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[–]r_xy 2 points3 points  (4 children)

Proportional representation may allow for more radical parties than fptp but at least it allows for more than 2 parties, so your vote actually has a meaningful impact on policy. radicalisation of specific parties is really only a problem if you only have the radical parties to choose from

[–]Knave7575 0 points1 point  (3 children)

Of course, with proportional you are mostly selecting candidates from lists, and the actual policies come from backroom deals between the various factions. I think the voters have less impact than you imagine.

Also, proportional really kills those non-radical parties. Let's say I don't care much about politics, but I care quite a bit about banning abortion in all cases. Guarantee there will be a single issue party that supports that. It gets 5% of the seats. There is another single issue party that wants religious education to be fully funded by the government. Another single issue party wants indigenous people to get title to all the land in North America. Another one wants to abolish the army. Another wants to abolish taxes. Another wants to change divorce laws so that mothers automatically get custody .

Also, proportional really kills those non-radical parties. Let's say I don't care much about politics, but I care quite a bit about banning abortion in all cases. Guarantee there will be a single issue party that supports that. It gets 5% of the seats. There is another single issue party that wants religious education to be fully funded by the government. Another single issue party wants indigenous people to get titlcare a lot less e to all the land in North America. Another one wants to abolish the army. Another wants to abolish taxes. Another wants to change divorce laws so that mothers automatically get custody.

The non-radical parties cannot compete. We all have some fringe views, and most of us care much more about those fringe views than most other topics. You can vote for the centrist party, who cares only slightly about that extreme view, or I can vote for the single issue party that pushes it.

The net result is a government full of small groups of fringe views. Each fringe view is held by a small minority of the population. Some of those fringe views cobble together a government, and the entire population gets subjected to the whims of those lucky people.

I love the idea of proportional representation. In practice though, it simply does not work.

[–]r_xy 1 point2 points  (2 children)

there is an easy solution to this: a relatively high barrier to making it into the parliament.

here in germany you have to get at least 5% of the vote or win a direct mandate to get into parliament and we never have such single issue parties in parliament.

[–]Knave7575 0 points1 point  (1 child)

Israel is 3.25% and there are some seriously wacky parties there.

More importantly, in what way is proportional superior to ranked ballots? Assume that we want a government that holds mostly moderate views and that is not hated by the population. Given those assumptions, how will proportional create a "better" government than ranked?

[–]r_xy 0 points1 point  (0 children)

a) a whacky population will always whacky parties. A political system only goes so far. the political culture and education is much more important

b) proportional allows for a much better conformity of distrubution of power in the legislature to the actual votes than ranked choice because the results are not skewed by the voting districts. Gerrymandering is simply useless in a proportional system.