Elections
Elections serve as the central political expression and exercise of power within democratic states, and conducting elections in democracies requires the translation of the political decisions of the distributed voting public into resulting “seat” representation of the various constituencies, except in the cases of Israel and the Netherlands which each have only a single constituency. It is philosophically accepted that in a democracy, each vote is equally valid amongst all other votes and thus each eligible voter casts only one equally valued vote. However, disproportionality and bias towards specific voting groups arise in the construction of artificial constituency boundaries in that political parties and policies are unevenly and inaccurately represented in the aggregate results amongst the electoral regions when compared to the popular vote.
Read more about this topic: Electoral Geography
Famous quotes containing the word elections:
“Apparently, a democracy is a place where numerous elections are held at great cost without issues and with interchangeable candidates.”
—Gore Vidal (b. 1925)
“In my public statements I have earnestly urged that there rested upon government many responsibilities which affect the moral and spiritual welfare of our people. The participation of women in elections has produced a keener realization of the importance of these questions and has contributed to higher national ideals. Moreover, it is through them that our national ideals are ingrained in our children.”
—Herbert Hoover (1874–1964)