Comments by "Luredreier" (@Luredreier) on "How Anti-Immigration Went Mainstream: Normalising the Sweden Democrats - TLDR News" video.
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@rupplopp My own preferred party (MDG) is the party that struggles the most with the system we have.
The party I mentioned got 1 representative into our parliament with a total of 4908 votes in total behind that representative.
My own party increased its number of seats from 1 to 3 representatives.
Being below 4% we ended up with non of the 19 leveling seats.
As a result our 110.973 votes only gave us 3 representatives or 36.991 votes pr representative.
On average you need about 17 200 votes to get a representative in Norway.
My party is among the ones that suffers the most from our system since they tend to attract urban voters.
And my vote is among the ones that counts less because of our system, since I live in the third/fourth biggest city in Norway, Trondheim (the position depends on how you define what is or isn't included in the city).
However thing of it this way.
A city or urban area has a lot more people who have similar living experiences.
In 2014 we had a population of 182 035 here in Trondheim.
That's means that it's very likely that at least someone who knows how it is to live in Trondheim is represented in our parliament in any given year.
But if every vote is of equal value you end up with a very, very long time between each time any given location in rural area is represented in parliament.
Between every time someone who knows how it is to live there, what problems they face etc is represented.
By giving rural voters more weight in our system we ensure that someone from those areas are represented anyway.
But the overal composition of our parliament is still adjusted for the overall popularity of a party by our leveling seats.
With 110 973 votes my party would have had about 6 seats if we had one seat for every 17 200 votes (the average number of votes pr seat in our parliament)
So once we get past 4% of the total votes we're going to get a lot of leveling seats.
We had 3.9%
It sucks.
But it also means that our voters have more influence.
Since each and every one of our votes matters more when we're in the area of that 4% treshold.
It's a bit like how voters in the US matters more in swing states then in red or blue states.
Except for us it's on a pr party level and it's the 4% threshold that matters.
Having that 4% threshold for our leveling seats means that parties that does make it above 4% are ensured to have a real say in our political climate since they get enough seats to be relevant in our politics.
But since you can get seats even below 4% we also have the possibility to be relevant due to the possibility of ending up with the balance of power between two parties vying prime minister position even with a single seat if the parliamentary math between the rest of the political parties adds up just right.
And even when it doesn' you might end up with balance of power in individual law proposals or even make law proposals of your own with a single representative.
So if you have a issue that matters you can push it with our system if you can mobilize enough voters.
And it's proportional at every level.
The 3 seats we did get where the 3 seats we had earned through our proportional voter share in the electoral circles where we did manage to get enough votes compared to other parties to get at least one seat.
All our 19 electoral circles are multi-member districts and proportional, with the two smallest electoral circles (in terms of seats) still having 4 seats each.
And we have 5 electoral circles that has a two digit number of seats each.
So it's not really unfair towards smaller parties in that sense.
And big parties with a broad appeal among multiple electoral circles will be well represented anyway in the various electoral circles.
So the 19 leveling seats mainly benefits smaller parties that has a broad appeal.
Small parties that's mainly popular in certain areas will get direct representation from their respective electoral circle.
Big parties will get a lot of seats *everywhere*.
And parties with less then 4% of the votes will get represented if they are popular enough in a electoral circle to make it, regardless of how small their total number of votes is.
And with the 4% threshold the parties that makes it past that point gets extra "omph" compared to other smaller parties meaning that you can get something done.
So there's a motivation to try to work issues out instead of just split up parties the moment there is a issue due to the 4% rule, and there is a motivation for people to go out and vote for parties near that limit, people who might otherwise stay at home, or vote for a bigger party, since every single vote might count a lot when you're close to that point, increasing participation.
It does lead to a little bit of tactical voting, since members of bigger parties might win more representation for their coalition pr vote by voting for a small party near that limit then for their preferred option, but since the outcome is always proportional I don't really see that as a problem, they're not forced to do this, it's a option that they have and can make a informed decision to do, and there's no real penalty for not doing so.
Most voters don't do this after all.
Yes, it does mean less power when we're below the 4% limit.
In this case my party.
But we'll get more power when we get above while we're still represented, getting our politics heard, our proposals voted on, and our votes counted.
And all the other parties know that it's just a matter of time before we will end up above the 4% limit and some other parties ends up below, so just ignoring us or pissing us off isn't a good play either.
Our system encourages a consensus, and addressing the issues of everyone.
The bigger parties doesn't have to do exactly what the smaller parties wants, but in order to push us under the 4% limit where we're relatively speaking harmless they have to adopt at least some of the policies of the factions within their own parties that's aligned with us.
So in the case of MDG, the green movement within the bigger parties like the labour party or even the conservatives (movements also represented in other parties like the liberals on the political right and the socialist left party on the left, while we are in the center.)
So yeah, I'm pretty happy with our system.
It's not perfect.
But it's pretty good.
And I think well suited for Sweden.
Perhaps it could allow the center party in Sweden to split up and focus more on farmers making them more compatible with the political left, while the capitalists in the party could merge with another right wing party or form their own themselves since they'd have a real shot for power without a lower limit for representation.
Or any number of other possible changes.
Basically I think it would make Swedish poliltics more balanced.
As for the Sweden Democrats, perhaps the extremists would leave the party and form their own smaller party where they don't have to deal with the moderating forces.
While the leadership could afford to alinate some far right voters in order to actually become a real coalition option.
And so one and so forth...
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