also need to control eachother. Now people have the "us versus them"-mentality and look how that's working out for the US...
THIS ^
I agree 100%
1. How can we treat this tribalistic "us versus them"-mentality in the political arena?
2. What do you mean by "also need to control eachother"?
Much rather have you spend more time answering 1. if you're going to pick one.
^This. So much this...
As long as Americans think of politics as a war with a clear winner and loser, nothing's going to happen. Running a multi-party system with proportional representation requires a certain level of compromise - something that Americans seem pretty bad at.
eXileF Even with 13 parties there can be an "us versus them"-mentality. Trust me.
+Koninkrijk der Nederlanden Yeah. Dutch politics have left-wing progressive vs right-wing conservatives. Some can work together fine, others are against the party-cartel. Rather amusing, those stand-alones who only try to fight with the other instead of trying to make changes which fits the Dutch society as a whole.
The German system is actually a combination of a party list system and a district-based system. There are candidates getting a seat by directly winning a district, But in addition to that, people also have to vote for a party, and the percentage of votes parties get there determines the percentage of parliamentary seats by adding additional candidates from party lists. It also means both votes don’t necessarily have to go to the same party. If you like the local candidate running for party A best and want them to get a seat, you can vote for them, even if you don’t like their party as a whole and would rather like party B to get more seats.
The downside of this is that it can result in a very large parliament. The upside is that is actually democratic while also maintaining representation from all parts of the country.
Our voting system is like everything in Germany. It's expensive, way more complicated than it needs to be and it works surprisingly good 😂
I wouldn’t say that it works so well. Also here 25% of the people don’t go to vote at all and even more are feeling unsatisfied and left out by politics. Even many of those who actually go voting are not happy with the way it works
@@Aliasn433First of all, it indeed works very well. There was a reason why the German Bundestag was structured like that after WW2. It protects the democracy and represents different parties and therefore different opinions of citizens.
Also Germans has a very high voting rate in comparison to its European neighbors. In countries like Spain less people actually vote. I believe Germany has infact one of the highest vote/ non-vote ratios in the world, which is a great thing. So you are totally wrong mate
nobody likes the current electin process except for the two parties.
in Germany every one gets an letter 2 weeks before the votingday and then he can go to the poling station with this letter and vote. totally easy.
In the US you have to register fist and then apply to vote before being allowed to.
think about this regarding participation problems
German voting system seems more messed up than US one lol, simply because of Merkel.
Elpeo Puru two words: old people
AgentPaul101 in Indonesia too, and many parties work together to......... corrupt money from every govt projects lol.
John Daly yeah, but at the very least money is spread around and not concentrated
Elpeo Puru seriously? germany is messed up? look at the US' joke of a leader
As an Australian, I'm glad we don't have the same political system as the USA
America should institute compulsory voting because people are complaining about lack of people voting.
I don't think compulsory voting would work in the US. I get the impression that Americans have a very pro-freedom "don't tell me what to do" sort of culture when it comes to anything regarding the government. Just consider the attitude towards universal healthcare and gun control debates. Imagine if the government started *forcing* people to vote!
As an American, I wish I was not an American. This country is as corrupt as ever. You Australians, on the other hand, are awesome.
We are not without our own instances of corruption, political issues and controversies, but I do think our political system is more fair and representative.
It feels like Americans treat their politics like it's a sports game.
You cheer for the side of your choice, boo at the other side, fight amongst each other, and the actual players get ridiculous pays while they just play a game.
Yes, those who play game are laughing at their mansion because it is easy to fool the voters and make them fight for nothing. The politicians will get richer in both sides, people get nothing.
Sure ! All we have to do is get the 2 parties to change the laws so that they lose their monopoly . i'm sure they'll do that .
As a Republican, if THEORETICALLY I didn't like the Republican Party Anymore, I would join the Libertarian Party! But I just REALLY wish they could ACTUALLY win Elections! I STILL Definitely Don't like the Democrats, & starting to loose faith in Republicans, because both Parties are so Bad in a lot of ways, & people need to see that! HOPEFULLY there WILL be a day were people WILL hate Both Parties! & Start Voting Third Parties! 😆✊🇺🇸
It's not a very effective way, but if one of the parties establishes a dictatorship by the consequences of the indirect vote, but do that before a impeachment attempt, the country will demands for direct elections and multiple parties. It worked at least in Brazil
CGP Grey made a great series
It's Monday morning, everybody's already irritated. I know this is going to be a very special Uncivil War in the comments section.
CobaltBob yup
BERNIE WOULD OF WON.
Isometric Aquariums oh did you have to be the one that started it?
I mean, if he didn't do it, someone else would have inevitably do it.
So glad I don’t have any classes on Monday. I can just sit back and watch the comment section.
I live in New Zealand and voted for the first time this year. And yeah, I 100% think that our systems feel valuable and important, it seems to really take everything into account.
I live in Ireland and we have a ranking system. I was shocked when I learned that in Northern Ireland you can only vote for one candidate.
It is such a terrible system for Northern Ireland specifically because Northern Ireland’s two main parties are terrorist groups. So if you want your vote to count, you are forced to vote for a terrorist related candidate. Most people do not support either party.
One of my friends who lives there had to vote for a brexit supporter (my friend DESPISES Brexit), so that another politician that was a terrorist wouldn’t get elected 🤦🏼♀️.
Are the Alliance candidates so terrible?
Robert Jarman haha I don’t think he had any alliance candidates in his constituency. Or at least none that had a chance. I’m not sure though
If they had the ranking system he would have been able to give them his vote without worrying that he can’t vote for the other.
So you were shocked that in Northern Ireland, which is part of the United Kingdom, they use the British election system?
Paco Ramirez I thought all countries used a ranking system. I just think NI really needs a ranking system as it’s causing more division in a place that really doesn’t need more division.
@@putinsgaytwin4272 surely NI can vote labour or conservative, why do they have to vote for local parties
Does this make sense? YES
Will it happen? NO
By saying that it won't happen.
DURR DURR Murica!!
It's up to ordinary citizens to petition and annoy the hell out of out leaders until they give us what we want.
Not with that attitude it won't! All that should matter is that it *can* happen (with a constitutional amendment) so let's make it happen!
SirNate cause a constitutional amendment would happen when a huge majority of those in the federal and state governments are members of the two parties that would have only to lose from it
In the UK we had a vote on whether to make the voting system more proportional. And people voted against it. So, I'm not sure what to make of that. It didn't help that the two largest parties obviously opposed doing so.
No. The system offered in the referendum was not proportional. It was just majoritarian.
Exactly. You can't get the parties in power to change the voting system, but you also can't entrust it to a referendum vote meticulously designed to produce the result favoured by the parties in power.
My understanding is that Labour has agreed that the voting system needs changed now so it stands a better chance. Plus the whole "it'll allow the lunatics to take power if we change the voting system" won't work so well now that the most popular politician is Pound Shop Darth Vader
some body It wasn't ideal, no. But I believe AV tends to produce more proportional results than FPTP, because it mostly eliminates the need for tactical voting.
When the democracy votes for monarchy. 10/10 democracy would vote again.
I think that was a great video, one of the best, non-biased Vox videos I've seen
👏👏👏 well done. Surprised I didn't see this sooner.
A few pointers, ranked choice voting did pass in Maine and there are movements to put similar ballot initiatives in other states. You should do a follow up video with people working on those.
Single Transferable Vote is one way to keep local representation with a proportional system. There's a great video series called "Politics in the Animal Kingdom" that explains all these voting methods really clearly.
END THE TWO PARTY SYSTEM!!!!!!!!!!!
Left Side Network Trump is trying. As soon as he gets rid of them lying fake news Demo's it will be a one party system.
Robert Marsing lmaoo that’s not what I meant guy
Robert Marsing thats even worse, but hey at least they would get stuff done.
Left Side Network and your profile pic is perfect for your comment
Left Side Network I feel like you support Communism....
IMO the biggest problem is going to be convincing the beneficiaries of a 2 party system to take steps towards eliminating that 2 party system.
Yep - the implications of Duverger's Law
well ther once was a party called the whigs .... you all know what happend to them
When I went to vote for the first time I didn’t realize that they ask you “democrat or republican” at the poll station before they even hand you a ballot.
That’s discouraging enough for republicans in democratic states who might now want to be judged...
But can you imagine democrats in republican states? If a democrat pulled up to a poll station with a bunch of trump supporters and said he wanted to vote democrat he would be ATTACKED.
I don’t understand why they give you a democratic ballot or a republican ballot. Why not just give you one ballot with all of the candidates from both parties so that you can keep your vote a secret ?
Very discouraging system...
It sounds like you were voting in a primary, not a general election.
We’re you voting in a primary?
Wait, what? That's in clear negation of the confidentiality of vote law. I thought at least this law was respected in the USA?
BTW, could some American please explain why do you need like a million different elections? Poland has 4, and it seems enough:
- President
- two houses of the Parliament
- Regional Officers
- Europarliament
It's not perfect, but it's just so much simpler and straightforward.
I just don't understand the American system. Can you explain?
@@wojciechmuras553 The thing where you get either a Democratic or Republican ballot isn't an election. It's a primary in which you're voting, as a party member, to choose who will be your party's candidate in the election. You don't have to vote in the primary in order to show up and vote in the election and you don't have to declare a party in the election. And it is a secret ballot.
@@wojciechmuras553 We elect more positions. President federal representative, federal senator, state representative, state senator, governor, mayor, city council member, etc. Basically there is 3-4 layers of government we vote for. Typically those are all the same day if the given term is up. The other "elections" are typically primaries run by parties rather than the actual government itself, and these primaries are not required to be democratic or remarkably fair as they are extra-governmental.
Have more political parties. Unless the two major parties are afraid of competition
pls refer to cgp grey's election videos for further information
Yes please. His videos on this subject are fantastic.
Search for "The Politics in the Animal Kingdom" or "Single Transferable Vote".
FPTP is so destructive. Reform is needed.
I love the art/animation for this video
Totally agree, 2 party system is just Duopoly with no incentive to change or to satisfy "customers" (voters). Basically political cartel (in main topics like military spending, no social benefits, protection of multinational corporations etc.)
If you are lucky you get 1 out of the 2 candidate good. Or you are just fkd up like last year.
I hope that this is a symptom of the toxicity of the political climate and once this flaw is fixed and the polarization is mitigated good / qualified people will step forward and offer their assistance.
WhiteWalkerPepe Trump is the best president smd
> Your vote is just a vote for whom ever lied to sway you more better than the other side
Now *that's* the kind of cynicism that gets stuff done!
Liberty Infinite I love generalizations!
WhiteWalkerPepe when people still cry over this.
pretty sure americans will just do that, right after they change their laws on gun control
tiscover ...And their measurement system
And their universal healthcare plan.
Never you commies.
Classic
The rate we're going they will change their gun laws in... oh god my calculator broke.
most youtubers have to either decide if they want to go for quantity or quality of videos, but here at Vox i think you're as equally good at both!
Unless you live in a swing state, you are not wasting your vote by voting 3rd party.
This requires the current people in power to decide to give away that power.
The US should indeed switch to a system with proportional representation on all levels, that true - but I can imagine the US moves to the metric system before that happens.
Also, I would totally vote for a party that has a moose as its logo.
In the 70s or early 80s the United States tired to go metric. It didn't work because it would have costed way to much money to reeducation the whole nation. On top of changing all street sign, product labels, Cars, ect. I think there is even a VOX video about it.
Peleg Bar Sapir Well, maybe they can adopt the UK method; Keeping units at gas stations, pubs, road distances and velocity in imperial units while moving the rest towards metric. Shouldn't be that hard.
Why should America use metric, that is like saying why can't other nations use our system, why waste time and money putting things in metric when the majority of the country doesn't even use the system to begin with, If you have an issue learn imperial, its easier than overhauling a whole education system.
Because metric is much handier for mathematics. By the time you get to college physics and things, metric is the standard. At my school, we were expected to convert units before starting if a problem was given in Imperial.
If you enjoy stuff like this, as I do, check out another creator named CGP Grey. He has done a plethora of videos on voting systems and they are all great IMO. You’ll have to scroll back a bit on his channel though lol.
Not really out of order, just very old. 200+ is a long time without an update.
CGP Grey has some really good videos on the election alternatives
I liked this video way better when it was called:
The Problems with First Past the Post Voting System Explained.
By CGP Grey.
AsharOzborne95
See also: Single Transferable Vote by CGP Gray.
Or his entire series on voting systems.
Can’t wait till cnn and the times pick up on this
Uh huh. So you realize that more than one person in existence has a problem with plurality systems, and they can make videos on the subject too, yes?
Same subject, but in different contexts and using completely different styles and presentations. In fact, alot of points (and I mean ALOT) of points in here are pointed out that are missing in the CGP video you mentioned. I gained alot from watching both. I think CGP is great for those who require the "explain it to me like I'm 5" option. Vox gave me a better synopsis overall and is great for those who might feel overwhelmed watching all of CGP's Voting Systems Playlist, and who require the "explain it to me like I've got dementia/short on time" option.
I live in Switzerland and we have a direct democracy. The people here have much to say (especially if you consider the small size of our country): After 4 years we vote the parliament of our country and the parliament of the country part where we live. The parliament then votes the government, which contains 7 persons. Each of these 7 persons is responsible for one department. Additionally we can make a petition for a referendum if we don't agree with a law change. When enough people sign the petition we can vote for or against the change.
Everyone of us has the right to create a party if we wanted to, therefore there are many parties. There are however 8 parties, which are powerful and well-known. They pretty much cover every position you could have: There's a right-conservative party, a right-liberal party, two left-liberal parties, a small left-conservative party and three parties in the centre.
At the end I want to say that I'm really proud of my system and wish more countries would have such a system.
Here in Finland last parliamentary election was 2015. 15 parties got votes. 8 parties got into parliament. 3 parties with most members of parliament formed government,they controlled 124 MP's of 200. This summer (2017) one of the government parties split into 2 and one of them left the government but they still barely have majority of the seats so they remain governing Finland. Sometimes i envy the american 2 party system because more parties = more compromises which doesn't really guarantee the best result. Current government is pretty unpopular but i don't really know is it more unpopular than previous ones.
So many Americans are libertarian and many more are social democrats, but their views are not represented at all. The two parties may pretend to appease multiple blocks, like Republicans pulling in libertarians and evangelicals, but they really work for oil barons. Our system sucks and you don't want it.
Well said Travis but I also feel Bhaalspawn84 too.
I really like the idea of the Single Transferable Vote that we tried to implement parts of Canada (though the referendum failed). It's sort of a hybrid between the proportional representation and the traditional one representative per district.
This video is aging well.
CGPgrey's video on the alternative vote system is great for further infomation on this
Gerrymandering will still skew the Alternative Vote System (as happened in Queensland in the late 20th century). It also happens on a national scale in the federal house of representatives in Australia. The National party received 642,223 first preference votes nationwide and have 10 seats. The Australian Greens received 1,482,923 first preference votes and only have 1 seat in the house of representatives. The MMP system used in New Zealand would go a long way to address the imbalance in Australia (modified to keep the Alternative vote at the electorate level, rather than the First past the post method used at the electorate level in New Zealand).
As a compromise, we keep the current system, but multiply the House of Representatives to make it twice the amount as before, with one half of the House being the current system, while the other half of the house is based on proportional representation. 435 seats for our current system, with 435 more for proportional representation, plus one more to break ties.
There's a better voting system where one half is elected using stv (redistricted under shortest splitline algorithm) and another using closed list pr
1:48
Says Alternative Vote then Describes Single Transferable vote. Alternative Vote is NOT proportional, STV is.
STV is used in Ireland and in the Australian Senate. Alternative vote is used for the Australian House of Reps
2:10 Ireland has something called "Single Transferable Vote" which has multimember districting. AV gets rid of the spoiler effect, but it means nothing if you don't have multimember districting.
Comment to support the algorithm, this is an incredibly important topic!
I came here to see people argue and chew bubble gum.
And im not even American.
Either way, the Two Party Dictatorship system the US has is the best system out there because it's 2 sides of the same coin.
Hey there, Vox: thanks for this video; very interesting!
But it left me wanting to know more. For instance, how do these other systems combat the so-called "Tyranny of the Majority"? Am I right to assume that the only remaining value to the Electoral College system is being able to give (in theory; I know that, in reality, it isn't the case) lesser voices more weight?
Im not entirely sure if this is an adequate answer to the "tyranny of the majority" but for example here in Germany no political party usually manages to reach 50% of the votes. Therefore you will have to form coalitions of two or more parties to govern. This way there is an exchange of ideas and plans at least in between the coalition parties.
Didn't expect this video to EVER be made.
Why not shift to a multi-party parliamentary system?
We need this change now!
I'd say that alternative vote or STV is the best way, it keeps local representation but it diminishes spoiler effect.
This is why we should have a multi party ranked system. The two party system either makes u liberal or conservative, and moderates have to choose one of the two for their vote to matter.
I've always felt like a 3rd party makes the most sense due to the whole 2/3 voting concept
The title is misleading, it only explains the benefits of a new electoral system, but not how to break the two-party hold on american politics.
The title is not misleading. You just can't break the two-party hold without a new electoral system. Simple as that.
It isn't really but kindof.
You break it by changing the voting system (as stated), but how you do that when both parties are against it (because they loose power) isn't explained
It's been proven that plurality voting systems lead to a situation where the government is mostly dominated by two parties.
The reason the USA has no significant support for third parties is BECAUSE of your voting system. Fix it and you would see change.
Iris, nextpkfr, that's not really true. Both Canada and the UK use plurality voting and they both have three major parties, not two.
The key is all those safe and unopposed districts: it would be pretty easy to win some seats for a third party by just running someone in those districts. They're designed to be safe against the other party, not a third party.
+Vox The challenge in public commentary is not in setting a goal, but in mapping the path to it. The critical question is: Why hasn't this been done already? So you land on the issues of campaign finance, good governance, and civic education. If you want to make a difference, Vox, you need to go deeper... as do we all.
This is the type of video that should go viral
man im australian and learning about US voting systems blow my mind! absolutely absurd that america still uses first past the post voting in 2017 (we stopped using that system almost 100 years ago!!!). party representation and diversity especially in bicameral parliaments is essential wtf (hope you get proportional and/or preferential voting soon!)
Thank you so much. I love Australia and New Zealand and if it doesn’t get better in my country than I will move to Oceania or Ireland or up to my northern brother Canada or something. Canada is basically the us but better
Vote for a third party like Green or Pice and Freedom.
I used to agree with the idea of a proportional system until I entered AP US government. I highly recommend u go take a course on it or buy a textbook on AP US government because this system they r proposing is a bad idea even thought it sounds very appealing; however, there is a lot more they aren't telling u because it takes a long time to explain. Simply put the current US plurality system is a very good system; however, to be clear it can still be tweaked for better representation and still avoiding a gridlocked government. Like the "Top-Two" primary system. It basically allows for all candidates from every party, including third party candidates, to have a more equal chance at winning. It also includes the open primary method of allowing members of any party, including independents, to vote for a candidate of any party they wish regardless of their party registration. Then the top-two candidates, regardless of party affiliation, will be the final presidential candidates. The twist is that because the candidates are picked based off of being the ones with the most votes and are not restricted by party affiliation you can have two nominees from the same party. For example, if u had the top-two candidates in the country being Republicans then u would have two Republican nominees running against each other. But the benefit of this system is that it allows for Republicans and Democrats to vote for an independent or third party candidate, and for independents to vote for Republican or Democratic candidates. Also, u this system means that third party candidates have a much higher chance to win due to the open primary aspect of this and the top-two aspect.
Easier said than done I’m afraid. How is it possible for the two leading political parties to relinquish their control over their dominance upon the US political scene?
The Two Political Parties System, being one significant phenomenon to The United States period of deterioration.
Left and right: Two wings of the same bird
Kinda like lest and right twix? Aren't they the same? lol
There isn't a left wing party in america. There are the republicans who are conservative/neo conservative and the democrats who are centrist/neo liberal.
More like one big and one small right wing in the same bird in the US' case
Brah American right and "left" are very right in comparison to Europe
Can you make a video about the difficulties for how this would be achieved?
Amazing but most countries showed don't show as much difference as say, As rural Alaska and Miami, this vote on the federal level wouldn't not represent each places individual needs, yet for day the presidential election this would work quite well.
Too bad it will never happen.
The only way to break the system is to vote neither. Just vote the third party. United we have a chance but divided we become slaves.
Great video
The biggest issue we'd have to worry about if such a system was put into place would be wether or not the government would get anything done with the major division between the parties
I liked that they also made the rattlesnake party, no step on sneck!
What a disaster of a system..Beacon of democracy indeed.
Indeed. Created modern democracy, was the first country to refer to its leader as ‘president’, and is the reason as to why most of the globe besides the UK and her common wealth are democratic imitations.
JRufu you're about 70 years too late... America was the beacon of democracy after they fixed up the world mid 20th century. A lot of countries followed suit and improved the ideas of representation. America isn't the golden child it once was but it's the one you got
America is a republic.
AMERICA IS NOT A DEMOCRACY it is a Republic
> AMERICA IS NOT A DEMOCRACY it is a Republic
Another pseudo-intellectual attempting to sound intelligent on the Internet.
The only good vox video I've seen
Once again, it's always Australia that does everything right. So much for America being the 'greatest country in the world'
What's up with all the Australians in the comments? We Austrians have proportional representation too!
You do have a very good system. It does have one huge problem though. Most voters don't take advantage of the system. You've got millions of people who just vote for their favorite candidate or worse who vote for the person who they think is most likely to win defeating the purpose of the thing.
Y'all need to start teaching some more civics in school.
Its not because we don't teach civics. Its because our politics have been a joke for the last few years. There is also often very good reasons not to like certain people based on whatever values they hold and how they present themselves. Tony Abbott for example, I don't think he got voted in because people like him. Honestly I don't know how he got in, he's a joke.
This didn’t happen explain how to break the two party system, just alternatives.
Relying on politicians to decrease their own power is a fast track to inaction, I don’t know how, but if we ever want to see these changes, we’re going to have to force them.
cgp grey has great videos on different voting methods with much better details
CGP grey has entered the chat
Single transferable vote please
New Zealander here, I can confirm that our system is way better, but switching to it won't solve the issue of people complaining about the system.
After our recent elections the losing party started to complain about how badly the system represents voters.
Losers will always look to blame others for their hard-earned loss. They need to learn to accept responsibility.
That might be down to the threshold, which needs to go.
Sort of like Clinton supporters blaming the elctoral college when the whole point of it is to prevent someone from winning just a small heavily populated region.
The electoral college makes sense: if the majority of your state (51%+) votes for x, then your state as a whole puts all its points towards x, you don't split your points.
Same when you vote as an individual: if you prefer x by say 60% to y's 40%, then you put your vote towards x, you don't want to split your vote.
Even though you like y by 40%, you don't want 40% of your voting power to be usurped by y. The same goes for how states vote.
You can also combine the two electoral systems - majority and propotionate - in order to mitigate their disadvantages.Here in Japan, we cast two ballots in each general election, one for district based on majority system and the other based on propotionate system.
Germany and New Zealand uses MMP. It has the first-past-the-post districts, which takes up half of the seats in Parliament, but also uses a list system, which takes up the other half. A difference though with MMP from a system like in Japan, which is just a parallel system, is that the percentage of the party vote must always match the total number of seats, including the FPTP seats. If the party vote and the district vote doesn't match, that may sometimes lead to overhang and balance seats to keep the numbers proportional. It's quite complicated, there are many video on YT about this.
could you make a video on how to get a more proportional alternative system with the state
Huh two party only. What can go wrong?