candidates for office, or for policy alternatives, in every social system ever
experienced. The recorded history of voting goes back, at least, to the Greek
polis. The modern word for the study of voting behaviour, psephology,
derives from the classical Greek ‘psephos’, the piece of pottery on which
certain votes, mainly about the banishment of those seen as dangerous to the
state, were inscribed. Voting is no more than the voicing of individual
opinions—the problems arise in counting the votes (seevoting systems),
and in deciding for whom, or for what alternative, the votes have been cast.
When the voting is in an election to choose a candidate among others, the
most important requisites are the secret and individual ballots, which allow the
impartial measurement of opinion. The use of these is actually quite recent, at
least in their fullest form; the secret ballot was not used for parliamentary
elections in the United Kingdom until the late 19th century. Allowing
candidates to put party labels on the ballot slips, the minimum necessary to
avoid wasted votes, did not happen until the late 1960s.
The vote has been restricted, throughout history, for a variety of reasons.
Probably the most common qualification, in national politics, has been a
wealth or property qualification. Since the late 19th century there has been
a series of developments on thefranchise, each slightly extending voting
rights, firstly among men and later to women. The typical modern standard in
the late 20th century is that all citizens over the age of 18 should be allowed to
vote.
Voting Systems
There are two broad families of voting systems used in modern democracies.
Historically the earliest is that called the simple plurality or, more colloquially,
the ‘first-past-the-post’ system. Here the candidate with more votes than any
other is elected, and elections are carried out in a series of single-member
constituencies. This method is used in the United Kingdom, the USA, Canada
and in many non-governmental contexts world-wide. It is not only possible,
but very common, for a candidate, or an entire government, to be elected
without gaining a majority of the votes cast, because the combined votes of
two or more opposing candidates, or parties, total more than those for the one
elected. In fact no British government has been formed having received a
majority of the votes cast in a general election since 1935; however, most of
these governments held a majority, sometimes large, of seats in the House of
Commons.
A modification of simple plurality, thesecond ballotsystem, is used in
France. A candidate is only declared elected on the first ballot if they receive a
majority of votes cast (that is, 50% + 1). In constituencies where this does not
occur (in practice, about two-thirds of all constituencies) a second ballot is held
Voting Systems