The origins of electoral systems have received scant attention in the literature. Looking at the history of electoral rules in the advanced world in the last century, this paper shows that the existing wide variation in electoral rules across nations can be traced to the strategic decisions that the current ruling parties, anticipating the coordinating consequences of different electoral regime...

Formal models of voting have emphasized the mean voter theorem, namely, that all parties should rationally adopt identical positions at the electoral mean. The lack of evidence for this assertion is a paradox which this article attempts to resolve by considering an electoral model that includes ‘valence’ or non-policy judgements by voters of party leaders. In a polity such as Israel, based on p...

The idea of proportionality, which compares votes cast to seats won, is a common test of fair representation. But fair representation is a relation between electoral aims and electoral outcomes. The proportionality test falsely presupposes that each voter aims to support a political party. It therefore tells us nothing about fair representation. We need to construct a deeper criterion of fair r...

In 1925 a new electoral system was introduced in Chile. This reform changed the electoral formula from a cumulative voting system to a proportional one (d ́Hondt) and established new rules about district magnitude and form of voting. It has been argued that this reform was motivated by the emergence of new parties or the expansion of the electorate. This article offers an alternative explanation...

the regional studies discipline (which considers regions as connecting links between nation-states to the grand level of the international system) studies conflict, war, crisis, cooperation and integration among the countries located in a region. to study the characteristics of the countries found in a region needs a model. the author suggests a pre-model for comparative study of regional const...