Duverger's Law and the Two-Party System Explained
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- čas přidán 10. 10. 2018
- Filmmaker, comedian, and CES supporter Andy Zhou created this awesome video to explain the concept of Duverger's Law and how it affects the number of political parties within an electoral system.
Man you put a lot of effort in this video! Very nicely done!
Thank you for making this. This is going to make it so much easier when I'm trying to explain Duverger's Law to people (and it's important!)
This is the best political science video format god bless ur editing skills
Really clear and informative. It's helped me so much. Thanks a bunch!
Thank you for the really helpful visuals and explanation !
This is so helpful! Thank you
Excellent video to share!
Proportional Representation drawback: It allows extremist groups to have political representation without cutoff thresholds.
Approval Voting drawback: The "pity vote" and "virtue signal" psychologies kicks in, giving 'approval' to political agendas based on the charisma of the representative rather than based on their political beliefs.
I believe something closer to a caucus system would be a better idea. Get 2 votes (primary and alternate) and then multiple rounds of elimination where if a person is last they are eliminated and that persons votes are then given to the alternative if they had not already been eliminated in a previous round.
I like how you simplified it to where I can honestly understand. 😊
I genuinely enjoyed the music with the cloned versions of himself doing gestures.
Really nice vid, love the fact that there's Political Science audiovisual content being made and disseminated. Here in Brazil, voting for almost all legislative institutions use proportional representation and althought small parties are in fact represented, ideological pillars (like religion, liberalism or conversadorism) still aglomerate elected candidates and parties in Congress voting.
Oh yeah! I forgot to mention an idea I had for generating support for Approval Voting: While we may argue over which 'alternative voting system' is the best, we already *know* that Plurality is one of the worst, and absolutely worse than just about any of the most popular alternatives. Therefore, we could promote the idea that, regardless of what voting system we ultimately decide to use in the end, we should *never* just accept that plurality should be the 'default'. Instead, we should go with the research and reasoning that Approval Voting should be the new 'default' voting system for any election. Why? Because if you really want to, you can still just vote for one candidate, and if everyone did that it would be identical to plurality. Also, it requires no changes to ballots, only vote counting methods, and even then only trivial changes. No other system would be so easy to adopt, while having so many benefits. And once we finally ditch plurality, there will be plenty of time to use approval voting to debate and vote for hypothetically even-better systems (IRV, Range/Score Voting, etc.).
In the mean time, whenever you come across a situation where there's a vote for something (anything), we should be ready and eager to propose that AV should be the automatic default instead of plurality voting. Class president, what movie to go to, local dog catcher, whatever. The more we expose people to AV, the less Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt (FUD) there will be about it, people will get comfortable with it, and eventually, hopefully, popular support for eliminating plurality voting with an extremely simple alternative will grow enough that it might actually happen in our lifetimes.
Inverse Hyperbolic Tangent While I agree that PV is by far the worst and most outdated method, it does lend itself to a rather fair system: the tournament system. Right now, in the United States, we have a flawed version of this, where “primaries” determine the “best” of all candidates, but if it were modified to confer with the approval system, that is, there are multiple rounds of voting where the leaders and trailing candidates are trimmed off into respective groups after each round then after a series of rounds, the leaders of all rounds match up in a quarter-finals, semi-finals, and finals votes, a much more representative vote would be had. It would essentially combine the plurality and approval votes into a stretched system where each candidate or proposal would have a series of challenges and the winners among those would square off, until a clear winner is determined. It also accounts for the run-off system which has increased in popularity, without necessarily diminishing the prospective roles of the rival or tertiary position. It would essentially allow a best-person wins, without necessarily discounting the other perspectives. When each position has a clear amount of support, outside of partisan boundaries, it would pressure politicians to take a more nuanced position instead of appeasing the partisan lines, as if they betray an entire voting block that they received votes from in one election, they might not have enough support in the following election. With that support for each position, and a multitude of counter/supplementary positions at that would also be presented. The other thing I would suggested in a system like this is having voting done on the weekends, where most people would be able to vote and have more time to vote. I would also suggest an unbiased, non-partisan informational packet and video addressing each position/candidate in a concise and understandable manner be presented at the voting centers, which should also be more plentiful and volunteers should receive part of an allotted amount for voting day, set aside in federal and state budgets. The more democratic we get, the better and plurality votes in the system we have very poorly represent the will of the people at large. A and B is not representative of the A-Z types of people we have around the world, even if A and B are the most common types of people.
Great video, but the music is annoying AF
The visualization here helps soo much, seriously
Very well done!!
BLESS YOU
I'm getting a lot of videos about voting system upgrades in my subs feed, which can only be a good thing.
Personally, I'd like to see: i. Shortest Splitline boundaries; ii. STAR Voting ballots; and iii. Proportional Representation being installed, but I'd be happy with Approval Voting in the meantime!
Shortest Split line is an interesting first attempt at impartial redistricting, but it leaves a lot to be desired. Please have a look at some of the more sophisticated redistricting algorithms put together by bdistricting.com , autoredistrict.org , or gardow.com/davebradlee/redistricting .
For example, BDistricting assembles districts based on census blocks, helping to ensure that district lines do not bisect property lines.
eclipz905: Thanks for the links; it's really interesting stuff. I share your concerns about SS and can see the downsides, so it's good to know that people are researching alternatives.
Have to say though that the "Minimal racial gerrymandering" thing on the autoredistrict website got my spidey-senses tingling a bit. I'm not sure why, but it felt like it might be one of those 'good intentions' types of things that might end up achieving the opposite what it set out to do, as it's treating race as an fundamentally important feature of voting choice when really it could be argued that it's just a contingent one. Will have to mull that one over for a bit...
The issue at this point is that we have entrenched interests that don’t want to allow the growth of 3rd parties since it doesn’t benefit them. The duopoly maintains its power by disallowing the possibility of the systemic change required to enact these other forms of voting.
Great video but the background music overpowers the vocals. Makes it hard to show in a classroom setting with speakers.
You missed some parts of Duverger’s Law.
Government Type.
Executive Type and Method of Choice.
Population Demographics.
Electoral Legitimacy.
The means of Proportional Representation affecting Government Formation (Who controls a Federalist, Congressional Legislature with Proportional Representation, which is very different from the Parliamentary system of “Coalition Government”).
Etc.
This is almost a perfect video but in addition to Approval Voting, you should have also mentioned Ranked Choice Voting.
RCV is used in several countries like Austrailia and Ireland and more recently, Maine and Alaska adopted it in ballot referendum. So it has far more real world instances used than Approval.
IRV is less desirable than Approval voting. A video could compare dozens of alternatives, but this video focused on simplicity and ideals. Bad, better, best: Plurality, Approval, Proportional.
Superb
4:40 - the problem with proportional representation - that it will move the problems you described in the beginning of the video - from level of people voting for representatives - to the level of representatives voting for laws - parties with small representation wouldn't have enough of power and would have to make coalition with major parties
better solution, i think, would be to make people vote directly for the LAWS, not for the representatives. that was unthinkable in the times of The Founders - but nowadays due to technology level it's more than doable
Yes 100% I'm so shocked to see how gullible Americans are... obviously it was naive of me to think otherwise but idk it is just soo sad to see this project(America ) that has accomplished so much and still has sooo much potential imo get destroyed by greed and thirst for power 💔 and leaders have warned us about this since the beginning of America yet ppl are so blinded by ,shitty con men it's sadly way to easy to manipulate Americans these days 😢
Yes. U people are really making Democracy SMART !!!
What to say to those who cite the "Dead Parrot" article?
where does ranked choice voting fit into this? great video btw!
thanks lol watching this for my poli midterm
Nicely done video! Great job with the production. Most of it was great, but I have one major critique, intended to be constructive: At the end of the video, I still don't have a clear conception of what Duverger's Law is.
I don't think there was a clear, concise definition of it in the video; or, if there was, it was buried within all the talk of voting systems. I know intuitively what it means because I've done plenty of reading and research into voting systems, but if someone were to ask me to give a clear definition of it right now, I don't think I could, even after watching this video. (cont'd in replies....)
As a contrasting example, I know Newton's Laws of Motion by heart because I've boiled them down to straightforward, concise descriptions/summaries. E.g. First Law is that "In the absence of any forces, an object's velocity remains constant." This is a little more precise than the standard version, "Objects in motion tend to stay in motion. (And objects at rest tend to stay at rest.)" The latter common definition is okay (better than nothing), but fails to mention the key concepts of velocity and forces, so it often leads folks to struggle to understand the simplicity of Newton's laws. Yet, after watching an intro video on it, I'm sure most people would be able to rattle it off pretty easily.
However, for Duverger's Law, I don't think I could give even a simple definition that I would have confidence is correct. "Plurality voting tends to create two-party systems?" But it's more than just plurality voting, right? Other systems also do that, right? I seem to recall the video talking about, "The way we vote has more influence on third parties than actual interest in third parties(?)" But that doesn't highlight the key problem of the current connection between current plurality voting and the current entrenchment of a two-party system in the US (and other countries/regions/organizations). It's not precise/concise enough.
I think the video (or a future version of it, perhaps) would do well to have a distinct section where it clearly defines Duverger's Law, and goes through the definition to explain why it is defined that way.
For example, I can further explain my Newton's First Law example by defining what velocity is (motion in a particular direction (i.e. a change in displacement), even including a velocity of zero (staying at rest)) and what forces are (interactions between objects within space & time which cause an acceleration (i.e. a change in velocity)). Then it makes perfect sense that if there are no forces acting on an object, then of course the velocity will remain constant (no force means no acceleration).
But for Duverger's Law, I still struggle to even put it into words, let alone to clearly identify the related concepts, even after watching this.
After looking it up for a definition, I think I can now identify what related concepts need to be clarified and explained. Duverger's Law seems to be that, over time, plurality voting (which should also be identified with its more common names like 'first past the post' and whatnot, since most people won't necessarily know the distinction between 'plurality' and 'majority') in a single-representative district (aka 'winner takes all') will *converge* into a two-party system, regardless of how many parties would best represent the actual population of voters. It will squeeze out third-parties, driving them to extinction, leaving only two de facto parties, neither of which will represent the desires of the majority very well. It's that sense of inevitability that I think is lacking in this video's description/definition.
The Wikipedia article on it also touches on some of the mechanisms by which it operates, namely the 'fusion' and 'elimination' mechanisms. I don't think it would complicate the video/topic to use those mechanisms as examples of how and why Duverger's Law works. They could then be used to explain how Approval Voting and/or Proportional Representation can counteract those mechanisms.
I could go on, but I think this is enough to get my main point across. In the end, I think the video is excellent, but I think it assumes the viewer already knows certain basic concepts that the general public will usually only have intuitive, fuzzy ideas about, and could use some help with making those ideas more complete and concrete. The video fails to do that, IMHO, but otherwise does a great job of summarizing the overall trend and potential solutions. It's more like a 201 course on Duverger's Law when what is still missing is a 101 course on it. So, great 201 video, but I think we still need a 101 video that's even more basic/fundamental.
Hey! Thanks for the input. I co-wrote the script with CES, so we may very well have glossed over a 101 version of the idea. I thought the slides towards the end indicating that plurality trends towards a two party system would have been a simple enough summary, but I probably should have spelled it out more.
this is all different in a federal government right?
We already have a number of outright crazies in our legislatures; wouldn't moving to proportional representation just exacerbate that problem? Or maybe that would be ok, because the rest of a given legislature might have more common ground with which to work?
I would say you still need approval voting for the presidency. It's simple to implement and effective at eliminating the spoiler effect. But proportional voting for house representatives seems like a great idea.
great editing but turn down the background volume
You could've just said proportional representation. But that's cool. I had to look it up. I said some kind of parliamentary system, but proportional representation is what I was getting at.
Is approval voting for you just ranked choice voting?
You could have talked about STV and other systems, I don't get why the debate is always FPTP vs PR
It was Plurality vs Approval, which could be implemented immediately. PR requires restructuring the elected body and/or districting.
For some reason, the Philippines has effectively 6 major parties in Congress despite FPTP.
Philippines are kinda younger country and in fact far more ethnically diversed than USA.
good video but the loud background music is very distracting.
Nice but how do we, and I mean regular citizens, make any of these things happen? I couldn't imagine relying on our current government to propose anything on their own that gave 3rd parties a better chance. Most of our gov is dominated by 2 mainstream parties, and both of those parties know that it's in their best interest to avoid laws that would give 3rd parties a better chance. So what exactly can be done in practice here?
Find out how to put it on the ballot for referendum vote. You'll probably need to go door to door and collect signatures. There are resources and people who can help you. You might get assistance at town hall.
Concerning proportional representation:
First, I like the intent behind PR, but not how it goes about solving the problem. The cost of implementing PR is you end up with much larger districts, which further alienates the voters. To have accurate representation you need fairly large districts, and voters are presented with PARTIES rather than CANDIDATES. I am aware of attempts to remedy this with things like mixed member seats and open party lists, but that doesn't solve the fundamental problem - which is that representatives are less beholden to the people than they are the party.
Second, switching to proportional representation would be far more difficult than adopting approval voting. In my view, having a quick and easy change that can make other reforms even easier accomplishes more in the long run than trying to get one big change all at once - and PR would be a very big change in the US. Actually, it would be illegal to start electing congressmen under PR, due to the Uniform Congressional District Act of 1967, which requires single-member districts for all congressional seats. Perhaps PR could be implemented relatively easy in certain states, but I suspect that is more the exception than the norm. So the best immediate fix would be to use approval voting, which is a good substitute for proportionality within a single-member district.
Third, if we want to apply the principles of PR, I believe I have devised a better system, which removes parties from the equation (note that I'm assuming a single-transferrable vote system is used): Instead of awarding seats to parties, award fractional votes to individual congressmen based on overall support within their district. This allows for much smaller districts of 3 or 4, and removes much of the leverage parties have to control who wins in their primaries. It also means virtually every American who choses to vote gets a specific person in congress they've authorized to act on their behalf.
Lastly, I've seen other comments disparaging PR because it gives representation to "extreme" elements of the country. To that I would ask: Who are you to insist that a particular voice be silenced and denied representation? I personally view socialists as detestable extremists who are a danger to the well-being of our country and everyone in it... but I don't think it is my place to deny them an opportunity to vote or have representatives. Indeed, an ideal system would offer a seat to a diverse range of political agendas and philosophies. I contend it is always a strength to have many different perspectives immediately available when trying to solve a complex problem - and congress attempts to solve many of the most important problems faced by our nation. Therefore unpopular opinions and perspectives should not be silenced, but given a seat at the table; even the "extreme" ones.
But what problems are created?
Less polarization, moderate centrist policies, larger majority representation, increased voter turn out, all terrible things.
Why is the US military music being used in the background when this is not a military video?
Because freedom.
Yeah but you fail completely to point out the drawbacks of proportional representation. Namely: larger constituencies for each representative.
2:15 "Approval Voting" = "Ranked Choice Voting"
Approval voting is slightly different from rank choice voting.
In approval voting
Candidate A: 75% approval
Candidate B: 68% approval
Candidate C: 52% approval
Candidate D: 9% approval
Candidate A takes the seat^
In ranked choice voting, it's a bit more complicated
Candidate A: 38% votes
Candidate B: 35% votes
Candidate C: 23% votes
Candidate D: 4% votes
Candidate D lost so the votes are redistributed based on rankings
Candidate A: 38% votes
Candidate B: 39% votes
Candidate C: 23% votes
Candidate C lost so the votes are redistributed based on rankings
Candidate A: 46% votes
Candidate B: 54% votes
Candidate B takes the seat^
Or just have ranked choice. That's significantly better
You still have winner take all since the 50 can pass anything or hold up anything... see Mitch McConnell for reference of a very close majority
Two corrections. 1) not all PR systems get rid of vote splitting so it does not fix the first part of his law 2) you dont need multi member districts to get PR. Look at a system called local PR
Also, PR systems which get PR by partisan votes undermine representative government which is an assumption for his law.
Under "local PR", the voter can influence who wins in other ridings?
@@williamwaugh8670 yes. This sort of system is common but normally they just pool the ridings into one big muti-member riding. Local pr keeps some amount of local accountability
NEWSY brought me here 🥴🙂🤷♂️
Proportional representation sholdn't be done through parties. I'd like to see it done, but voting for a single candidate and have that vote count towards that candidate's transfer list in an STV election. The reason is because I think STV is good enough, but I don't think it is reasonable to ask voters to rank all the candidates or let their vote exhaust.
Yes, parties are not the important thing here for proportionality. You can achieve something better with proportional cardinal systems, however.
STV, being preferential and attempting to preserve the majoritarian goal, will produce an ideologically extremist group of representatives who will barely cooperate, so it will still lead to large levels of polarization and oppositionism.
@1ucasvb, I think that is a problem with all PR, but I think it would be better without parties. I also think we could do away with formal coalitions and allow parliament to use a Condorcet method to elect each minister on the cabinet. You can also have different factions draft and propose their own budget and parliament can also use a Condorcet method to elect a budget. If you do this, you don't have anymore of the standstills in which nobody can agree on the budget or form a government.
@@Mutex50 No, it's provably an issue with STV, and provably not an issue with proportional cardinal systems.
Extremism is a byproduct of favoritism in preferential voting.
The problem with proportional cardinal systems today is perhaps they elect a group that is too ideological uniform and "moderate".
An ideal system would be something in between.
Reweighted range voting
@@1ucasvb haha extremism? Australia seems to do just fine, in fact most of our political instability is inside partys not between , @Mutex50 The problem with "transfer lists" is that you can encourage heaps of micro-partys that all do deals and with complex maths to get one of them elected on a slither of the primary vote. optional preferential voting is the way to go (with a minimum).
Voting for a major party when they don't represent your values is a throwaway vote. Voting for the "lesser of two evils" is a throwaway vote. Voting for Republicans, who ALWAYS say one thing and do another, is a throwaway vote. In 2016, Gary Johnson was less than 2% away from making it to the debates, which would have changed history, and it's thanks to this "throwaway vote" "lesser of two evils" mentality that keeps the duopoly in power!
Which is exactly why you should prefer Approval Voting. There's no "throwaway vote"
If you love Liberty please share this with "liberty" party members. The LP is harming Liberty.
How so?
We need this more now then ever the 2 party system is destroying the country I'm scared for my kids future
While it is true that proportional representation does tend to give value to EACH vote, in the "first past the post" system the candidates tend to be chosen by the grassroots voters at nominating conventions, primaries etc. In proportional representation, the list of candidates is almost always chosen by the party hacks at party HQ. While the result may be unfair to the voters whose votes are "lost" in the system, you are usually going to be represented by a member who has been chosen by YOU and/or YOUR NEIGHBOURS, not by a gang of political hacks 2000 miles away......
That is solvable by having Open list en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_list and having a rule where candidates need to being selected from local nominating conventions, primaries etc.
OH!
And…
Israel.
India.
These are typical examples of “Multi-Party Governments.”
They are NOT “better” than our system.
Just “Different.”
AND…
While they DO “better represent the population.”
THAT is a Trade-Off that gets them “A VASTLY LESS FUNCTIONAL Government.”
Sorry guys, but this is *W.E.A.K* . Durverger's Law is critical to understand... it has been being *perfected* by the oligarchy's One Corporatist Party (GOP/Dem Duopoly) *over the past 100 years* to maintain control over our government by *keeping 3rd Parties out* . D.L. consists of *many tactics that all must be addressed* or else we are nothing but a *distraction* and helping the *oligarchy stay in control* .
To all Americans: VOTE HOWIE HAWKINS / ANGELA N WALKER for POTUS/VP 2020. Green Party USA!
or Charlie Kam / Liz Parrish U.S. Transhumanist Party for POTUS/VP 2020!
Make the White House Green or Transhumanist in 2021!
You can't blame Greens, Transhumanists, Marxists, Socialists, Communists, Anarchists, or Libertarians.
They're not the ones in power.
He doesn't even explain the other side of the argument, The U.S Electoral System is more stable and efficient than that of a proportion system, which commonly relies on coalition government.
The US system is efficient?
Yes it is more efficient than that of Proportional Representation
No actually we do not have a so called two party system we have two parties dominating the election system because the US citizens continue to be fed lies about voting also people need to vote on good principles and on good faith.
Yes, but the Plurality election system perpetuates the duopoly.