The US-based Fair Vote site makes the very valid point that some attempt at civic education needs to be done in advance of any proposals for electoral reform. It particularly concerns the actor Richard Dreyfuss who makes one or two pithy points on the subject:
“Don’t call it ‘civics’ because ‘civics’ is easily the most boring [...]
Posts under ‘Voting systems’
Celeb visualisations: Calling @stephenfry to explain voting systems
Voting systems compared
If the rumours are correct, Gordon Brown is about to announce his intention to promote a new voting system for Parliamentary elections in the UK. His choice is said to be the Alternative Vote (AV) system. It looks like the Vote For A Change campaign will get their way and there will be a referendum [...]
A few signposts off
We can learn things from the way they elect Popes – and the way they used to.
Chris Dillow reprises his ‘extremist not a fanatic’ theme – that it is rational not to care too much about politics – and that politics benefits from our indifference.
And finally ‘Reboot Britain’ will be worth keeping an eye on [...]
Empower failure
According to the Municipal Journal, the UK Government has abandoned plans to introduce a Community Empowerment Bill, which would have implemented some parts of the Communities in Control White Paper.
According to the Commons authorities, the Bill would have enabled remote voting in Council meetings, reduced the barriers to introducing an elected mayor, change the definition [...]
Benchmarking and 'empowerment' are two different things
Wonk-blogger Will Davies has an excellent post up here. Quoting the Communities in Control White Paper as follows…
We believe that the causes of political disengagement, while complex, can be distilled to a dominant factor: a sense of powerlessness on the part of most citizens that their voices are not being heard, their views not listened to, [...]
Two party systems
There’s a very good article over at Westminster Wisdom about the longevity of the US two-party system – a dominance of only two largely unchanged political parties since 1860 – “a record unmatched by any other Democracy.”
A comparison with the UK, in which the period from 1945 until the late 1960s marked a fairly rigid [...]
Proportional voting and crime
On proportional systems of voting, and how they can have a direct impact upon the way that social issues are addressed:
“Proportional representation correlates with more welfare, reduced corruption, less crime, and a host of other social benefits. The need for consensus among a number of groups with drastically different agendas forces government to be more [...]
A blog about representative democracy, social media and a conversational politics. How will peer-to-peer communications change local democracy? How is representation changing? 
