ARHIVELE OLTENIEI - Universitatea din Craiova

310Mihai Ghiţulescu, Cosmin Lucian GhergheIn the “First Past The Post” System (also known as “plurality singlememberdistrict system”) the first candidate (the one with the most votes) winsthe seat even if he does not have the absolute majority. It is the most used(probably because of its simplicity) of the majoritarian systems (in 47 countriesfrom all around the world, but nowhere in the Eastern Europe) and, absolutely,the second most used after the PR System 4 .The Two-Round (Runoff) System produces a winner with a majority ina second ballot, if nobody has a majority in the first one. It is the classicalsystem for the election of the Presidents by universal suffrage (i.e. the election ofRomanian President), but in some countries it is also used in the single-memberdistricts for the elections of the MPs (France is best example 5 ). AlthoughDuverger considered it, 50 years ago, considered it “an old technique” 6 , it isnowadays the third most used electoral system (22 countries from all around theworld, especially from Africa and Asia).In the next table we will present the distribution of plurality/majority andPR electoral systems across national parliaments (for the countries with bicamerallegislatures, we will consider only the lower houses) from all the continents.System Africa Americas Asia Eastern Western Oceania Middle TotalEurope EuropeEastPR 16 19 3 13 15 0 4 70FPTP 15 17 5 0 1 7 2 47TRS 8 3 6 1 1 1 2 22Source: Electoral System Design: The New International IDEA Handbook, p. 31, inhttp://www.idea.int/publications/esd/upload/ESD.We must notice that the pluralitary/majoritary system is very littlecommon in Europe. Only the United Kingdom (FPTP) and France (TRS) use itin a pure form, but many other countries include it (especially the FTP) in theirMixed (4) or Parallel (8) Systems 7 .4 Arendt Lijphart, who analysed 36 democracies (1945-1996) from all around the world,observed that 12 of them used the FPTP System. They are countries historically related to theBritish civilization. That is why Lijphart considers the FPTP as one of the essential characteristicsof the Westminster Model (see Arend Lijphart, Modele ale democraţiei. Forme de guvernare şifuncţionare în treizeci şi şase de ţări, Iaşi, Polirom, 2000, p. 143-144; 27, passim).5 In France, if no candidate has a majority after the first ballot, a second one is opened toall those who obtained more than 12,5% and the candidate with the most votes (the plurality) inthis second ballot win the seat. But, generally, there are only two candidates in the second ballotand, evidently, one of them has the majority (see A. Lijphart, op. cit., p. 144).6 The TRS had its “golden age” in Europe in the XIXth century. Most countriesabandoned it at the begining of the XXth century: Belgium (1899), Netherlands (1917),Switzerland, Germany, Italy (1919), Norway (1921) and even France, under the IVth Republic(see Maurice Duverger, Les partis politiques, Librairie Armand Colin, Paris, 1976, p. 331).7 Electoral System Design: The New International IDEA Handbook, p. 31, inhttp://www.idea.int /publications /esd/upload/ESD.