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11.8: Electoral Reform Efforts

  • Page ID
    179316

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    Local Debates

    Just as there are debates about electoral reform at the national level, such as considering the efficacy of the filibuster, the electoral college, and campaign finance laws, they have their corollaries at the local level and have led to significant electoral reforms. We can think of democracy as a grand experiment to find the right formula to have the best representation, yielding the best policies for local governments. Two recent reforms that have been implemented deserve our attention. The first seeks to improve descriptive representation by replacing at-large with district elections. The second seeks to increase voter participation by requiring that the dates of municipal elections correspond with state and national elections. Additionally, many other proposed reforms are intriguing. For example, ranked-choice voting is gaining more attention and has been implemented in some local elections in California and other states.


    This page titled 11.8: Electoral Reform Efforts is shared under a CC BY 4.0 license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by Steven Reti.

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