The voting system a government chooses has influence upon the way people vote, as it has some bearing on the average person’s utility received from voting. In the United States the Electoral College system is used to determine who becomes president-elect, but theoretical arguments have been made to support a change in voting structure to Proportional Representation. I developed my model to understand more about how a change in the voting structure would affect voter utility. My contribution to the research question focuses upon relative benefits of one voter in a specific party to another voter in another party. I used an empirical approach, using data pulled from past elections and survey data. My model suggests that Republican voters would receive a higher utility from a change in the voting system from the Electoral College to Proportional Representation. It is unclear whether Democrats would receive a higher benefit, but at least would receive a lesser utility change than that of the Republican voters.

Voter frustration in the US is driven largely by partisanship and gridlock in Congress. This paper seeks to understand the root causes of gridlock and look at alternative methods for eliminating it. I find that while the media focuses on polarization as the root cause of gridlock, the checks and balances system plays an equally significant role, and that the interaction between the party system and the governmental structure of the US government creates incentives that cause gridlock to form. Recent reforms have failed to successfully address gridlock because they do not change the polarized party system or the barriers to policy-making in government. After acknowledging the failure of recent reforms, I consider a new set of reforms: electoral system reform. The field of electoral systems provides many policy alternatives with profound tradeoffs, many of which make gridlock obsolete. Majoritarian systems create single-party majorities and reduce checks on majority power, allowing the majority party to implement their platform tempered through voter approval rather than checks on their power. Proportional systems retain checks and balances through the creation of governing coalitions, but the parties in power have stronger incentives to cooperate and compromise than under the current polarized US system. I propose a system for evaluating electoral systems and compare them in terms of accountability, legitimacy, effectiveness, representativeness, and complexity. Finally, I propose two electoral reforms, informed by the study of electoral systems, that are both feasible and increase the ability for third parties to gain seats in the legislature. The first, proportional representation for House members, creates small to medium-sized proportional Congressional districts at the state level to reduce the threshold for party entry. The second, Alternative Vote (ranked-choice) for Senate, proposes switching to a preference ranking system for Senate elections further remove barriers to third parties. These reforms should undermine the polarized two-party system and create new incentives for cooperation in Congress.

The Finnish electoral system was introduced in 1906 and elections were held the following year. Since 1906, all women and men have been eligible to vote and to be nominated in elections. The age of eligibility has been successively lowered from 24 in 1906 to 21 in 1944, to 20 in 1969 and to 18 in 1972. The Finnish parliament (Eduskunta) consists of 200 MPs elected from 15 districts. Except the Åland Island district elects a single member, the other 14 districts are all multi-member (the district magnitude is determined by the population size). Basically, the Finnish electoral system is a list system of proportional representation with multi-member constituencies. The allocation of seats to parties (including party alliance) is following the d'Hondt method. The Finnish electoral system has undergone some transformations since it was originally introduced in 1906. As it works today, general elections are held every four years (there is a provision for premature dissolutions of parliament¡Va presidential prerogative). There is no predetermined order of the candidates within each list. The names of the candidates are normally printed on large sheets of paper, where each candidate has a number, and the names may be organized within each list for example in alphabetical order. The ballot paper is a small slip of paper, where the voter has to write the number of the candidate for whom he or she is voting. The individual votes thus received by different candidates within each list (normally each list corresponds to one party or a coalition of several smaller parties) will determine their final order. In other words, the voter has the duty to vote for a single candidate, and the electoral campaign is very much oriented accordingly, as a competition between individuals, although the voters presumably are also aware of the party affiliation of the candidates and of the fact that their votes will benefit not only the individual candidate but also the party in question. When the votes have been counted and the order of the candidates within each list thus has been established, the final allocation of seats to the lists is carried out by the election board on the basis of comparison numbers, using the d'Hondt method. At the allocation stage, the individual votes of candidates are no longer relevant, as the order has already been established, and the lists compete with each other on the basis of the total votes received for each list. Therefore, the election is not exclusively a competition between parties; it is also a competition between single candidates on the party list. Because of the deadlock at present on Taiwan's electoral reformation, I personally think that Finland's electoral system will probably be a good solution to the problems of electoral system in Taiwan, and should be included in the discussion of improving our electoral system. Hence, I recommend that Finland's model will probably be suitable to Taiwan and deserve more attention in the current discussion on Taiwan's electoral reformation.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 2004. / Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 237-248). Also available on the Internet.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 2004. / Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 237-248). Also available on the Internet.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Michigan State University, 2002. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 172-180).

Thèse (doctorat)--Université de Caen. / "Bibliographie": p. [vii]-xii.

Critically examines the role of electoral systems in the democratisation process and conflict management in divided societies such as Kenya and Rwanda. Analyses the power sharing arrangement institutionalized in Rwanda in the aftermath of the genocide in order to demonstrate the potential to mitigate issues of ethnic. Also explores the anomalous results caused by the current electoral system in Kenya (First Past The Post) in its process of democratization and then find out which is the most suitable electoral system which encourage co-operation and inclusiveness and discourage conflict and exclusiveness. minority representation / A Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of Law University of Pretoria, in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree Masters of Law (LLM in Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa). Prepared under the supervision of Dr. Atangcho N Akonumbo, Faculté de Sciences Sociales et de Gestion, Université Catholique D’Afrique, Centrale Yaounde Cameroun. / Thesis (LLM (Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa))--University of Pretoria, 2009. / http://www.chr.up.ac.za/ / Centre for Human Rights / LLM

The older population is growing rapidly and businesses must prepare for changes in their workforce. Cases of age discrimination have also become more common. Older workers are being forced out of their jobs at a faster rate than any other age group. As a result, older workers commonly take jobs in different careers, where they compete with younger workers who have similar relevant experience and are valued for their youth. Both prototype matching theory and career timetables theory state that people hold stereotypes of the job in addition to stereotypes of people. In laboratory research, a mismatch between the age of the worker and the age-type of the job has led to lower evaluations, lower job suitability ratings, and other indicators of discrimination. The purpose of this thesis is to assess whether the construct of age-type is related to discrimination in real-world legal cases. Real life instances of discrimination were attained from a 15-year sample of 388 age discrimination jury verdicts and settlements. Each job in the sample of cases was rated to determine age-type, perceived proportion of older and younger workers in the job, and importance of stereotypically older worker features to the job. Results showed that all forms of age stereotypes, both general and specific, were related to the frequency of cases in jobs associated with older or younger stereotypes. Specifically, older workers were more likely to have age discrimination cases go to trial in younger age-typed jobs. However, these variables did not help to predict formal outcomes of the cases (win vs. loss). Among the cases that did win, cases in older age-typed jobs won significantly more money than in younger age-typed jobs.

The thesis examines the reasons why the German National Assembly of 1919 chose proportional representation to elect officials to the German Reichstag. Sources include the series Quellen zur Geschichte des Parlamentarismus and die politische Parteien, the "Hajo Holborn Papers", and the Reich Ministry of Interior debates concerning the institutional draft. The thesis traces the arguments for proportional representation, its use throughout Europe before 1914, and voting reform in Germany during World War I. The thesis surveys the German provisional government's adoption of proportional representation, emphasizing the constitutional drafts of Hugo Preuss and the role of the provisional government. Finally, the thesis scrutinizes the National Assembly debates, concluding that most of its members had already decided to follow the provisional government's course and accept proportional representation.