Talk:Proportional representation/Archive 2

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Lead

Hi Balcoder and 87.79.167.96. I am keeping some of what you suggested, but reverting some of it. Let me explain, and hopefully we can come to an agreement.

Balcoder, I can see why you reverted the Lead section based on an older version. However, you went back several versions to do that, which seems to me a bit dangerous because you can end up missing some intermediate edits, which is what happened with the last section. This is why I undid your reversion, so that we could take it from there.

Contributor "87.79.167.96" had done two things. One is that he/she had moved the titles down a bit. I like that idea, because otherwise the lead is unusually long, and the division that "87.79.167.96" proposes between the Lead and the rest strikes me as quite logical. I would suggest keeping the titles, the way he/she has suggested we do. Could you agree to that?

However, "87.79.167.96," you made another change, which was to remove what is now paragraph 2 (I have put it back). You offered as an explanation that this "paragraph makes invalid claims not applicable to PR systems in general." While I did not write this paragraph myself, I was pleased to see it there, because it makes a very important point, which helps us to understand a fundamental condition that needs to be filled in other to have proportionality - namely the need for multi-member districts of some sort. Indeed, with only one winner in a single-member riding, the only way to get proportionality would be if 100% of the voters supported the winning candidate. The likelihood of that is so low as to not be worth mentioning. To my mind, the logic of the paragraph is irrefutable. Plus, it is backed up by a reliable reference. For these reasons, I really don't think it should be removed. If I am wrong about that, and the reference is also wrong, perhaps you could explain why before removing it again, OK?Reallavergne (talk) 01:53, 23 August 2014 (UTC)

(BTW, WP:TALKNEW says you should add new topics at the bottom. Also, it can't be a good idea to put updates in the middle because people are unlikely to find them (WP:INTERSPERSE). Those threads concern old problems and you are talking about new ones. Nor IMHO should you re-name old section headings (like "Divisions")", add a new section at the bottom).
You are right, I should have undone 87.79.167.96 edits separately (they are both wrong). But I panicked, the article seemed to be slipping ever faster into chaos. 87.79.167.96's heading is better but it shouldn't be there at all.
But if with "intermediate edits" you are referring to your own edits, I don't think I reverted anything of yours - my edit comment was wrong. I think I just took the latest text and put it all back into the lead.
In my comment for the revert I referred you to WP:LEAD but you don't seem to have read it. Just read the intro (would that we could all write so clearly). "The lead should be able to stand alone as a concise overview" and "summarize the most important points". That means everything in my lead should stand. Sure it's longish, but you can't seriously think that the various types of PR do not need to be summarized in the lead, or PR use in the world. The operative word here is "summarized": most of what you added to the Mixed-member bullet should be in the article body, not in the lead. Everything about MMM/Parallel should not be mentioned at all in the lead - it is not a PR system - I left a mention of it in just to point out (to you, because you added MMM earlier) that it is semi-proportional, but you have again suppressed this not unimportant info. You write "which combine single-seat voting districts and multi-member representation at the regional or national regional level" (I assume the second "regional" is just a mistake). If the crucial word "compensatory", which you have unaccountably dropped, were inserted before "multi-member", a sentence about MMP added, since it is the best known variant, and a mention that it is also called Additional Member System - I got those details wrong - but you can't just suppress AMS, that would be all that is really necessary. Put the details (less the verbiage) in the body. BalCoder (talk) 13:22, 23 August 2014 (UTC)

OK, Balcoder. I made a couple of quick edits in response to your comments for now, then tomorrow or Monday, I will follow your suggestions to keep more of the material in the Lead but move some of the extra material down. One good thing about that approach is that it will help to beef up the MMP section in the body, which is much too thin as it currently stands. I would not leave out MMM altogether, but for clarity will refer to it as semi-proportional. It is definitely a mixed system, but of course it is less proportional than other options. I explained elsewhere why I think mentioning AMS just confuses things, but I can bring it back into the body to keep the peace. I would also like to move the paragraph about sortition out of the Lead, because it is not currently covered in the body (so by rights it should not be in the Lead). These various changes will shorten the Lead quite a bit. I left out the word "compensatory" not because it was wrong, but because its meaning taken in isolation might not be clear to the uninitiated - I used other words instead, but can try to work it back in if you think it is important. Thanks for the advice. Reallavergne (talk) 02:27, 24 August 2014 (UTC)

Good, progress. I said MMM should not be in the lead, but of course it should be in the body (because it is so closely related to MMP). "It is definitely a mixed system": sure, but the bullet should not say "Mixed-member systems" but more properly "Two-tier compensatory systems" (which I got from the NZ Election commission site) which would rule MMM out (there is a separate WP article for semi-PR). AMS: all you need is "also called Additional Member System" plus a source (e.g.Electoral Reform Soc.) - this contradicts the WP AMS article, which misled me, but it's sourced, so that's ok. Sortition: The 1st sentence has to stay - it is the only way to get perfect PR of all and any divisions and the article is about PR not PR voting systems (for this reason I was careful to put "electoral systems" in the very first line and not "voting systems"); the rest can go in the body, but IMHO it's simpler to leave it all in the lead. "Compensatory": sure but there you are complaining about the length. All you need is "to provide compensatory proportionality" which is what I had in the first place. Perhaps "compensating" would be better.
I'm only a casual Wikipedean but I will presume to give you some advice. You write "I made a couple of quick edits": One of the best bits of advice I found here was WP:There is no deadline, there is no need to do anything quickly. Related to that is Help:Show preview to reduce the no.of changes and so not to "clog up the page history", something which you are doing. If you are doing a big edit save the text to your PC (that might not be possible if you use the Visual editor, I don't know), and come back the next day and review it, repeat as necessary until it is ok, only then save it to WP. Use your Sandbox. Another good piece of advice, also on the WP:Plain and simple page, is "Undo others' edits with care" which I will interpret to also mean "rewrite others' edits with care". I would have thought this was obvious, respect other edits, don't unnecessarily change someone else's work. For example, when I rewrote the article, I took over the sentence "If 30% of the electorate support.." in the very 1st para.from the previous version. I didn't much like "roughly", "about" would have been better, but I kept it because there was no good reason to change it. It's ok. But you have made dozens (and I mean dozens) of unnecessary changes to my work, often damagingly. For example, in the Sortition paragraph I wrote "A further method approaches perfect proportionality...". For no obvious reason you deleted "perfect" so that the phrase is now nonsense. The point that sortition can produce ("can produce" would be better than "approaches") perfect proportionality has been lost. I wrote "There are three distinct types of PR voting systems" which you changed to "PR voting systems can be categorized as follows into three main types". That was necessary? Ok "distinct" could be deleted (and not "As follows"? and there are several of those), but the change is completely unnecessary. The heading "Link between constituent and representative", which comes from IDEA 2005, is now "Opportunities for voters to consult with representatives". "in a representative democracy the representatives should be representative", one of my better phrases, and which usefully makes readers think about the meaning of the word, is now "in a representative democracy the representatives should represent all segments of society" - dullsville. As I say, there are dozens of these, and almost all more verbose. See WP:Plain English. Please don't try to explain any of this, there's no point.
You may not have seen my Talk points at the bottom of the page. BalCoder (talk) 14:02, 24 August 2014 (UTC)
Hi again. Sorry for the delay. I have been in a conference for several days. I do want to get going on this a bit this afternoon though, before it gets stale. Thank you for your advice. You have obviously spent more time reading WP protocol and advice to editors than I have. I have a lot of experience as a writer and editor, so I am somewhat of the "when all else fails, read the manual" lesson that my Father taught me ;-). I do like to make my edits in bite-size portions, for a number of good reasons that are not inconsistent with WP:There is no deadline. For one thing, I think it makes it easier for other editors to see what changes have been made, rather than seeing a whole new paragraph at a time. But anyway, let us agree to disagree to some extent on this point. I recognize that clogging up the History page is not a good thing either, and that I need to use the Preview page more. I did that the last time and worked on the article a whole day before saving. It was scary as I was afraid of losing my changes, but it did achieve the purpose to which you refer.
I gather now that you were the main author of this WP entry, so I can appreciate how you would be unhappy about someone making many changes as I have done. But the reason that I chose to work on this page was that I felt it needed a lot of work (again, let us please agree to disagree). And yes, I was bold in my edits, as WP invites us to do. Clearly though, in the current setting, there is a danger of us getting into an edition war, and I greatly appreciate that we are addressing some things in this way instead! I will carefully read and consider all of your comments, and if I disagree with something, I had better explain that rather than just making the change and expecting that you will be OK with it. On with it then. I will start with the Lead.Reallavergne (talk) 16:53, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
Me again. I have now revised the Lead section, as explained in the summary of edits. In addition to my small edits of the first paragraph that I've explained in a separate Talk heading, I have woven the "Definitions" and "Prevalence" subsections of this WP entry back into the Lead, removed the headings, shortened the text to keep just the essentials, and moved the rest into the relevant parts of the body. The result is a lead of reasonable length and appropriate content. As noted in my edit summary, the body will need a bit of editing later, but I will have to put this down for a few days due to other obligations. I will come back to it next week.
Edits that might benefit from a bit of explanation or comment are the following.
  • For the bullet on party list systems, the first sentence used to refer specifically to “closed lists,” while open lists were identified as a variant. I have adjusted this so that the definition can cover both closed and open lists, and mentioned closed and open lists subsequently.
  • For the bullet on STV, important defining features of STV include the use of multi-member districts and voting for particular individuals (rather than by party), so I made sure to include that in the first sentence. I’ve checked some other definitions, including the one provided in the WP STV entry and the one in the ACE Project Electoral Knowledge Network, and see that both of those mention multi-member districts, but do not bother to emphasize that it involves voting for particular individuals. So the latter might be considered unnecessary. However, I see its particular usefulness when it is put forward immediately after a definition of the party list system, which involves voting by party.
  • For the bullet on mixed systems, I used the same heading as in the body (mixed systems, rather than mixed-member systems). I don’t think it matters. People inevitably categorize things a bit differently. My preference for mixed-member systems was based on its use in a specialized book on this topic: Mixed-Member Electoral Systems: The Best of Both Worlds.” Worth noting is that some sources include only party-list and STV as PR systems, while others include mixed systems as well. Writing from a Canadian perspective, where both MMP and STV are put forward as the most likely or appropriate PR systems for Canada, I strongly recommend including mixed systems. However, the text has to be clear that these are “mixed” systems, and for the MMM variant (parallel voting), the expression semi-proportional should be used. Note that MMP does not necessarily have to be any less proportional than STV or even party lists systems, depending on other features of the systems in question. An MMP system using relatively large multi-member districts would be more proportional than STV or party list systems using smaller districts (even a party list system could be done by province or by region, in theory). So I suggest including mixed systems, but being clear about the implications for proportionality.
  • I have kept a sentence on sortition in the lead, as discussed with Balcoder. Personally, I think it is a bit of a distraction, but it is an interesting addition, and it seems a fair compromise to leave just the one sentence in the Lead, while moving the rest to the Body.
  • In the body, I’ve now ordered the various systems, including sortation, in the same order as the are in the Lead.
  • For the geographical information by country, I found a more up to date reference, so have used that instead of the 2005 IDEA Handbook. In terms of what to include in the Lead section, I limited things to the big overview data and moved the rest into the body. When moving some of the geographical information to the body, I’ve added a new title, “Prevalence of PR systems in the world today. For the share of population covered by single-district vs PR systems, I had to retain the 2005 IDEA Handbook reference because I could not find more recent data. This is not as elegant a solution as it could be, but it probably doesn’t matter too much, because no really big countries have changed system since 2005 as far as I am aware. The only major change that I could find is the case of Russia (which went from an MMM or parallel system to a party list system in 2007/08) and this change has no effect on the number cited. The other difference between the two sources is that the more up-to-date sources covers more countries, but the new countries are all small ones, and I don’t think that would affect the results very much. Still, it would be great to find a more up-to-date source, of course. I’ve mentioned this in the footnote and have written to the Ace Project folks to see if they can give me more recent data by population.”Reallavergne (talk) 16:38, 27 August 2014 (UTC)


"important defining features of STV include the use of multi-member districts". This has already been discussed in the 2nd para as a defining feature of ALL PR systems so is redundant here.
"and voting for particular individuals (rather than by party)". I wrote "Single transferable vote (STV), where voters rank candidates in order of preference." There is not the slightest reason to change any of that (except the "where" perhaps).
I agree that emphasizing multi-member districts is redundant, but redundancy sometimes has its advantages. Here, the comparison is with list systems, which normally use national lists or at most provincial lists. STV in comparison might use smaller regions (as in the case of the proposal submitted to voters in British Colombia). In the article, the words I used were "multi-member constituencies" which is very general, but does the job. I would favour keeping those words just to emphasize the point about the multi-member nature of the ridings, whatever they are.
Regarding your wording "where voters rank candidates in order of preference," I have not changed it, and see no reason to do so. We agree on that. I just used different wording in my explanation to you.Reallavergne (talk) 22:30, 4 September 2014 (UTC)
"My preference for mixed-member systems...": your preferences are irrelevant. You don't seem able to grasp this point, but it is essential to Wikipedia: WP:NPOV - "This policy is nonnegotiable".
I mentioned my preference in a Canadian setting because you thought that maybe I was biased for MMP instead of STV, and I wanted to clarify that this was not the case. I TOTALLY subscribe to NPOV, but by knowing my preferences, you might be able to help me spot any unintentional biases that need to be remedied.Reallavergne (talk) 22:30, 4 September 2014 (UTC)
"some sources include only party-list and STV as PR systems, while others include mixed systems as well". Both are correct. There are, after all, only two PR methods: list and STV. But there are three PR voting systems, which is what the bullet list is about. The two sources mentioned say three, so there is no more to be said. Canada and your own ideas are completely irrelevant. Just the facts.
Classifications systems are not "facts." They are a way of organizing reality, and different people organize things differently depending on context and need. I think it is good to be humble and to recognize that. Canada is not irrelevant, because it is a real country, where most analysts consider it useful to consider MMP a form of PR. I expect Germany would also call its system proportional. However, there are other ways of cutting it, where mixed-systems are treated as a separate category. In deciding which sources and which classification system, one has to make some judgement calls, and that should be recognized. For a source that classifies things a bit differently than this WP entry does, see the Electoral Systems section of the Ace Project.Reallavergne (talk) 22:30, 4 September 2014 (UTC)
Mixed member systems. The sources say that MMM is semi-proportional (and I doubt that Shugart & Wattenberg say different) but you put it on equal footing with MMP. That is underhand. That is bias. You may think you are not proselytising for MMP or MMM but you obviously are: "My preference for mixed-member systems".
I don't find that you are being respectful here. Let us please try to avoid accusations such as the above and assume that we are working in good faith. In fact, neither MMP or MMM are purely proportional. Even under MMP, the level of proportionality can be modest or only moderate if the regions are small and the number of list seats is small. At the other extreme is the German model, with a high level of proportionality. Even STV could be less than fully proportionate depending on the size of the districts choses. MMM could in theory be quite proportional if the number of list seats was large relative to the number of single-member seats. However, you are totally right: all else being equal, MMP is more proportional than MMM. The two approaches are in this respect not equivalent and this needs to be said. I thought that this could be made as clear as possible in the body of the text, and was planning to return to that in due course. Looking at the body now, I find it is OK, but maybe it can be clarified. For now, I have added a couple of sentences in the Lead that should address your concern.Reallavergne (talk) 22:30, 4 September 2014 (UTC)
Sortition. You have so misshapen the paragraph that is is borderline garbage. "Personally, I think it is a bit of a distraction," It is the ONLY method of obtaining perfect PR of all possible divisions. So it has to be mentioned. "it seems a fair compromise": it's not fair at all. Why shouldn't all methods have the same space? "In the body, I’ve now ordered...", but you overlook that sortition is not a voting system. I don't think it need be in the body. The STV text in the body is so poor it would be better to just have a "Main article" link and no text. Same with sortition.
I was not aware of having misshapen the material on sortition. In fact, I changed very little, it seems to me. My understanding is that the material in the Lead should be a summary of the key ideas in the body. In another exchange, you insisted that at least the first sentence on sortition should be left in the Lead, so I left it there, and then introduced Sortition as a section in the body too (there was none). It seems to me that a subject should not be included only in the Lead. I am not opposed to having something on sortition. As you point out, it is not a voting system, which is why I called it a "Non-electoral approach." I am afraid I do not understand the source of your dissatisfaction on this point.Reallavergne (talk) 22:30, 4 September 2014 (UTC)
Use of PR. In my summary readers, after learning about the three voting systems in the bullet list, could learn how widespread use of each was in the world. Some might have seen a certain logic in that arrangement. With your changes, readers only get the overall PR figure - less interesting - and single-winner elections - not at all interesting. And a sentence explaining the statistics - how you can think that belongs in the lead baffles me. "A running tabulation of electoral systems in 234 countries (retrieved on 26 August 2014)" is all uninteresting, just the ref.is sufficient. Readers can see the date and draw their own conclusions. As you say, the differences between 2005 and "A running tabulation" is unimportant, especially in the lead.
I do think it is important to be precise about the data base one is using. However, I do agree with you that providing some information in the Lead on the various PR (or semi-PR) systems in use would be a useful addition. I've added a simple sentence to that effect, leaving your longer sentence about STV for the body though (one needs to keep something for the body, so that the Lead and the body are not identical).Reallavergne (talk) 22:30, 4 September 2014 (UTC)
Other changes you said you would bring back are left out: AMS, "compensatory". You are not amenable to argument. You rampage through other peoples work, blithely oblivious of the damage you are doing. BalCoder (talk) 09:35, 1 September 2014 (UTC)
I heard you earlier about AMS, and will try to work something into the body. I have not forgotten. I don't have a problem putting the word compensatory into the Lead, but had forgotten to do so. I have done so now.Reallavergne (talk) 22:30, 4 September 2014 (UTC)

Dear Reallavergne, some answers to points you raised above on Sep.4:

  • "list systems, which normally use national lists or at most provincial lists". Quite wrong, open-list elections are almost certainly going to use smaller districts simply because the ballot paper would otherwise be too long. Denmark, for example, uses open lists and 11-member districts. How this justifies re-mentioning multi-member districts I don't understand.
Good point about open-list systems. I see that the text in the Lead is not problematic in this regard, so no edit is needed. Regarding the definition of STV, where you consider the words "multi-member districts" to be redundant, I agreed with you on that, but noted that other definitions do include reference to "multi-member districts." I indicated why I preferred to keep the reference in, but if you feel strongly that these words need to be removed, you can do so, and I promise not to revert this change. I am a fan of redundancy when it helps to emphasize a point, but it's not that important one way or another.Reallavergne (talk) 17:24, 12 September 2014 (UTC)
  • NPOV. Everywhere you add a mention of MMP you demonstrate your bias. The sentence "However, under normal circumstances, MMP..." is unnecessary, the text already says MMP rules have to be "rigged" to pervert proportionality. "However, the trend in the twenty-first century..." is correct but it should be in the Mixed Systems section, it is not an Advantage of PR. That whole paragraph is a dreadful nonsense (I don't choose those words frivolously). "This is one of the reasons that mixed-member systems have become a popular...". That is not "neutral". "Mixed-member systems involving modest-sized..." is, I think, your own idea. Is there an example to illustrate this? Is there a source? If not it shouldn't be there. I doubt your Shugart book says that.
  • The sentence "However, under normal circumstances..." is from the section on gerrymandering. What I was trying to avoid was the danger of drawing general conclusions from a single example. The sentence that I added was a quick fix at the time. However, there are some general things that can be said. The reason that special reference is needed to mixed systems is that mixed systems work differently from party-list or STV systems with regard to the potential for gerrymandering, because gerrymandering can influence the results for local districts. If the regional districts are small, or if the number of regional seats is small, then gerrymandering will be possible. The same problem would exist under MMM and is more serious under MMM because of the lack of a compensatory mechanism. The existing text refers to "rigging." I am not sure what this alludes to but it could involve the sort of collusion that happened at one time in Italy where different but allied parties would contest the local and regional seats, thus undermining the compensatory intent of MMP. All this needs to be clarified and explained better and I have now tried to do that. I've also added a link to the WP entry on MMP, which includes a section on collusion. Have a look and see what you think.Reallavergne (talk) 17:24, 12 September 2014 (UTC)
  • "However, the trend...". The paragraph about meaningful comparisons is meant as an introduction to the material that follows. It is not intended to express an advantage of PR or of MMP. In order to avoid any confusion, I opted to move that paragraph up into the Lead. It makes sense to include it there, since its purpose is to introduce some of what follows. I see that you describe this paragraph as "dreadful nonsense." This leaves me befuddled, and I don't know what to do with that. The fact is that people who are learning about PR are primarily interested in knowing not just how it works, but how it compares to other systems. The question "compared to what?" is thus extremely important, and in my experience, people find it very useful to be made aware of the different types of comparisons that can be made. Perhaps you can make the point more clearly than I have.Reallavergne (talk) 17:24, 12 September 2014 (UTC)
  • "This is one of the reasons..." This point is raised under Issues, and is well established. I only had one reference from Canada, but have now added Shugart, who refers to the German and New Zealand cases as well (see p. 6 in the Intro chapter). The additional point to be made is that voters actually have an additional choice under Mixed-member systems, since they also can refer to their regional representative should they choose to do so. This is common sense, and the point is routinely made in Canada. I don't have time to search for a reference right now, but that is not a reason to remove this point which is an important one to make. It is in fact similar to what is said in the next sentence for STV.Reallavergne (talk) 17:24, 12 September 2014 (UTC)
  • "Canada and your own ideas are completely irrelevant. Just the facts." Perhaps we are talking at cross purposes here. By "Just the facts" I mean just what reliable sources say. The classification is taken from the cited sources. Of course others may see it differently. You can include them too, but that would make the lead unnecessarily complicated. Canada is no more relevant or irrelevant than any other country, the fact that Canada is (I assume) having a referendum on PR is what is completely irrelevant to the article.
I agree that we need to use reliable sources. No, there is no referendum process underway in Canada.Reallavergne (talk) 17:24, 12 September 2014 (UTC)
  • "one has to make some judgement calls". Not really, you can't leave out solidly supported facts. If you have a source that says something different you have to ADD that and say: Something is X and Y, others claim Z.
One always has to use judgement because one has to choose what to include or to exclude. It is not possible to include everything that was ever written. However, I think your point is that one should not be biased in presenting solidly supported material. I agree. I would add that facts and examples have to be set in context. For example, one should not allow one example to give the impression that the example is the rule. Facts and examples should be used to support more general statements.Reallavergne (talk) 17:24, 12 September 2014 (UTC)
  • "Mixed systems". Theoretical possibilities that MMM can be PR, or MMP not be PR, are most certainly inappropriate in the lead, which is required to be a concise summary. The German model is not an extreme, it IS the model - describe that in the lead. Perhaps to you, because of the name, "Mixed systems" includes MMM, but to me, in the context of the PR article, it doesn't, it means simply "hybrid" - for this reason, as I have already said, it would be better to talk of "Two tier compensatory systems" rather than "Mixed systems". As it stands the uninitiated (your word) are not going to find elucidation here.
As we've seen, there are different ways to slice things. If we think that most readers want to know how PR differs from plurality/majoritarian systems, then a taxonomy that covers the three main categories used in the current article is probably the most useful one we could use. Yes, one could exclude MMM on the grounds that it is only semi-proportional, but a case can equally be made for including it. If we exclude it, we should explain why. Or, we include it, but explain how it's different. I remain a bit uncomfortable with the assertion that "There are three main types of PR voting systems," as though this was a "fact." A taxomony is not a fact, and it is really the editors' choice to use one taxonomy rather than another one. So it's tricky. We don't want to confuse readers by getting into the complexities of choosing one taxonomy over another, but we should not be pretending that there is only one way of doing it either. When I went back to your August 2 changes, I see that what the text said before was: "Most systems can be classified as variants of the following categories," which in my view is much better. I will change it back to that. Another issue is what terminology to use. MMP and MMM seem to me to represent the most common usage out there, although parallel voting is also used a lot instead of MMM. We could discuss this further, of course, but I feel we are encountering diminishing returns on this one.Reallavergne (talk) 17:24, 12 September 2014 (UTC)
  • Sortition. You included this in the body as a sub section of "PR voting systems", which it ain't, that is what I was referring to. In a perfect world the lead should reflect the body, but the body being in such a poor state there is little point in including sortition in the body, it should all be in the lead as I originally had it. "I was not aware of having misshapen..." Well, I pointed out one glaring error on Aug.24. Click on "View History", page down to the line for my Aug 2nd edit, and click on the timestamp - you will get the article as it existed after that edit. Compare the first sentence of the sortition paragraph with what it now is, in particular the use of the word approach. No-one else apart from you has edited it.
Right. Sortition is not an electoral system. How about we change the heading level in the body to make that clear? I'll do that for now. I feel that sortition is a bit of an outlier that is mainly of academic interest, which is why I would prefer not to have it in the Lead at all, or to have only a little of it in the Lead. However, this is your material, so why don't you just set it up the way you want. I did edit the material, because I thought the expression "approaches perfect proportionality" was too strong a statement to make without further explanation. In fact, I am not sure what it means. Is a jury of 12 ever "perfectly proportional?" So I edited it out, thinking that it was an unnecessary complication. You can put it back if you want, or perhaps find another way of putting it.Reallavergne (talk) 17:24, 12 September 2014 (UTC)

Your Sep.4 posts have resulted in yet another pointless update. At this rate it will be months before the article returns to a reasonable state. But I have repeatedly asked you not to update the article but to revert all your changes and start over which you haven't done.

We disagree about this. I do not see reverting all of my work over the last 40 days as the best way to move forward (see below).Reallavergne (talk) 17:24, 12 September 2014 (UTC)

I have been very patient, I have helped you recover the lead which you, against the WP rules, deleted, twice, in fact, because after I recovered it (your version not mine) with a reversion you reverted my reversion. I have also made well-meant suggestions for reducing the number of times you re-edit your own revisions by using a sandbox or saving work to your PC, without any obvious effect, and I have pointed out WP guidelines, at least one of which, WP:PLAINANDSIMPLE, you should have found yourself (from any article click Help in the left panel and read the first para.under "I want to edit Wikipedia"). And I have spent hours answering your over-extensive Talk postings trying, in the spirit of collaboration, largely in vain, to get you to improve your work, hours which I would have preferred to spend more usefully.

Clearly, we have different things to offer. I have only a few months of experience as a Wikipedia editor; and although I am becoming more experienced over time, I have appreciated your well-meaning suggestions. I have taken them to heart and used them to improve my skills. My strengths have to do with my considerable experience as a writer (including several books), my expertise in policy analysis, and my increasing expertise on PR specifically.Reallavergne (talk) 17:24, 12 September 2014 (UTC)

But there is a limit and I now have reverted all your work since the beginning of August. Very little of it improved the article. Most of it was unnecessary, unconsidered, wrong and ignored WP guidelines, and all of it was overly wordy. Refs have been displaced, narrative flow replaced by non-sequiturs, and structure destroyed.

I beg to disagree, and would request that we keep our comments to each other specific and actionable, as called for in WP protocol.Reallavergne (talk) 17:24, 12 September 2014 (UTC)

I accused you of partiality for MMP (I didn't say I suspected you of it, I said it was obvious), you denied it, but a few days later you say you have a preference for MMP. I point out a mis-representation (MMP vs MMM) and you accuse me of being disrespectful (Sep.4th). I do have precious little respect for your work, for the reasons already mentioned. In fact one of your very first WP contributions, to this article on March 13th, drew negative attention to itself because you admitted, apparently unashamedly, not knowing how to format a link. Anyone who starts out in Wikipedia without bothering to find out how to set a hyper-link, one of the most basic features of any Wiki, might reasonably be thought not to be over-endowed with respect for Wikipedia. And you can think what you like about my edit of Aug.2nd, but you cannot deny it is an improvement on what was there before. But you changed most of it without, as I have said, much thought and that, as I have also said, is not suggestive of respect.

You claim you support NPOV but I have pointed out several examples of your bias. An earlier example was your April 26 introduction of bullet lists into the lead when you specified four types of PR system, citing the Law Commission of Canada report "Voting Counts: Electoral Reform For Canada". But that report identifies only three types. You can't do that, you can't "interpret" a source. In my Aug.2 edit, where the comment mentions correcting the lead, that is what I was referring to. BalCoder (talk) 10:03, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

Hi Balcoder. I have in fact found many of your suggestions helpful. Of course I do not agree with everything you say, and our exchanges have been so extensive that I could not hope to respond to every observation that you make. A particular issue that you had was that you wanted a longer Lead section, and once I understood your intent, I did revert some of the changes that I had made in that regard. I had planned to make some time over the next few days to look at others of your comments in more detail to see how they could be taken into account. I think in many cases, only minor changes are needed.
We have been trying to use Talk to address the issues you raise, and in my view have been doing so successfully, if more slowly than you might like (but like you said "there are no deadlines"). From my own perspective, I can't say that I have found every aspect of our exchanges useful, but at least we were making progress. I would suggest that, in addition, there is nothing stopping you from going in and making edits of your own and explaining them, the way Wikipedia editors normally do and are encouraged to do.
Ultimately, however, what you really want (and have now done) is to revert all of the edits that I have made since your own major contribution of August 2. This represents a huge loss of work, and involves throwing away the baby with the bathwater. Involving multiple reversions in one stroke, this measure seems to me contrary to the spirit in which editors are invited to work in Wikipedia. For this reason, I will restore the Sept. 4 version.
If you think that we can work from there in resolving our differences, I am willing to try. It may take some time, but I see no reason why it would not be possible. Otherwise, I think we need to ask for help by using the appropriate dispute resolution mechanism. Like I said, I had planned to work further on the article in response to your comments, but if you prefer to go for a dispute resolution mechanism first, we could do that. Reallavergne (talk) 01:28, 12 September 2014 (UTC)
I should have been clearer. I refer you to my post of Aug 23 in Talk:Proportional representation#New Aug 2014 Advantages and Disadvantages section already history that in the spirit of WP:BRD I should revert your work and then we could discuss. I hoped you would revert and then insert your changes in a more disciplined way. We have since had plenty of discussion but precious little reversion. So I have now changed my mind and reverted. You were bold, I have reverted, now you can discuss on the basis of an article that is coherent, not a building site. If you don't like that you can invoke dispute resolution. It is not open to you to revert my reversion, so I am undoing it. Since you have since added more edits, to undo your reversion I have to revert those too. BalCoder (talk) 17:08, 12 September 2014 (UTC)

Single transferrable vote in a single member constituency

Strangely, we don't seem to have this method, which is the one being suggested by the UK Labour Party. Perhaps because it is not really proportional? In this method, candidates are eliminated in order of least number of votes and their second (or subsequent) preferences distributed until one candidate has reached 50% of the poll. Comments? --Red King (talk) 10:30, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

You are speaking about the Australian method, which is not a proportional system. Remember that, generally speaking, proportional representation is impossible in single member constituencies.--82.48.89.94 (talk) 12:20, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Indeed, STV is not at all proportional, it's just an "improved" FPTP system, somewhat similar to the French system of FPTP in two rounds. --Roentgenium111 (talk) 10:37, 24 September 2014 (UTC)

List of countries using proportional representation - MMP vs. MMM vs. AMS

This table (but not the map) seems to list any country using a mixed system as MMP, though the article on MMP uses this term only for countries where the proportional part is used to balance out the constituency seats such as Germany or New Zealand. Is the term also used by some sources for parallel systems such as Japan and Thailand, and systems with some, but not full compensation such as Hungary or Mexico, or is this just an oversight in this article? Øln (talk) 19:57, 16 September 2014 (UTC)

Hi Øln. Certainly, MMM (or parallel) system countries should not be listed as MMP, so that is unequivocally an error. For a really good list of systems in different countries, see the [list produced under the Ace Project]. The Ace Project also has an excellent map which is probably more up-to-date than the one on the WP site.
A general issue, which I have raised elsewhere in this Talk page (see the Dispute Resolution section - third paragraph in today's entre that starts "Further on this..."), is whether MMM should be included or not as a mixed system. I think it should because the reliable references that I have been using (including ACE, Shugart and the Law Commission of Canada) all include both MMP and MMM as mixed systems. However, the current draft of the page does not include MMM under mixed systems. I imagine this will be fixed before long, but I am waiting for BalCoder to weigh in on this point. It is true that MMM is best described as semi-proportional, but that can hold true of MMP as well, depending on the features of the system. It could even be true of STV is the STV districts were small enough.
Re: Mexico. Mexico is listed in the Ace Project's list as a form of MMM, although there is a ceiling on how disproportionate the final result can be (no more than 8% difference between the share of seats and the share of the vote). I would therefore not include Mexico as an example of MMP as the current text says.Reallavergne (talk) 21:26, 16 September 2014 (UTC)
Okay, thanks, I'll see how the discussion goes. As for Mexico, the IDEA handbook seens to list the system as MMP, so here the sources diverge, which is an issue. The ACE project also lists Hungary as MMP, even though their new law can't really be considered proportional, or at least less proportional than Mexico. I've done some work at Table of voting systems by country (which needs more work) and the questions discussed here are relevant to that article too, so I hope to find a consensus on how to best describe the different systems. MMP in particular seems to have a bit of a vague definition. Øln (talk) 08:15, 17 September 2014 (UTC)
I removed the entries that are using parallel systems with no link between constituency and list vote such as Japan and Thailand and left countries like Hungary and Mexico in for now. I'll leave the rest for the discussion on what to include. Maybe we should instead refer to Table of voting systems by countryØln (talk) 15:37, 22 September 2014 (UTC).
Hi Øln. The best referenced and up-to-date source appears to be the map and list of countries maintained by the Ace Project. It seems to me that the best service that Wikipedia could provide would be to link users to those two resources. Have a look at the addition I have just made with that objective in mind and see what you think.Reallavergne (talk) 17:33, 22 September 2014 (UTC)
I'm unsure if linking in such a way is compatible with the wikipedia guidelines. Øln (talk) 13:46, 24 September 2014 (UTC)
I have not seen any guidelines on this, but in general, one purpose of references is to provide a way that readers can get more detail. I stand to be corrected if necessary, but since the reference serves that purpose here, it seems to me it should be OK.Reallavergne (talk) 20:38, 24 September 2014 (UTC)

New Aug 2014 Advantages and Disadvantages section already history

Dear Reallavergne, advantages and disadvantages should be combined. Please read WP:PROCON: the conclusive reason is to avoid fragmentation of facts, readers shouldn't have to go back and forth gathering the facts themselves. About "Issues" you say "the problems identified here do not manifest themselves in each case and depend upon the type of PR system in place". First of all, why does it matter? Secondly, they (Opportunities for voters to consult with representatives and fragmentation and coalitions) are not necessarily "problems", in particular party fragmentation and coalitions, but readers, seeing "Advantages" and then "Issues", will obviously think that "Issues" are something other than "Advantages". Thirdly, you use bullets but WP prefers narrative (WP:EMBED); there is no justification for a bullet-list here.

I guess this is your "more sophisticated and context-specific understanding of the options".

Possibly even more serious is your including the couple of sentences about STV, independent candidates, and Ireland under "Issues", tacked on to the fragmentation bullet. STV support for independents is of course an advantage (for democracy, not perhaps for parties). But if you are proselytising for MMP, and you obviously are, then I can imagine independent candidates are an "issue", MMP being no better than FPTP for independents. Worse, actually, since districts are necessarily larger. If I were in the Canadian STV camp I would be incensed. Let's assume it's just a mistake. In any case, fragmentation and coalitions are not at all entwined, and independents are not necessarily a result of fragmentation, far from it.

What I should do, in the spirit of WP:BRD, is to revert your changes, then we could discuss and you could start over but I don't have the time or the inclination. What you should do is revert to the combined section yourself and then build on that. BalCoder (talk) 13:42, 23 August 2014 (UTC)

Hi Balcoder. I haven’t yet had time to fully review the entry material on this topic, but for now, let me just reassure you that I am taking your comments seriously. I appreciate that having an Advantages and Disadvantages approach at all can incite opinionated debate among contributors and that one has to be particularly careful on how that problem is managed in an encyclopedia-type medium like WP. At the same time, PR is a policy option for electoral reform in countries that currently have single-district systems, and many or most readers will be logging in to assess the advantages and disadvantages of PR relative to other systems.
I could not help but notice that opinion on pro-con sections is divided in WP:PROCON:. Indeed, I found it LOL ironic to read at the bottom of the article the following: “This article contains a pro and con list. Please help improve it by integrating both sides into a more neutral presentation.” Evidently even the people who are against pro-con end up using a pro-con format to make their case! If you share my sense of humour even a little, you will find that pretty funny! Anyway, for me it’s not cut-and-dry.
Here is how I approached editing this section. I started with the title, which was already there: “Advantages and Disadvantages of PR” which was what I would normally be looking for first and foremost as a user. However, I found underneath that a number of “topics” in which advantages or disadvantages were not clearly discussed, and I found the material hard to digest. How could the reader form an educated opinion if the material was not better organized?
I looked elsewhere for inspiration to see how others tackled this problem, notably in the International Idea Handbook (2005) and the online ACE Project Encyclopedia on Electoral Systems, which I considered relatively neutral and found that they do have sections on advantages and disadvantages, where they separate out the two. So it could be done, and I was easily able to find other lists of advantages and disadvantages.
One could readily take the points outlined in those sources and readily have a credible advantages and disadvantages section that way. However, that would not have been respectful of the existing material in the WP entry. Working through that material, I saw that some subjects could fairly readily be identified as “advantages” that everyone could agree upon, while others pointed to issue areas that were more difficult to handle. My solution was thus to organize the material that way: to list the putative advantages first, then cover the issue areas. Maybe ‘Controversies’ would be a better title for the latter. Maybe one should consider removing the “Advantages and Disadvantages” title if it is confusing. This needs to be thought through to find the best possible approach. There is a need to revisit this material, to be sure.
I see that other WP pages dealing with electoral reform have taken different approaches to the advantages/disadvantages conundrum. I am not sure that any one approach is better than the other. For instance the Instant Runoff Voting entry uses “Comparison to other voting systems” as a title instead of “Advantages and disadvantages.” However, it seems to me that the authors have tried so hard to be neutral and clinical in their treatment of the subject, that it is hard for the reader to form an opinion. The First-past-the-post entry uses the title “Criticisms” and does not have a separate section on the strengths of the system at all. The MMP entry does not have a section on the advantages of the system, but spends about half the entry on the potential for tactical voting and collusion. The STV entry, similarly has only an “Issues” section. Such an approach is as biased as one that would include only a discussion of advantages, since it leaves readers with the impression that such systems are problematic, and a limited sense of how they perform in practice. We need to avoid that sort of bias as much as any other.
At this point, while struggling with how to make the presentation as useful as possible, I have s far tried to avoid removing anything from the original text if possible. That is why I left the material about STV independent candidates (for the time being), even though I don’t think that material is well integrated into the flow of the argument.
In the interests of full disclosure, I do believe that PR would be an important step forward for Canadian democracy (where I live), but I don’t have a particular bias for MMP or STV: I can see the advantages of each, so no, I don’t have an axe to grind in that respect. Nor is it my intent to use Wikipedia as a pulpit for advocating a particular point of view. That would make me a poor Wikipedia editor indeed! My aim is for people to have a convenient place to get a summary statement on the subject, so they can form their own opinions. I have an academic background, so I know the difference between summarizing the arguments in a balanced way (as much as one can), and advocating for a particular opinion or point of view.
So no, I don’t think we should simply revert the work that I did back to some other version. But yes, I do see your point, and the need to figure out the best way to present the material, in a way that does not invite a polemical response from others.
In the meantime, could I invite you to consider adjusting the title that you have used for this Talk section, which itself sounds more polemic than in should be to me. Would you consider shortening it just to: “New Aug 2014 Advantages and Disadvantages section?”
All for now.Reallavergne (talk) 17:44, 28 August 2014 (UTC)
Dear Reallavergne, please try to keep your posts to a moderate length - this is a joke. And it doesn't even say much.
"Indeed, I found it LOL ironic...". Yet another example of how you edit before you think. That is merely an illustration of the "pro & con list" template. The article is very short and there is no pro & con list in it. The discussion is on the talk page. You obviously haven't read either.
I have no great opinion either way on pro & con lists. But the WP:PROCON article (and its Talk page) has good arguments against and WP generally seems to prefer narrative. So I combined them in a narrative. Pointing out WP:PROCON to you, my reasonable expectation was that you would read it, then in reply present some counter arguments. But you haven't done either. You write at excessive length that others use pro & con lists which we all know.
"I found the material hard to digest". If you cast aspersions on others' work you should at least provide an example so that we know what you are talking about. "How could the reader form an educated opinion if the material was not better organized". Ridiculously tendentious. The obvious answer is: By reading it. The simple point that the organizing argument works both ways appears not to occur to you. Some readers may like to have advantages listed together, and disadvantages separately, others, reading, say, about representation of minorities, might prefer to have the pros & cons presented together in that section. In both cases the arguments are "organized", just differently. Your argument seems to be that advantages and disadvantages should be listed separately because they should be listed separately.
"Maybe one should consider removing the “Advantages and Disadvantages” title if it is confusing". What can one say? Claptrap.
"This needs to be thought through...". Speak for yourself.
"while struggling with how to make the presentation as useful as possible, I have so far..". I take this to mean that your changes are still a work in progress. Still more reason to revert your work completely. Copy the article to a sandbox, then you can edit and experiment there to your hearts content without troubling others.
"I don’t think that material is well integrated into the flow". You can say that again. But when I left it it was integrated.
The title: Polemical? Hardly. It's factual. What do you expect? Before my change the article was very poor. I substantially improved it, you substantially mangled that improvement.
I say again: revert your changes completely. Then you can add the few changes you made which were improvements into that structure. BalCoder (talk) 09:41, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

Hungary 2014

A competely different complaint under the Advantages Disadvantages section: "where in 2014 Fidesz combined gerrymandering and a number of other tricks to contrive" This is libel, not impartial reporting. Additionally it is complete hogwash since the system currently in place in Hungary is not a clean-PR system but a FPTP system. Ironically enough Fidesz had also been criticized FOR changing the system from PR to FPTP, because apparently that too is "trickery". Removing example. --N0B0DY-1MP0R7AN7 (talk) 00:19, 14 September 2014 (UTC)
Restoring section. This is not libel; it describes EXACTLY what our source, the New York Times, is reporting. If you don't like it take it up with the NY Times. That is as perfect sourcing as is possible. --NellieBly (talk) 04:30, 14 September 2014 (UTC)
Thanks NellieBly. N0B0DY-1MP0R7AN7: The also cited OSCE report confirms Lane Scheppele. I don't think you can impeach these sources so you can't delete the paragraph. It also says "a mixed electoral system was retained". Lane Scheppele mentions "elimination of the second round of voting in individual constituencies" and the "new FPTP system of individual constituencies" so it looks like the method of election to the single member districts did change as you say, but the overall system remained, basically, mixed member PR. BalCoder (talk) 09:14, 14 September 2014 (UTC)
BalCoder, NellieBly This however is in direct conflict with the wikipedia page about Hungary. I quote the page on Hungary: In 2012, the new Constitution lowered the number of MPs to 199 and instituted a first-past-the-post election with a single round. BLOGS of the opposing political side as quoted in the citation ("liberal conscience"), are generally not a good source of information about the actions of political party. Here's the primary source: http://njt.hu/cgi_bin/njt_doc.cgi?docid=142940 The system is mixed at best, and NOT a good example for PR. Redeleting. --N0B0DY-1MP0R7AN7 (talk) 20:13, 27 September 2014 (UTC)
The Hungarian 2014 election is cited to illustrate gerrymandering of MMP single-member districts. The primary source you cite says the Hungarian parliament has 103 single-member seats and 93 list seats, and describes the method of allocating compensatory seats. It may be a unique variant of MMP (most of them are), and not a good example of PR, but it is nominally MMP. As has been said before you can't dismiss the Krugman Blog nor the OSCE. The article was also published in The Nation which you can add as a third citation if you want. What you can't do is revert the text. --BalCoder (talk) 09:18, 28 September 2014 (UTC)
If we are to keep a bit about the Hungarian election, it has to be changed. There is much more about the system that gives Fidesz a majority than just gerrymandering. If it was just gerrymandering of the constituency seats, Fidesz wouldn't have gotten 2/3 of the seats, maybe not even half of them. The compensatory mechanism was changed in the new system so that it only very weakly compensates for disproportional outcomes in constituency seats. It's not a good example of gerrymandering undermining the compensatory mechanism. Øln (talk) 10:16, 28 September 2014 (UTC)
I agree. Reversion, counter-reversion and a further reversion is not a good way to advance the quality of the page. If an example is to be used, we need to be clear on its relevance and the limitations of its relevance. I am inclined to believe that the reversion made by N0B0DY-1MP0R7AN7 is the best way to go on an interim basis until improved text can be provided, because the relevance of the existing text is not clear. If the relevance of the example is not clear, it is probably better not to use it until that relevance can be made clear, and removing the example (however temporarily) qualifies as an improvement. If improved and clearly relevant text can be provided, then it should be proposed.Reallavergne (talk) 13:26, 28 September 2014 (UTC)
It would be nice if we could also decide how best to describe the Hungarian system. It sounds closer to MMM than to MMP but the ACE Project calls it MMPReallavergne (talk) 13:26, 28 September 2014 (UTC)


Øln, the text is about gerrymandering not the Hungarian electoral system. You write "There is much more about the system that gives Fidesz a majority than just gerrymandering", but the text says exactly that: "combined gerrymandering and a number of other tricks to contrive...". You also write: "It's not a good example of gerrymandering undermining the compensatory mechanism" but it's the other way round, the modified compensatory system doesn't (as a "regular" MMP system would) "undermine" the gerrymandering. On the contrary, because single-seat winners surpluses are added to the list totals, the gerrymandering is reinforced or amplified. If the Hungarian districts were gerrymandered and the compensatory system compromised, which is what the text is about, then why not use Hungary as an example? Where is the problem? But if you, too, have a problem with the word "tricks" (Lane Scheppele's word) then change it (but use some other formulation from one of the refs). --BalCoder (talk) 08:32, 30 September 2014 (UTC)
BalCoder, I think you are misunderstanding Øln's point. What he is saying is that the system was probably the main explanation of why the Fidesz party was able to secure such a large majority. If gerrymandering contributed to Fidesz success, then that deserves to be said and probably described in a bit of detail, but one can have disproportional results with or without gerrymandering. If the separate effect of gerrymandering cannot be assessed for its relative importance, then we should not be implying that it was the main contributor to the observed electoral outcome as the example currently does, regardless of what the sources say.N0B0DY-1MP0R7AN7's revert should stand until the relevance of the example can be established. At the very least, if we use the example, it needs to be accompanied by the necessary qualifiers. An ambiguous reference to "other tricks" does not cut it. If the main "other trick" was changing the system, then that needs to be clarified. I'm not saying that the example is no good, but if the sources don't allow us to tell a better story and we don't have the expertise, time or other resources to tell that better story, then the example does more harm than good and should not be used.Reallavergne (talk) 17:29, 30 September 2014 (UTC)
BalCoder,BalCoder, Please explain why you think that the modified compensatory system enforces gerrymandering. I have found no indication of such a thing in the actual legal documents. We must work on the assumption of innocence if we are editing a universally accessible resource for information. Either point out the parts of the legal documents that prove that the modified compensatory structure enforced gerrymandering and "other tricks", or refrain from such accusations.--N0B0DY-1MP0R7AN7 (talk) 17:22, 2 October 2014 (UTC)
Are you people being serious right now? You should read up on the acceptable sources page. Blogs are not one of them. Here the problems: 1) The Hungarian system is not a good example for faults of PR-voting-systems because it is very much a mixture of multiple types. 2) The tone in which it is described is non neutral. This is a violation of Wikipedia standards. 3) It is a one sided personal opinion of the opposing political side. You can NOT regard this as fact, no matter how many newspapers linked the blog. 4) The system currently in use in Britain - as i already said below - allows for the exact same type of election outcome. This makes it even less acceptable to single out the Hungarians using such a system as a bad thing.
I will delete the section again, until one of you can come up with an alternative that does not violate Wikipedia standards. --N0B0DY-1MP0R7AN7 (talk) 17:12, 2 October 2014 (UTC)
Whether the Krugman blog is a reliable source has been discussed in the past and the answer is yes, the blog is subject to New York Times editing and fact-checking  – see WP:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_105#NYT_blogs-Krugman_specifically. The blog, the author, Krugman himself, and the NYT are unimpeachable sources, as is of course the second source, the OSCE. The Reliable Sources Noticeboard WP:RSN is available to you if you want to question this. 1: A "mixture of multiple types" is exactly what Mixed-member PR is. 2: The tone of the original text is neutral, reflecting accurately reliable sources. "Gerrymandering" and "tricks" are factual, objective, if unadorned, words used by Lane Scheppele. The only non-neutral word is "striking" which was introduced in a later (16 Sept.) edit; you can delete that word if you like. 3: Who has a one-sided opinion, you or Kim Lane Scheppele, a reliable and respected source? And OSCE? 4: The British system is not, and does not pretend to be, PR, neither is it gerrymandered so can't serve as an example. The text does not "violate Wikipedia standards" so I am restoring it. --BalCoder (talk) 09:09, 13 October 2014 (UTC)
NellieBly,N0B0DY-1MP0R7AN7 and BalCoder, it sounds like the facts of the example are correct as we have more than one citation to back them up. What remains is to be clearer on what the example illustrates. The existing introductory sentence ("The single-seat districts used by Mixed-member PR are susceptible to gerrymandering and this can impair proportionality if the rules for awarding compensatory list seats are rigged.") was insufficient in this regard, because a) the problem exists even without "rigging" and is intrinsic to the mixed-member modality; and b) the problem does not exist in the same way for all mixed-member systems. I have added some text to clarify these points and thus better introduce the example.Reallavergne (talk) 13:42, 16 September 2014 (UTC)
Reallavergne The problem was only partially the incorrect interpretation of hungarian electoral laws. The Main issue was the absolutely unfitting tone of "gerrymandering and other trickery to contrive" The NYT might have used that tone, but it is absolutely unfitting of a lexical text, as it clearly represents a personal opinion. It's made additionally repulsive by the fact that the british electoral system allows for the same exact same thing to happen as proven by https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_general_election,_2001#Results . --N0B0DY-1MP0R7AN7 (talk) 20:13, 27 September 2014 (UTC)
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