Coalitions

Everything interesting about the UK elections was actually predicted a long time ago; only three things surprised me:

1. Although Nick Clegg of the Liberal Democrats became much more popular after the televised debates, his party actually lost seats in the election.
2. Gordon Brown stepped down as leader of Labour.
3. The Conservatives agreed to a "full review" on proportional representation.

To put the UK election in American terms, here is what happened: Ralph Nader was invited to participate in the Presidential debates, became very popular, got almost no votes, then became Vice-President under George W. Bush.

Surprisingly, many people are happy with the outcome: The Conservatives are in charge of the economy and reducing the debt, while the Liberal Democrats act as a counterweight to protect the public interest.  People are also quite happy that Labour, in power for the past 13 years, is suddenly sidelined, and that Gordon Brown--who was never elected--is out.

Now the next question is whether this coalition can hang together.  They have promised to vote as a block for the next 3 years, but if I know my conservatives, this was strictly a matter of expediency and they will quickly try to railroad the Lib-Dems, which will lead to a vote of No Confidence, and a new general election.

In particular, the "proportional representation" is a non-starter for the Conservatives, because it ensures they will get fewer seats in the future.  As I mentioned in the past, the "first past the post" system (currently used by the UK and most of the US) means the candidate who gets the most votes in a region, effectively gets all the votes.  This virtually guarantees a two-horse race, which is why the Lib-Dems keep getting shut out.  So even though they got 23% of the vote, they only won 9% of the seats!  (By comparison, Labour got 29% of the votes but 40% of the seats!)

Some argue that the current system is good because, by forcing everyone to choose between only two candidates, those candidates have a stronger "mandate" to govern.  I think there is a stronger nuance here: That by forcing everyone to choose between only two candidates, it forces those candidates to appeal to a wider audience, thus bringing them closer to the middle.  Those countries that do have proportional representation--and by that I mean Israel--have many small parties that appeal to a core group of people, and (I think) it reduces their flexibility as a result.

Now we could argue all day about whether or not that is a good thing, but I'll just leave you with the words of Henry David Thoreau: "That government is best which governs least."