The workings of the single member plurality electoral system in India and the need for reform
| Date | 01 June 2019 |
| DOI | 10.1177/2057891118769166 |
| Published date | 01 June 2019 |
| Subject Matter | Research article |
Asian Journal of Comparative Politics
2019, Vol. 4(2) 141–161
The workings of the single
ª The Author(s) 2018
Article reuse guidelines:
member plurality electoral
sagepub.com/journals-permissions
DOI: 10.1177/2057891118769166
system in India and the need
journals.sagepub.com/home/acp
for reform
Rekha Diwakar
Department of Politics, University of Sussex, UK
Abstract
India uses the single member plurality system (SMPS) to elect members of the lower house of its
national (federal) parliament and the state assemblies. The electoral system has remained stable
despite its inherent disproportionality, India’s highly heterogeneous population and, more recently,
a fragmented party system. Using a comprehensive data set covering all national and some state
assembly elections during the period 1952–2017, this article evaluates how SMPS has performed in
India in comparison to its expected benefits, and whether there is a case for reform of the electoral
system. The article finds that SMPS neither provides effective representation nor is likely to lead to
stable single party governments in India – a situation that could be termed ‘the worst of both
worlds’. It also highlights that a combination of rational-choice behaviour on the part of key actors
as well as historical and institutional reasons has ensured the continuation of SMPS in India. The
article concludes that it is time for India to seriously consider reforming its electoral system.
Keywords
disproportionality, electoral reform, electoral system, India, single member plurality electoral
system
Introduction
India uses single member plurality system (SMPS) to elect members of the lower house of its
national parliament and the state assemblies. Under SMPS, elections are conducted for separate
geographical areas, known as constituencies or districts, and the electors cast one vote each for
their preferred candidate, with the winner being the candidate who gets the plurality of votes.1
SMPS is traditionally defended primarily on the grounds of simplicity and its tendency to produce
Corresponding author:
Rekha Diwakar, Department of Politics, University of Sussex, Falmer, Brighton, BN1 9RH, UK.
Email: r.diwakar@sussex.ac.uk
142
Asian Journal of Comparative Politics 4(2)
winning candidates, which provides a direct link between constituents and their representatives. It
tends to provide a clear-cut choice for voters between two main parties, and is expected to give rise
to single party rather than coalition governments. It also has the benefit of excluding extremist
parties from gaining representation, unless their support is geographically concentrated.
However, SMPS has been criticised because it can lead to a substantial disproportionality
between the share of the votes cast for each party and its share of seats. According to Lijphart
(1994), majoritarian electoral systems such as SMPS make it difficult for small parties to gain
representation because they need to win majorities or pluralities of the vote in electoral districts;
and these electoral systems also tend to systematically favour larger parties, produce dispropor-
tional election outcomes and discourage multipartism. As Shugart (2008: 8) points out:
Despite its long historical pedigree and its continuing widespread use, it is a system that academic
specialists in electoral systems rate as one of the least desirable systems (Bowler and Farrell, 2006), and
it also does not fare well in competition with other electoral systems when new democracies are
choosing their method of electing representatives.
SMPS can also exclude minorities from fair representation, and encourage the development of
parties based on clan, ethnicity or region. Further, it leaves a large number of wasted votes, which
do not count towards the election of the winning candidate in a constituency.
SMPS was adopted in India when the country held its first democratic elections in 1952 (except
for few multi-member constituencies in 1952 and 1957 elections), and has remained stable since.
SMPS usually works best when the two largest parties share most of the votes across different
regions of a country. However, since 1989, the Indian party system has fragmented, and in the
seven national elections held during the period 1989 to 2009, SMPS failed to produce a single party
majority government at the centre, leading to a phase of large (comprising many parties), and for
the most part unstable, coalition governments. Although the most recent national election held in
2014 produced a majority for one party – the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) – this does not mark a
clear reversal of coalition politics or governments in India (Diwakar, 2014: 124). The efficacy of
SMPS in India has not been sufficiently debated either in academic studies or in a policy context.
Most prominent comparative studies on electoral system reform also exclude India from their
analysis (for example, Blais, 2008).
This article seeks to address the question about the suitability of SMPS during an era of party
fragmentation and coalition politics in India. Drawing on a comprehensive data set covering all 16
national elections held during 1952–2014, and some recent state assembly elections held during
2015–2017, it evaluates how SMPS has performed against its stated benefits. Based on this
evaluation, the article discusses whether there is a case for electoral system reform, and highlights
the reasons for the continuance of SMPS in India despite its many shortcomings.
Choosing an electoral system
By converting votes cast by the electorate into seats, an electoral system effectively determines
which candidates are elected, and which party gains power. As International IDEA (2005: 1) point
out, the electoral system ‘has a profound effect on the future political life of the country concerned,
and electoral systems, once chosen, often remain fairly constant as political interests solidify around
and respond to the incentives presented by them’. According to Lijphart (1994: 57), the two main
political consequences of electoral systems include their effects on the proportionality (between
Diwakar
143
share of votes and seats) or disproportionality of the electoral outcomes, and their effects on the party
system, particularly the degree of multipartism and the tendency to generate majority victories.
The main objective of the electoral system is to provide representation to the electorate. The
electoral system should also facilitate formation of a stable government which is able to enact
legislation efficiently, and allow voters to hold government to account either by altering the
coalition of parties in power or by throwing out a single party which has failed to deliver (Inter-
national IDEA, 2005: 12). The nature and the size of party system, as well as the internal cohesion
and discipline of parties, are also influenced by the type of electoral system chosen. If an electoral
system is not considered fair, and provides limited opportunities for the opposition to win, it can
lead to political unrest, and even extremism, where parties or social groups decide to work outside
the system, using non-democratic means.
Designing an electoral system involves making a choice between two main trade-offs:
between the representativeness of the legislature and government accountability; and the
accountability of individual politicians and party cohesion (Hix et al., 2010). One view is that
elections should produce a representative parliament, where party vote-share translates directly
into party seat-share. According to this view, elections are best held under some form of propor-
tional representation (PR). On the other hand, there is a contrasting view that favours electoral
systems such as the SMPS that deliver an accountable single party government and facilitate
giving a majority to whichever party comes first in terms of seats. It is difficult to achieve both of
these objectives through a single electoral system. Similarly, it is difficult for the electoral
system to produce both accountable politicians as well as cohesive parties which are able to
deliver on their electoral promises (Hix et al., 2010) .
Shugart (2008: 54) states that a paradox of reform in parliamentary SMPS is that it must be
initiated by the very party that was advantaged by the existing system – the party with the most
seats in parliament. And therefore, the likelihood of electoral system reform being implemented is
relatively low. Hix et al. (2010) remind us that there is no such thing as a perfect electoral system,
since features which are virtues to some observers could be viewed as defects by others. Choosing
an electoral system is ultimately a political decision, and the consideration of electoral benefits is
always an important, if not the only, factor in the choice of electoral systems.
Why did India choose SMPS?
India’s parliamentary form of government and SMPS are a legacy of British colonialism, which
ended with India’s independence in 1947. The British introduced self-government to India in
stages, and it was not until the end of colonial rule in 1947 and the adoption of the Indian
Constitution in 1949 by a Constituent Assembly, that universal suffrage was achieved.2,3 India’s
choice of electoral system was influenced by the twin pressures of continuing with the SMPS with
which it had some experience during the British rule, and moving towards PR to ensure adequate
representation of its highly heterogeneous population. For a new country that was experimenting
with democracy despite...
To continue reading
Request your trial