How Does the Left Lose? The Effect of PR Systems on the Right’s Representation

• In Event: It's My Party and I'll Realign If I Want To

Abstract

Electoral systems have an impact on parties and voters’ ideology as well as public policy. Previous literature argues that PR systems are more likely to benefit the left (Iversen and Soskice 2006). According to Rodden (2019), geography is the crucial driver of the right’s advantage in elections held under majoritarian rules: the concentration of left-wing voters in urban districts produces an overrepresentation of right-wing parties in legislatures elected through majoritarian systems. However, his evidence is practically confined to the US and factors other than geography are neglected. In this paper, we show that left-wing parties maximize votes and seats under PR, particularly when the average district magnitude is high, and its variance is small. We also test whether other variables such as strategic vote or malapportionment play a role in explaining these patterns by examining empirical evidence from 20 OECD countries between 1945 and 2018.

Authors

• Robert Lineira, University of Glasgow

• Pedro Riera, Carlos III University of Madrid