European Multi Party PR & American Two Party FPTP Electoral Systems: Built on Coalitions

The European electoral system is based on Proportional Representation (PR) with multiple parties while the American electoral system is based on the First Past The Post (also known as Single Member Plurality (SMP)) with only two parties.

Interestingly the Canadian and United Kingdom systems feature an FPTP voting system with multiple parties.

However both systems depend on coalitions to elect a government, the difference being when the coalition is formed.

In Europe you vote for the candidate or party that best represents your views and elect a legislature that represents the views of all voters, proportional to their support. The parties then have to co-operate and negotiate a government that has the support of a majority of the legislature (which reflects a majority of voters because of the Proportional Representation system). These coalition governments may be a coalition of parties on the left or right or a coalition of centre left and centre right parties. The whole system encourages co-operation amongst parties.

In the United States the party structure is made up of two, what some call “big tent parties”, one party for everyone left of centre and one for everyone right of centre, in effect two coalitions of voters. Theoretically this should result in a centre left and centre right party but obviously it does not always work that way. Although the current American political situation is not what one would call historically normal, with the Republican Party being taken over by fascists.

Interestingly, historically in Canada we had two major parties, one centre left, the Liberals and one centre right, the Progressive Conservatives (PC) until the far right took over the PC Party, even changing it’s name to the Conservative Party.

The American right of centre “big tent” party (as well as the Canadian one) has silenced the voices of the moderate and progressive right while the American “big tent” left of centre party has marginalized the social democratic left.

The Fifth Column contends that a Proportional Representation system does a better job of electing legislatures that represent the views of all voters, and governments that represent the views of a majority of voters. For non-legislature single occupant posts (such as president or governors) direct election using ranked ballot voting is preferred.

Canada Needs a Red-Orange-Green National Unity Government

At a time when the country that has been our best friend, ally, and international partner for longer than we have been a country has decided that we are now the enemy (and the country that was our and our NATO allies’ historical enemy is now their best fiend) we need to be united.

This time in our history is not the time for a snap election, a change of leadership, or for a Prime Minister to be distracted by an election campaign, especially when Justin Trudeau has just proven himself to be the leader we need.

At this time, facing this existential threat, we can certainly not depend on Pierre Poilievre and his MAGA and freedumb convoy sympathetic Conservatives to lead us against the attacks of the Trump regime to the south.

There is however a solution. The Liberal Party, New Democratic Party and Green Party must come together to form a coalition National Unity Government. Justin Trudeau can continue as Prime Minister until after the fall election without the political distraction of having to seek re-election.

In the next election the three progressive parties must pledge to not run against each other, with the candidate from the party with the most votes in the last election in each constituency being the National Unity Government candidate. The new Liberal Party leader will lead the Liberal Party campaign leaving Prime Minister Trudeau free to lead the country in this battle for our existence until a new government is elected.

This war will be continuing and I would propose the continuing National Unity Government (if the voters so choose) appoint Justin Trudeau as a special envoy to deal with the Trump regime.

The National Unity Government should also bring in electoral reform in it’s first term after re-election. Ranked Ballot Voting which essentially keeps our single member constituency system, effectively only changing the way ballots are counted, will probably be the easiest to find a consensus for.