Distinction
Though plurality (first-past-the post) is often mistaken for majority rule, they are not the same. Plurality makes the options with the most votes the winner, regardless of whether the fifty percent threshold is passed. This is equivalent to majority rule when there are only two alternatives. However, when there are more than two alternatives, it is possible for plurality to choose an alternative that has fewer than fifty percent of the votes cast in its favor.
Read more about this topic: Majority Rule
Famous quotes containing the word distinction:
“No one can doubt, that the convention for the distinction of property, and for the stability of possession, is of all circumstances the most necessary to the establishment of human society, and that after the agreement for the fixing and observing of this rule, there remains little or nothing to be done towards settling a perfect harmony and concord.”
—David Hume (1711–1776)
“A distinction of property results from that very protection which a free Government gives to unequal faculties of acquiring it.”
—James Madison (1751–1836)
“Quadruped lions are said to be savage, only when they are hungry; biped lions are rarely sulky longer than when their appetite for distinction remains unappeased.”
—Charles Dickens (1812–1870)