La riforma elettorale in Canada: la difficile ricerca di un’alternativa al “first-past-the-post system”

The electoral reform in Canada: the difficult search for an alternative to the “first-past-the-post system”

Abstract

This paper provides an overview of Canada’s electoral system and a review of past Canadian federal and provincial electoral reform initiative. The “single-member plurality system”, commonly referred to as the “first-past-the-post”, used in Canada at the federal level since Confederation, has essentially three major effects on electoral politics: it converts a minority of votes into a majority of seats, it handicaps smaller national parties by giving them a smaller share of seats than their share of the popular vote, it encourages regionalism. The performance of Canada's electoral system has been a frequent subject of discussion and examination and many reforms of the “first-past-the-post” have been considered. The case for electoral reform in Canada is compelling and the issue has been actively debated for many years both federally and provincially, but yet no reform proposals has ever been adopted.

Keywords: Canada; Electoral reform; Single-member plurality; First-past-the-post; Trudeau.