Particracy Forum

I propose to add a new option for the law of: "The method used to determine the number of seats each region receives in the national legislature".
Currently the three options are:
- Equal representation, regardless of region population.
- A pseudo-proportional algorithm that gives considerable advantage to smaller regions.
- A proportional algorithm that gives a very small advantage to larger regions.
I would like to add an extra option:
- The seats in the legislature are determined by proportional representation; the regions send no seats to parliament.
If a nation has this selected, the seats in parliament is determined by the percentage of votes each party receives, not the percentage of seats they receive in each region.

The problem with this is that you cannot hold, say, 37/100s of a seat. Could you further explain how this would work? Would parties have 42.1% of the seats rather than 316?

toro42 wrote:Could you further explain how this would work?

The fact that seats are determined by region brings with it two potential problems:
1. Rounding is done by region. This is a very small effect.
2. The number of seats a region gets is determined by the number of persons living in the region, not by the number of people who actually vote. This can theoretically lead to drastic effects when voter participation varies strongly from state to state. Here's an example:

Imagine you have two regions a and b, for each region there are 50 seats. There are two parties A and B. In region a 99 people vote and they all vote for A, so A wins all 50 seats, in region b only 1 person votes, and the vote is cast for B, so B wins all 50 seats. Together there are 50 seats for A and 50 seats for B. If the seats were to be determined on the national level A would have 99 seats and B 1 seat.

Something like this happened in the US presidential election of 2000, when Gore won the popular vote but Bush "won" by electoral vote.

TheTsar wrote:I would like to add an extra option:
- The seats in the legislature are determined by proportional representation; the regions send no seats to parliament.
If a nation has this selected, the seats in parliament is determined by the percentage of votes each party receives, not the percentage of seats they receive in each region.

This would probably require work on the game engine. But that is not done anymore.

mpog wrote:

TheTsar wrote:I would like to add an extra option:
- The seats in the legislature are determined by proportional representation; the regions send no seats to parliament.
If a nation has this selected, the seats in parliament is determined by the percentage of votes each party receives, not the percentage of seats they receive in each region.

This would probably require work on the game engine. But that is not done anymore.

This is correct; it is very unlikely that the changes necessary to bring this about would be implemented, since Particracy Classic is no longer being developed.

The law set on the allocation of the seats per region is actually now effectively redundant and makes no significant difference. As the old-timers here will remember, there was a time when regions had population sizes that differed very considerably, but that is no longer the case - they are now all almost the same.

I believe that it states the total percentage on the result. Can you somehow use that to determine the amount of seats.

TheTsar wrote:I believe that it states the total percentage on the result. Can you somehow use that to determine the amount of seats.

Not without a revision of the game's coding, which looks unlikely.

I think you will find, though, that in most nations the percentage of seats a party wins will bear a close correlation to the percentage of the national vote it won, and the correlation becomes stronger the more seats there are in the legislature. So if you had a legislature with the maximum number of seats (750), you would tend to get the closest correlation. On the other hand, if you had a legislature with the minimum number of seats (75 - only 15 for each region) then you would be more likely to get some more unusual results where there is less connection between the percentage of seats parties win and the national percentage of the vote they received. This will be especially so if, in a legislature with only 75 seats, there are a large number of parties.

Not without a revision of the game's coding, which looks unlikely.

I think you will find, though, that in most nations the percentage of seats a party wins will bear a close correlation to the percentage of the national vote it won, and the correlation becomes stronger the more seats there are in the legislature. So if you had a legislature with the maximum number of seats (750), you would tend to get the closest correlation. On the other hand, if you had a legislature with the minimum number of seats (75 - only 15 for each region) then you would be more likely to get some more unusual results where there is less connection between the percentage of seats parties win and the national percentage of the vote they received. This will be especially so if, in a legislature with only 75 seats, there are a large number of parties.

Well, I received 59% of the popular vote, yet I only have 35% or so seats in the legislature. We have only two parties and 325 seats in the legislature.

TheTsar wrote:

Not without a revision of the game's coding, which looks unlikely.

I think you will find, though, that in most nations the percentage of seats a party wins will bear a close correlation to the percentage of the national vote it won, and the correlation becomes stronger the more seats there are in the legislature. So if you had a legislature with the maximum number of seats (750), you would tend to get the closest correlation. On the other hand, if you had a legislature with the minimum number of seats (75 - only 15 for each region) then you would be more likely to get some more unusual results where there is less connection between the percentage of seats parties win and the national percentage of the vote they received. This will be especially so if, in a legislature with only 75 seats, there are a large number of parties.

Well, I received 59% of the popular vote, yet I only have 35% or so seats in the legislature. We have only two parties and 325 seats in the legislature.

http://classic.particracy.net/viewnews. ... sid=516448

Your last election is one of the more unusual ones I've come across! The explanation for the odd result would seem to be that voter turnout was significantly higher in some regions than others, which meant in regions with low turnout the other party could win a lot of seats without actually receiving that many votes.

Aquinas wrote:

TheTsar wrote:

Not without a revision of the game's coding, which looks unlikely.

I think you will find, though, that in most nations the percentage of seats a party wins will bear a close correlation to the percentage of the national vote it won, and the correlation becomes stronger the more seats there are in the legislature. So if you had a legislature with the maximum number of seats (750), you would tend to get the closest correlation. On the other hand, if you had a legislature with the minimum number of seats (75 - only 15 for each region) then you would be more likely to get some more unusual results where there is less connection between the percentage of seats parties win and the national percentage of the vote they received. This will be especially so if, in a legislature with only 75 seats, there are a large number of parties.

Well, I received 59% of the popular vote, yet I only have 35% or so seats in the legislature. We have only two parties and 325 seats in the legislature.

http://classic.particracy.net/viewnews. ... sid=516448

Your last election is one of the more unusual ones I've come across! The explanation for the odd result would seem to be that voter turnout was significantly higher in some regions than others, which meant in regions with low turnout the other party could win a lot of seats without actually receiving that many votes.

Very interesting election. I've noticed more of these regional turnout quirks lately. But you'll be fine Tsar, just propose lots more bills.

http://classic.particracy.net/viewnews. ... sid=516448

Your last election is one of the more unusual ones I've come across! The explanation for the odd result would seem to be that voter turnout was significantly higher in some regions than others, which meant in regions with low turnout the other party could win a lot of seats without actually receiving that many votes.

Very interesting election. I've noticed more of these regional turnout quirks lately. But you'll be fine Tsar, just propose lots more bills.

The regions that mostly voted for me are the politically informed ones, while the ones that voted for the Military Party are the politically apathetic regions. Reasoning: the regions that I won most of the vote in had high voter turnout, while the regions where the Military Party took the upper hand had extremely low turnout.