Will Canada seriously consider electoral system reform? Women and Aboriginals should.

Donley T. Studlar is Eberly Distinguished Professor of Political Science at West Virginia University. He has published extensively on Canadian topics, including gender representation in legislatures and provincial cabinets.

For some time, Canada's first-past-the-post (FPTP) electoral system has been subjected to criticism for increasing the regional distinctiveness of the party caucuses in Ottawa. In a plurality system, the one candidate with the most votes, not necessarily a majority, wins the single seat in the district. A party with a substantial vote over the country or even a region has sometimes received few parliamentary seats in return.

In contrast, proportional representation (PR), of which there are several variations, attempts to maintain a closer correspondence between the percentage of votes for a party and its seats. An increasingly popular form of PR in Western democracies is Mixed Member Proportional (MMP), a combination of the two.

Although academics and political commentators have periodically raised the electoral system question, only rarely has FPTP been seriously addressed in the political arena. For a brief time in the late 1970s and early 1980s, however, the issue did generate some political interest, but even that quickly subsided. The election results of 1993 and 1997 may resurrect political interest in electoral system reform.

A debate that hasn't happened

This article examines the history of electoral system reform in Canada and why Canadians have been reluctant to confront the issue. Other contributions to this volume explore the regional and partisan dimensions of the question. This one will consider briefly why women and Aboriginal peoples should consider alternative electoral systems.

Canada has been a persistent and recognized exception to the established relationship that FPTP will lead to a two-party system because regionally based, smaller parties have been able to sustain themselves by winning seats in the House of Commons from that region. In this century, the Progressives, Cooperative Common-wealth Federation (CCF), New Democratic Party (NDP), Social Credit, Creditistes, and, currently, the Bloc Quebecois and Reform have been successful in gaining seats in the federal House of Commons.

Progressive Party insurgency from the West into the then two-party system in the 1920s briefly led to consideration of changing the electoral system on the federal level. Two government-sponsored bills to change to the Alternative Vote, which would have required a majority vote for a party to gain a seat, did not pass second reading. A hiatus of almost a half century occurred before reform of the electoral system was again considered on the federal level. Meanwhile, the few experiments with the form of PR known as the Single Transferable Vote, notably in Western cities and provinces, were abandoned by the 1960s.

The question of changing the electoral system reached the political agenda in a brief and limited fashion in the late 1970s and early 1980s. The Conservative minority government elected in 1979 had only two MPs from Quebec, at the same time that the Parti Quebecois governed the province and was preparing to hold a referendum on sovereignty. These circumstances prompted questioning of the continued viability of FPTP in a country with such severe regional divisions. The most significant political advocate for considering a form of PR was the Pepin-Robarts Task Force on Canadian Unity, which noted that: Experience in other federations indicates that when party membership in the central parliament becomes concentrated in regional blocs it is an advance signal of eventual disintegration. The regional polarization of federal political parties corrodes federal unity. Because we see developing signs of such a situation in Canada we have come to the conclusion that electoral reform is urgent and of very high priority.

NDP leader Ed Broadbent supported a change after the 1979 elections, as did academic and political spokespersons for western Canada, then beginning to assert its own regional demands. The Liberals were returned to power with a majority government in 1980, but had no MPs from Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia despite over 20 percent of the vote in each. Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau indicated in the Speech from the Throne that he would appoint a parliamentary select committee to consider changes to the electoral system, but he let the matter drop in the absence of a consensus among the parties. The NDP, at its convention in 1981, rejected Ed Broadbent's initiative as likely to keep the Liberals in power perpetually. In short, no federal party was seriously committed to electoral reform, then--or now.

Why did interest fade in the 1980s and 1990s? A confluence of circumstances made the issue seem less than pressing. The number of parties represented in Parliament was reduced to three in the elections of '80, '84 and '88, a situation that had occurred only once in 14 previous elections since 1935. And, for the first time since 1953, there were five federal majority governments in a row ('80, '84, '88, '93 and '97).

Other factors worked against consideration of electoral system reform. The repatriation of the Canadian Constitution in 1982 improved prospects for a constitutional settlement, especially with the absence of the PQ from power between 1985 and 1994. Most importantly, the formation of two consecutive Conservative majority governments in 1984 and 1988 suggested that regionalization of the party system might be declining. Historically weak in Quebec, the Conservatives, under Quebecer Brian Mulroney, won an overwhelming legislative victory in 1984 and a substantial one in 1988, sweeping seats in both the west and Quebec in the process.

The historical opportunity of a long-term west/Quebec axis through the Conservative Party was lost, however, by the late 1980s. The precipitating events were the failure of the Meech Lake Accord and growing popular disenchantment with the government, culminating in the referendum rejection of the Charlottetown Accord and the precipitous electoral decline of the Conservatives.

In the 1988 election, the party favouring the contentious issue of free trade with the United States, the Conservatives, won a majority of seats and formed a government on the basis of a plurality of the popular vote while the two parties opposing free trade, the Liberals and NDP, together won a majority of the vote but only a minority of seats. Yet this did not ignite significant political debate over electoral system change. Instead, attempts to bring a form of PR into the Canadian system shifted toward making the appointed Senate more representative. Despite commissioning studies on electoral system reform, the MacDonald Commission on National Unity concluded in 1985 that changing the electoral system for the House of Commons would be a "second-best solution" and advocated testing the effects of PR by using it to elect a reformed Senate.

The regional problem emerged again in the 1993 federal election, although the results were somewhat masked by the election of another majority government, this one Liberal. The Conservatives, challenged in Quebec by the Bloc and in the west by Reform, effectively disintegrated as a national party and were reduced to 16 percent of the vote and two seats in the House, an incredible result considering their performances in 1984 (211 seats) and 1988 (169 seats). The New Democrats did almost as badly, with 7 percent of the vote and nine seats, all of them in the West. Reform won 19 percent of the vote and 18 percent of the legislative seats, all but one in the west, while the BQ won 72 percent of the Quebec seats (18 percent overall) with 49 percent of the Quebec vote (14 percent overall). Canada was not only left effectively with only one country-wide party, but had an Official Opposition, enjoying the perquisites of that office, which was dedicated to the breakup of the country!

Even under these circumstances, there was no ground swell for electoral system reform.

Electoral reform efforts continued to target the Senate. The Reform Party demand for a "Triple E" Senate--equal (in number of senators per province), elected (instead of appointed), and effective (rather than a tool of the majority government) --inevitably raised the question of the method of election, and the abortive Charlottetown Accord provoked discussion about electing senators by a method other than plurality vote. Yet the question was deliberately neglected in the massive research (four official volumes and 23 separately commissioned academic studies) of the Commission on Electoral Reform and Party Financing (Lortie Commission), appointed by the Conservative government in 1989 and reporting in 1991. Despite a host of studies--on lowering the voting age to 16, voting rights for prisoners, special districts for Aboriginals, etc.--the Commission refused to assess the impact of the existing electoral system and possible alternatives. In the thousands of pages produced by the Lortie Commission, a topic which would be expected to be prominent in deliberations about electoral reform is only mentioned in passing. Without any research on which to base such a conclusion, the Commission recommended that FPTP be continued.

Few instances of keeping an issue off the political agenda are more obvious--in stark contrast to New Zealand, where appointment of an Electoral Reform Commission in 1985 began a process which culminated in adoption of MMP. Canadians sceptical of the positive effects of electoral system reform argue that the consequences of reform must be highly predictable. The Lortie Commission thus represents a historic missed opportunity to analyze the potential of alternative electoral systems, especially since several of the academics employed by the Commission have done such research elsewhere.

The discrepancy between votes and seats and the increasing regionalization of parties in the federal elections of 1993 and especially 1997 have stimulated some interest, at least in journalistic and academic circles, about electoral system reform. In the 1990s, the Liberals became, as never before, the party of central Canada, Reform claimed leadership of the west, the BQ was firmly ensconced in Quebec, and only the Atlantic provinces proved to be a multiparty battleground, at least in terms of seats, in 1997.

By whatever measure is used, Canada has one of the most disproportional electoral systems among established democracies in terms of the ratio of votes to seats. Taken as a whole, these measures show recent regional polarization of party support to be at a modern peak in Canada. If the driving force for electoral system reform in FPTP systems is increasing fragmentation of electoral results, then the time should be ripe for putting the electoral system on the political agenda in Canada.

Why women and Aboriginals should look to electoral system reform Although the partisan and regional effects of FPTP are often discussed, there is less frequent consideration of how a change to a more proportional system, whatever that might be, could benefit women and other political minorities. Most advocates for these groups view electoral system reform as either too removed from their proximate grievances or standing little chance of adoption.

                   Women Legislators in Lower Houses of
                   Advanced Industrial Democracies, 1997

Electoral                 Country      % Women      Mean
System                                 Legislators


(1) Party List PR         Sweden              40.4
                          Norway              36.4
                          Finland             33.5
                          Denmark             33.5
                          Netherlands         31.3
                          Austria             26.8
                          Iceland             25.4
                          Spain               21.4
                          Switzerland         21.0
                          Luxembourg          20.0
                          Portugal            13.0
                          Belgium             12.0
                          Israel               7.5
                          Greece               6.3
                                                    23.5

(2) STV PR                Ireland             12.0
                          Malta                5.8
                                                     8.9

(3) MMP                   N.Z.                29.2
                          Germany             26.3
                          Italy               11.1
                          Japan                4.6
                                                    17.8

(4) FPTP                  Canada              20.6
                          U.K.                18.2
                          U.S.                11.7
                                                    16.8

(5) Majoritarian          Australia           15.5
                          France              10.9
                                                    13.2

All PR or Mixed (20)                          20.9
FPTP or Majoritarian (5)                            15.4

Source: Inter-Parliamentary Union Web site: http//:www.ipu.org

On a worldwide basis, there is little doubt that FPTP is an obstacle to greater legislative representation of women, as the table at left shows. A plurality system does not favor non-territorially based groups such as women. Several analyses over the past 20 years have shown the type of electoral system to be a major factor influencing the percentage of women in democratic legislatures. In MMP systems, which use both lists and single-member districts, women MPs tend disproportionately to come from the lists. While Canada is now the world leader in women's representation under FPTP, with 21 percent, women would likely do even better under a more proportional system.

Aboriginals are a much smaller group but with a greater degree of territorial concentration. Nevertheless, they are likely to benefit from a more proportional system, too. A proportional system, especially one with a relatively large number of members per district, would allow Aboriginals and other ethnic minorities the opportunity to have their own MPs without incurring controversy about designated, guaranteed seats.

There are two general problems for even serious consideration of electoral system change. The first is the disinterest of Canadian political parties in electoral system reform. Parties which do well by FPTP and consider themselves to have a reasonable chance of forming a legislative majority government in the short-to-medium term are unlikely to plump for changes in a system that gives them a relatively free hand when in government--however much they may suffer in the political wilderness when not. Canadian political culture also inhibits contemplation of electoral system reform. The elite political culture in Canada overwhelmingly has viewed FPTP as appropriate and desirable. Yet popular opinion might be willing to follow a strong lead for change. Unlike many aspects of Canadian politics, changing the electoral system opens no constitutional wounds; it can be done by simple majority vote of both houses of Parliament. But it would need a concerted push from a significant section of the political elite and substantial public support.

The position of FPTP in Canadian political culture is connected to another British-inherited penchant--preference for a strong single-party government. In Canada, this has been extended to a preference for periods of minority government rule rather than formal power-sharing coalitions. On the federal level there have been six minority governments in the post-World War II period, most recently in 1979-80. A singleparty central government, many feel, is needed to hold a divided country together. Thus, unlike elsewhere, Canadian electoral system reform proposals have very often been concerned with maintaining singleparty majority government. MMP proposals for Canada, such as Weaver's in this issue, tend to keep the number of compensatory seats relatively low.

The relentless march of Canada towards near-uniform FPTP continues. Provincial and federal governments have eliminated variations such as multi-member districts. The last redoubt of multi-member districts, Prince Edward Island, abandoned its long-time practice in the mid-1990s. A Lortie Commission recommendation for the establishment of a few federal Aboriginal districts was never implemented.

There is a dearth of formal procedures left to improve women's and Aboriginal representation under the current electoral system. There are no Aboriginal districts on the horizon, a referendum proposal for gender-equal, two-person districts in Nunavut was defeated, and the dual-member electoral districts, which allowed women to become provincial legislators in P.E.I. in greater numbers than elsewhere in the Atlantic provinces, are gone.

Adding proportional features, even if only enough to create a mixed electoral system, would increase opportunities for women and other minorities not through designated seats, but through the normal operations of the system. This would depend, however, on the size of the multi-member districts created. In general, the larger the district, the better for minorities since there is less struggle for a few prime places within each party's nomination list.

Objections to changing the electoral system in Canada usually hinge on fear of the consequences and a Micawberish hope that "something will turn up" to resolve present difficulties. Defenders of FPTP hope that the national unity question will be settled--eliminating the Bloc challenge--and that there will be a merger of Reform and the Conservatives, or a fading of the former. There is precedent for both, since the Progressives and Conservatives amalgamated and Social Credit disappeared. But the degree of regional polarization is unprecedented and neither alternative scenario appears imminent.

Since the 1920s, electoral system reform has largely been off the political agenda. Despite increasing fragmentation and regionalization of the party system, and underrepresentation of women, Aboriginals and other minorities, established political parties, buttressed by Canadian political culture, have kept FPTP in place. Since the 1997 election, there has been renewed academic and journalistic interest in electoral system reform. The question remains: will this lead Canadians to reconsider their electoral conservatism and put reform on the political agenda?