Comments by "Luredreier" (@Luredreier) on "The Dutch Reach a Coalition After 271 Days- TLDR News" video.

As long as the system of caretaker governments works and as long as the parliament is capable of passing laws on its own I don't really see much of a problem. That said, the Norwegian approach to proportionality with proportionality within the electoral circles with no lower limit for a seat being responsible for 150 of our 169 seats and then 19 leveling seats that does have a voting threshold of 4% might be worth looking at. 19 seats out of the 169 total isn't so much that it punishes smaller parties that much. But having those 19 seats up for grabs gives a bit more incentive for parties to stay together instead of splitting up into similar ones, or even in some cases merging to increase influence. While splitting up over genuine issues still doesn't cause political irrelevancy. Our system also makes it possible to benefit certain areas more than others if need be to ensure that everyone, including low population areas are heard. Every step of the way is proportional. But having just a few extra seats available just above the 4% threshold sure helps motivate people. Obviously our exact system probably wouldn't work. But it might be a good system to take inspiration from next time they look at possible electoral reforms.
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@Eikenhorst That's outright false. First of all, it's not the party leaders that propose most laws. They might get the most media attention, but in the end they're not the ones actually making the legeslative decisions. And by having so many representatives you make election results non-binary in nature. Something that's desirable in itself. Because you'll have a situation where people don't just win or lose but gain or lose relative power. Including potential parties not currently represented. As a example, in my own country Norway we just had a representative voted inngrom a new party. She had 0,2% of the votes, but she represented a community concerned because it had been decided that their hospital was to be closed down. A hospital that provided for the biggest town in their region and the surrounding areas. Closing it down would entail these people having to cross a mountain that's often unpassable in winter in order to get emergency treatment or to give birth. So this one representative represents issues that no one else in parliament can represent and that no other party represents. The fact that she got elected forced the other parties to recognize the issue and address it. Likewise while a prime minister might be in charge every single representative in a parliament holds power. And they're free to leave a party at any time if they wish. One did last period here in Norway if I don't remember wrong. Sure opposition movements within a party doesn't get as much media coverage in a proportional system since the big conflicts tends to lead to the formation of a new party there unlike first past the post systems. But conflicts still do happen. And members of parliament will force through legislation and even executive decisions that goes against the will of the leaders of their party every single term. That's democracy in action, and it's so common that it's simply not news. And it usually doesn't lead to hard feelings. Mostly just respect. Because party leaders tends to be better at outplaying people then others in the party. That's usually how they got their position in the first place.
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Oud-Netherlanders? Dutch people living abroad? Or dutch people from outside the Netherlands living inside the country? Or something else?
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@night6724 Right. Norway uses a modified Sainte-Laguë method. We used to have 19 "fylker" (regions), many of these have been merged recently, but the 19 electoral circles remains. The first step is that each eligible voter and each square km of land in each electoral circle "votes" for that electoral circle using that method. (This is behind the scenes, we voters don't have to deal with this). And the electoral circle with the most "votes" gets a seat, then in the next round they have to divide with a bigger number using the method described, so eventually seats starts being distributed to other electoral circles. The circles with the fewest seats only have 4 seats each, the ones with the most has double digit number of seats out of the 150 available for this step. I don't remember how much weight land has compared to people, but the idea is that any given rural town in a low population density area far away from the capital is less likely to be represented in our parliament any given year then a city with far more people is, so by distributing seats based on both land and people those low population density areas still has a reasonably high likelyhood of being represented any given year, meaning that there's someone in the parliament who knows how it is to live there and what problems they face, even if that means that areas with more people ends up with less representatives from their own area. Once seats are distributed among the electoral circles the actual election can take place. People vote for party lists. Lists can overlap so someone can be in two lists at the same time. And people can reorder people on the lists or add names from other lists. But changes from the original list will only be counted if a significant number of them are changed. Seats are distributed proportionally, again using the modified Sainte-Laguë method within these 19 electoral seats. So if you get 25% of the votes in a 4 seat electoral circle you'll get 25% of the seats, aka 1. If you have 10% of the votes there you'll get no seats, but in a circle with more seats you might get more representation. Since seats are distributed according to both land and population the circles with a lot of land but few people will have more valuable votes in the sense that that you'll need fewer votes there then elsewhere to get a seat for any given party. The smallest party represented in parliament this year had 0,2% of the total votes at a national level and still got a seat. They where created to ensure that eastern Finnmark keeps a ER unit and a maternity ward, do people inna emergency or giving birth don't have to cross a mountain that often is unpassable in winter in order to get to a hospital with these facilities. They managed to get enough local support to get 1 of the 5 seats in this electoral circle. The conservatives lost theirs. Of course this means that at this stage low population areas have more of a say in what parties are represented at this stage then higher population areas. So each electoral circle also has a leveling seat. But the leveling seats are not given bsed on the proportionality within each circle, but at a national level. Since the parties already have seats awarded at the previous stage any party with more seats then they should have given their national popularity won't get leveling seats. But parties who have fewer seats then they should given their number of voters st a national level will gain seats. This is usually smaller parties that got close to getting a seat in the individual electoral circles, but didn't quite make it. Although sometimes larger parties get some too. Unlike the direct seats from the individual electoral circles these 19 leveling seats do have a electoral threshold of 4% of the total electorate voting for a party in order for it to be eligible for these 19 leveling seats. Giving parties and their voters a incentive to reach that level. This means that big parties can split if there's disagreements. While smaller parties have a incentive to stay united. And voters have a reason to make an effort to vote for the small parties even if they just have a few percent of the votes. The communists had 1 seat last election, but got 5 this election, because they're above the 4% threshold. My own party had 1 last year and got 3 this year with about 3,9% of the votes. If we had over 4% we'd have at least one leveling seat awarded to us, possibly two. My party had the fewest seats pr vote of any party represented in our parliament this year.
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@Eikenhorst 10 people would be way too little for everyone to count anywhere but the lowest population locations. Perhaps it might work on Greenland or something... But that's about it...
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