Single Constituency Research Articles

LEADERSHIP CRISES AND FAILURE OF POLITICAL PARTIES A HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE OF ISOLATION OF EAST AND WEST PAKISTAN

the inception of Pakistan on the map of the world as a result of the partition of all India, the dominancy of the Western part of Pakistan was very clear but un-understandable. The political parties and leaders from the West Pakistan always thought themselves superior to that of East Pakistan. This behaviour of the political parties and the leadership from the West Wing gave birth to hatred among the subjects belonging to the East Pakistan. The political Parties and the leadership never tried to take such steps which could create harmony among the masses of the both sides. As the time passed, hatred increased. The reflection of these hatred emerged in the general elections, held on 1970.Awami League led by Sheikh Muji-Ur-Rehman secured 160 seats out of 162 seats allocated for the East Pakistan but unfortunately, it failed to win even in a single constituency of the West Pakistan. On the other hand, PPP led by Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, secured a marginalised victory of 81 seats out of total 138seats allocated for the West Pakistan but it did not participate in East Pakistan. These unexpected results further divided the parties and leadership because the West Pakistan was not ready to give its dominance in the hands of the East Pakistan while there was an absolute majority of the East Pakistan and constitutionaally, the rule was to be given to Awami League. Whereas, the leadership of that time is concerned, they were not ready to solve the rift politically. The problems increased; Pakistan had to go into war with India in 1971.As a result of this political chaos and anarchy Pakistan had to face humiliation in the war. The East Pakistan separated from the West Pakistan and emerged as an independent country on international sphere, known as "The Republic of Bangladesh". This study also unwraps some shroudedl things such as, West Pakistan's genocism act against the East Pakistanis and the Indian roll of taking part into the matter of Pakistan, which became an immediate factor for physical separation of Pakistan. The study uncovers how Indian intervention into the burning matter, reinforced the already existing variables, paved a way for the creation of Bangladesh. Para oxically, foreign agents such as the USA,USSR and China had a very bounded and limited impact on the sources and upsurge of the East-West isolation.

Performance of Women-led Political Parties in Lesotho’s 2022 National Elections

Since the dawn of multi-party democracy in Lesotho in 1993, few political parties have been formed and led by women, and they are not doing well. The main political parties lack the political will and commitment to nominate women as leaders. In the elections of 7 October 2022, none of the main political parties were led by women and none of them won a single constituency. While many women-led parties could not make it into parliament, a few women leaders got into parliament through Proportional Representation (PR). Four women-led political parties contested the election, all of them performing dismally. It is important to explore why women-led political parties did not perform well, as Lesotho has signed and ratified international protocols on women’s empowerment and equality in politics, among others, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolution 1325, the African Union (AU) Maputo Protocol, and the Southern African Development Community (SADC) protocol on gender and development. All these urge member states to ensure meaningful participation of women in politics and elections, specifically as leaders. We assess the implementation of Sustainable Development Goals (SDG 5) on gender equality and women empowerment to measure the progress Lesotho has made and the challenges yet to be addressed. This article explores factors that contributed to this poor performance and analyses the reasons for the poor performance by reviewing relevant documents regarding the performance of women-led political parties in Lesotho’s 2022 national elections.

Competition, Cooperation, and Influence in the Informal Economy: Interest Representation in Informal Markets in Mexico City

This article proposes that the specific conditions under which collective action happens in informal markets generate a non-linear relation between organizational density (the number of organizations representing a single constituency) and effective claim-making around common objectives, unlike the expectations of standard theories tailored to organizational activity in the formal sector. Informal workers' capacity to demand resources from the government is best served by intermediate levels of organizational density, when organizations experience enough competition to make them responsive to their constituencies, but not so much that internal strife undermines their effectiveness in securing shared objectives. To test this argument, I leverage a mixed-methods approach to examine the case of informal workers' organizational behavior in public and street markets in Mexico City.

Faktori teritorijalne reprezentativnosti u zatvorenom proporcionalnom izbornom sistemu - slučaj Republike Srbije

The author maps the patterns of geographical representation in the National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia over the last nine electoral cycles, since the year 2000. During that period, a closed-list PR system is implemented in Serbian elections, within a single nationwide constituency. According to the theoretical expectations, such a system is unsuitable for equal geographical representation, because voters choose national lists as a whole, without affecting the order of the candidates, so the system does not provide incentives for parties to offer regionally balanced lists. However, even within that framework, a significant number of elected representatives come from different local subdivisions. Within districts as this paper's level of analysis, the author is determining underrepresentation and overrepresentation patterns, as well as potential demographic, economic, or geographical factors affecting the representation ratio, i.e. the share of elected representatives in relation to the share of the district's population.

How postgraduate university students construct their identity as learners in a multicultural classroom

ABSTRACT This article considers the ways in which a group of postgraduate students position themselves in a multicultural classroom at one university in the UK. Research indicates that postgraduate students actively negotiate and renegotiate their learner identities and belonging in the context of higher education environments and develop new subject positions. The study examines students’ constructions of their own identities as learners and considers their changing identities from the perspective of agency. Our data collected from focus groups and one-to-one interviews with students prior to the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic, comprise a large proportion of non-UK/EU students, amongst whom Chinese students are the single largest constituency. Findings show that students’ experience of learning is constitutive of the identification work they do during lectures and group-work to position themselves as participants of HE, and in the process, practice othering of students belonging to non-traditional participants in UK higher education.

Kobiety w jednomandatowych okręgach wyborczych do Senatu RP

The objective of the present article is to identify and assess gender disproportions in elections to the Senate of the Republic of Poland in single member constituencies (SMC) in 2011, 2015 and 2019. The subject literature expresses an opinion that SMCs exclude women from the bodies of the legislative power, because it is much less likely that they will be appointed candidates in the party structures dominated by men. The lack of empirical data regarding gender disparities in three elections to the Senate of the Republic of Poland prompted us to conduct research in this area. The article presents the results of the analysis of the participation of women in the Polish Senate elections, which were held ten times since the "round table" talks, with particular emphasis on the election campaigns and their results in 2011, 2015 and 2019, i.e. after the introduction of the SMCs.

THE 2020 PARLIAMENTARY ELECTIONS IN THE SLOVAK REPUBLIC FROM A REGIONAL PERSPECTIVE

The subject of this article is the analysis of the 2020 parliamentary elections in the Slovak Republic from the point of view of the regional success of individual political entities. The authors refer the strong and weak areas of support for individual political parties, which gained more than five percent of the votes on a nationwide scale. As the Slovak Republic is considered as single constituency in the parliamentary elections, the results themselves do not literally indicate the areas with the strongest or weakest voter support. It is interesting to observe the extent of influence of the residence of the electoral leader, the ethnic composition of the population or the religiosity on the electoral behaviour. Equally interesting is the observation of the stability of electoral preferences, as we have witnessed largely different results in the 2020 parliamentary elections compared to the 2019 elections (presidential elections, as well as the European Parliament elections). Key words: parliamentary elections, Slovak Republic, electoral gain, National Council of the Slovak Republic, regions.

Electoral politics, party performance, and governance in Greenland: Parties, personalities, and cleavages in an autonomous subnational island jurisdiction

Greenland is a strongly autonomous subnational island jurisdiction (SNIJ) within the Kingdom of Denmark. This paper takes its point of departure in studies of politics in small island territories to ask to what extent Greenland matches findings from other small island states and SNIJs in terms of personalisation of politics, party performance, and political cleavages that do not follow left-right divides. Even though Greenland possesses a strongly multiparty system, supported by elections involving party-list proportional representation within a single multimember constituency, a single political party, Siumut, has led the government for all but a brief period since the advent of Greenlandic autonomy in 1979. By considering Greenland’s political ecosystem, spatially and personally conditioned aspects of voter behaviour, and coalition-building processes, paying particular attention to the 24 April 2018 parliamentary elections, we argue that it is inappropriate to study Greenland as a monolithic political unit or to draw oversimplified analogies with party politics from large state Western liberal democracies. Instead, Greenlandic politics must be understood in relation to the island territory’s particular historical, geographical, and societal characteristics as well as its electoral system.

Sitzzuteilung in Doppelwahlkreisen: Ein Vorschlag für eine sanfte Reform

The author advocates a reform of the election system in favour of multi-nominal constitu­encies (see ZParl, no . 4-2019, p . 906 ff .) . It has to be noticed, however, that the political debate shows strong inertia in the present system, which has prevailed since 1949 and which consists of one-person-constituencies and Land candidate lists . Therefore, a second­best solution seems to be to continue the system as such but to organize the assignment of constituency seats in double constituencies . Each double constituency would assign two seats to the strongest or the two most-strongest parties within its area, applying the meth­ods of d’Hondt or Sainte Laguë . Tentatively calculated on the basis of the federal election results of 2017 and 2021, the suggested reform would not produce overhang seats (“Über­hangmandate”) . If this proposal were combined with a reduced number of constituencies, the probability of overhang seats would drop further . In this proposal single constituencies might not have a direct representative in Parliament . Directly elected MPs of neighbouring single constituencies or elected MPs of the Land candidate lists would become their co-representatives .

The Routledge Research Companion to the History of Evangelicalism. Edited by Andrew Atherstone and David Ceri Jones

This ‘Companion’ is what it says on the cover, a companion. It is not itself a history, and it has little overall picture of an unfolding and growing organic movement. Rather, it identifies some characteristic features of evangelicalism, and traces the story of each of these seriatim. The scope is in theory five centuries of time and the whole globe in space. The upshot brings certain trees into sharp focus without giving very much picture of either the wood or the neighbouring trees. The reader’s interest is directed to these particular concerns—some very general and predictable (as, e.g., ‘Evangelicals and the Bible’), some much less expected (as, e.g., ‘Evangelicals, money and business’). The editors kickstart the enquiry with some difficult mapwork on ‘Evangelicals and evangelicalisms: contested identities’. Tensions exist among evangelicals, classically in relation to ecclesiology and the quest for a tightly confessional church or the readiness to live in a ‘mixed’ fellowship—some of which affect the issue of infant baptism, not mentioned in this enquiry; should the pure scriptural gospel be locked into an exclusive, even sectarian, organization, or can it be risked in an unconfessional context? And when new presenting issues arise (as, e.g., in different centuries the retention of slavery, the ordination of women, or the acceptability of same-sex unions), corresponding new tensions threaten the identity of a supposed single evangelical constituency. If, of course, there is no identity, then there can be no enquiry; but for the moment we go along with the editors’ conviction, or at least working hypothesis, that within the world Christian church there is an evangelical entity which can be identified and reported.

Realization and the Implementation of the Two Third Gender Rule as Enshirined in the Constitution: The Kenyan Case

The Kenyan constitution of 2010 has addressed the problem of gender inequalities in Kenya, 4 the role of gender in the national development discourse and particularly sustainable development in Kenya is pertinent. The current Constitution of Kenya 2010 places great emphasis on the equality of both gender and their participation in the country’s development agenda. The constitution sets a frame work stating that not more than two-thirds of the members of elective public bodies should be of the same gender. In the Constitution of Kenya (2010), Article 27 talks about equality and freedom from discrimination. This Article of the Constitution provides that, every person is equal before the law and has the right to equal protection and equal benefit of the. This equality includes the full and equal enjoyment of all rights and fundamental freedoms. The constitution also provides that, women and men have the right to equal treatment, including the right to equal opportunities in political, economic, cultural and also social spheres. This provision aims at granting both men and women an equal and levelised playing field either politically, economically and also at the social level. Furthermore, the Constitution of Kenya provides that, the State shall not discriminate directly or indirectly against any person on any ground, including race, sex, pregnancy, marital status, health status, ethnic or social origin, color, age, disability, religion, conscience, belief, culture, dress, language or birth. This provision of the constitution ensures that women are given the same opportunity to contest for National seats just as their fellow men counterparts. Article 27(8) provides for affirmative action where the State is required to take Legislative and other measures to ensure that no more than two-thirds of the members of elective or appointive bodies are of the same gender. Article 81(b), another very key provision in as far as this research work is concerned, is to the effect that, not more than two-thirds of the members of elective public bodies shall be of the same gender. In Kenyan public institutions, and in particular the National Assembly, however, gender balance has been twisted against women and for that reason it has not been fully honored. There are other several Articles addressing gender equality in public offices, Article 177(b) on membership of the county assembly, provides that, the number of special seat members necessary to ensure that no more than two-thirds of the membership of the county assemblies are of the same gender. Article 97 on membership of the 7 Supra n. 4 Article 27(1) Article 27(3). National Assembly shall consist of forty-seven women, each elected by the registered voters of the Counties, each county constituting a single member constituency. On the other flipside of the coin, Article 98(1)(b) provides that the senate consists of, sixteen women members who shall be nominated by the political parties according to their proportion of members of the senate elected. These two provisions of the constitution aim at ensuring that there is a place preserved for women in National leadership. Article 100(a) provides that the parliament shall enact legislation to promote the representation in parliament of women. *LL.B (Moi University), LL.M (Cand), University of Dar Es Salaam), DipLaw (Ksl)

Democracy without political parties: the case of ancient Athens

AbstractPolitical parties, formal, durable and mass organizations that inform voters on public policy issues, nominate candidates for office and fight elections for the right to govern, are ubiquitous in modern representative democracies but were absent from the direct participatory democracy of ancient Athens. The paper investigates how the political institutions of Athens may explain their absence. The arguments explored include voter homogeneity; the conditions at the start of the democracy, characterized by single constituency configuration of the demos, simple majority voting and lack of organized groups; the irrelevance of holding public office for determining public policy; appointment to public posts through sortition; and voting on single-dimension issues. The paper then discusses how in the absence of parties voters became informed and how political leaders were held accountable by the courts.

Impulsar la participación de los ciudadanos como factor de legitimidad en el proyecto de la integración europea

Desde hace unas décadas se ha tratado de impulsar la democracia participativa y, en general, la participación de los ciudadanos en la vida política de la Unión, a través de diversas vías, con el fin de luchar contra la acusación de déficit democrático e incrementar la legitimidad de la Unión. Una de las vías ha sido la iniciativa ciudadana europea, que permite a los ciudadanos participar indirectamente en la formación del Derecho de la Unión, pero que no está obteniendo resultados importantes en la práctica. Otra vía que se está tratando de implementar es la de que los ciudadanos puedan influir en el nombramiento del Presidente de la Comisión Europea a través del sistema de los Spitzenkandidaten, que se empleó con relativo éxito en las elecciones de 2014 al Parlamento Europeo, pero que no es seguro que se termine implantando de forma definitiva. Se están barajando otras vías, como la de establecer una circunscripción electoral común única o la de implementar convenciones populares, pero su eficacia deberá ser valorada en los próximos años.Recibido: 21 diciembre 2018Aceptado: 10 enero 2019Publicación en línea: 30 abril 2019

INSTITUTE OF «MOBILE ELECTIONER» AS A WAY OF ELECTORAL LAW PRINCIPLES’ PROVISION ON THE ELECTIONS IN THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION: EXPERIENCE OF THE ELECTION CAMPAIGNS, YEAR 2018

In the article the new institute of electoral law, the mobile electioner (the voting of electioneer on the place of location, not living or indwelling) and the experience of its application on the elections of the President of the Russian Federation on the 18th of March 2018, additional elections of the State Duma of the Federal Assembly of Russian Federation deputies of the seventh convocation on single member constituency and elections of highest executives of the Russian Federation subjects on the single day of voting on the 9th of September 2018 are analyzed. Positive and negative aspects of this institute`s practice into election campaigns are distinguished. The conclusion about the importance of this legislative novelty is made, some ways of its perfection are proposed. The procedure of realization of active electional right by assistance of attaching the electioneer to the site on the place of location, its terms and the order of this procedure is described. The conclusion about the importance of this legal novelty for citizen`s active electoral right`s provision is made, few ways of its perfecting and correcting some detected during its application lacks are offered. The question about some features of mobile electioneer using during the holding of region election campaigns is risen.

Consequences of the Electoral System in Polish Municipalities – Pathologies and Abuses

Pathologies and abuses accompany elections and are connected with the electoral system both in its narrow and broad sense. Moreover, they stem from a human nature and a degree of democratic principles consolidation. Cohabitation is conditioned by the electoral system and, in the case of the proportional allocation of seats, it arises more often than in the majority system with single member constituencies. The phenomenon itself is not always pathological. However, such an adverse situation develops when it comes to clashes, neither substantive nor creative, between the municipal bodies and, in consequence, the interests of the local community are jeopardised. Elections at the municipal level are also accompanied by other pathologies and abuses including: coercing votes when voting by proxy, adding voters to an electoral roll, bringing residents to a polling place, paying for one’s votes, preying on the naïvety of voters which can take grotesque forms or brutalising an election campaign caused by the mediatisation of local policy. The above-mentioned phenomena were examined and presented in the paper based on the analysis of statistical data, articles from the local press and, most essentially for the discussed subject, a rich material collected thanks to the in-depth interviews conducted by the authors.

The right to vote and nomadic voter enrolment

ABSTRACT What model of voter enrolment is appropriate for states with nomadic minority populations? The present paper examines this question with reference to an equality-based, moral right to vote and considers four models that track some of the different institutional strategies that have been developed by states with transient populations. The paper shows that the right to vote is compatible neither with a model that makes permanent residence in a constituency an absolute condition for voter enrolment and so excludes nomads from the electoral process, nor with a model that enables nomadic voter enrolment but restricts the number of nomads that can enrol in a single constituency. But the right is, subject to certain caveats, consistent with a model that enables nomads to enrol in a constituency of their choice and, as well, with a model that enables nomads to enrol and vote in a distinct, non-territorial constituency.

The Rebounding of the People’s Action Party of Singapore in 2015: An Electoral Analysis of Three Hotly Contested Constituencies

The 2015 Singapore General Elections (GE) produced a puzzling outcome. Although it was predicted by analysts that the People’s Action Party (PAP) would rebound, the depth of victory by way of popular vote of 69.9 percent was confoundding. Given also that the Workers’ Party of Singapore (WP) was expected to retain Aljunied Group Representation Constituency (GRC) as well as the Single Member Constituency (SMC) of Hougang and Punggol East, it further flummoxed analysts when the WP lost Punggol East to the PAP, and WP had its margin of victory reduced in both Aljunied and Hougang. Epitomising PAP’s rebound was also the increased margin of victory in the PotongPasir SMC. Although the opposition, namely, the WP was expected to further pluralise the parliamentary system in Singapore by winning more seats in GE2015, the reverse took place in that the PAP not only rebounded from the 60.1 percent it received in GE2011, but also further entrenched its one-party dominance in governing Singapore. Based on an electoral analysis of three constituencies, Punggol East, PotongPasir and Aljunied, this article argues that these constituencies illustrate how the PAP rebounded while the WP retrogressed in GE2015. Pursuant to the electoral outcome, this article makes the case that there needs to be a re-evaluation when applying the concept of authoritarianism to Singapore’s context.

Network models and biproportional rounding for fair seat allocations in the UK elections

Systems for allocating seats in an election offer a number of socially and mathematically interesting problems. We discuss how to model the allocation process as a network flow problem, and propose a wide choice of objective functions and allocation schemes. Biproportional rounding, which is an instance of the network flow problem, is used in some European countries with multi-seat constituencies. We discuss its application to single seat constituencies and the inevitable consequence that seats are allocated to candidates with little local support. However, we show that variants can be selected, such as regional apportionment, to mitigate this problem. In particular, we introduce a parameter based family of methods, which we call balanced majority voting, that can be tuned to meet the public’s demand for local and global “fairness”. Using data from the 2010 to 2015 UK general elections, we study a variety of network models and implementations of biproportional rounding, and address conditions of existence and uniqueness.

States, Countries and Peoples: Who Should the Second Chamber Speak For?

States, Countries and Peoples: Who Should the Second Chamber Speak For?

Singapore Beyond Ethnicity: Rethinking the Group Representative Constituency Scheme

The resounding victory of the People’s Action Party (PAP) in the 2015 Singapore general elections surprised many observers. Several observers had considered the previous election, held in 2011, to be the new normal in Singapore politics, with the Workers’ Party being the first opposition party to win a Group Representative Constituency (GRC). Instead of its popular vote sliding from 60% in 2011, the PAP secured almost a 10% increase in its fortunes. Analysts have spoken about PAP’s hard work and the opposition’s failures when commenting on the ruling party’s success; this article, however, points out how Singapore’s electoral system, especially the GRC, continues to favour the ruling party and why it should be rethought. Introduced in 1988, the scheme ensures minority candidates (non-Chinese) are voted into parliament. Candidates contesting in a GRC form a team of Members of Parliament (MPs) with at least one minority candidate in each team. This article argues that the 2015 election results proves that Singaporeans no longer vote along ethnic lines, and non-Chinese MPs have comfortably led the GRCs and won in Single Member Constituencies. To be sure, the GRC scheme does new PAP candidates a disfavour: it weakens their legitimacy with voters, since they remain under the shadows of senior PAP candidates and cannot win elections on their own accord.