Among the voting systems, the majority uninominal system with two turns is a simple vote without weighting. The voter must choose a candidate among several. One then counts the number of voices obtained by each candidate. If a candidate collects the absolute majority (more than 50% of the votes cast) it is elected. If not, one organizes one second election, for example 8 to 15 days later, being able to comprise a more reduced number candidates, and at the conclusion which that is elected which collects the most voice (relative majority) among the votes cast.

Implementation

There exist many details of implementation.

The election with the first turn can be subjected to different conditions:

• In France for example, at the time of the legislative elections, to be elected with the first turn, a candidate must collect more than 50% of the votes cast and the voices of more than 25% of the registered voters.
• With the Costa Rica, for the presidential election, a candidate can be elected with the first ballot with only 40% of the voices
• To the Sierra Leone, for the presidential election, it is necessary to obtain 55% of the votes cast
• In Argentine, a candidate must obtain 45% of the voices or 40% plus a margin of at least 10% on the candidate who occupies the second rank to be elected

The election with the second round can be preceded by an elimination of certain candidates.

• In France, at the time of the presidential election, only can be maintained the two candidates made at the head
• To France, at the time of the legislative elections, can be maintained only the candidates having obtained the voices from at least 12,5% of the registered voters or, failing this, the two candidates arrived at the head

Use

This voting system is used for the election of the president of the republic in many countries: majority of the countries of the Latin America, the French-speaking Africa like in Europe for the Austria, the Bulgaria, the Finland, the France, the Portugal, the Russia, the Romania and the Ukraine.

One also finds it at the time of parliamentary elections or legislative in the Vote by districts.

Favors and disadvantage

The majority poll with two turns is a vote easy to strip.

The presence of a second turn allows a carryforward of the voices which can bring to a consensus. It supports also a division bipartist of the political world, particular case which makes it possible according to some the democratic choices to find the characteristic of coherence (see Théorème of impossibility of Arrow).

N the other hand, it surreprésente the parliamentary majority and sanctions the minorities. For example, at the time of the French legislative elections of 2002, the Union for the presidential majority obtained more than 60% of the seats by gathering only 33,3% of the votes cast with the first turn (and 47,3% with the second turn), while the National front, in spite of its 11,3% with the first turn, did not have the least seat. Always concerning this election, the Union for the French democracy had carried 29 seats out of 577 per 4,9% of the votes cast with the first turn, the PCF 21 seats for 4,8%, the green 3 seats for 4,5% and the Radical left party 7 seats for 1,5%. The French National Assembly forever be really representative of the popular vote under the Fifth Republic, except in 1986, elections having then taken place with the Poll proportional plurinominal.

Always in the case of France, a study of the Fondation for the political innovation showed that, at the conclusion of the legislative ones of 1988, the system of 1986 would have made it possible the socialist group to carry more than 50% of the seats, whereas in the facts, with the majority poll with two turns, it had had only 48% of it (either several point moreover than the line and without true potential ally, included/understood as regards Communist there). This way of voting is thus not inevitably ready to release a parliamentary majority, so of course this one must fatally be unipartite to be clear, a difficulty which does not arise in other European countries traditionally turned towards the negotiation (the logic of the conflict being more present in France). In Sweden, for example, the current parliamentary majority is made of 4 groups all individually minority. Similar situations could be observed in France twice under Ve République: between 1958 and 1962, gaullists being combined with CNIP (although no alliance was concluded before the poll) and between 1997 and 2002 with the Plural left. Remain the particular case of 1973, where the gaullists, very clearly put in minority, have to make alliance with the centrists, an alliance of circumstance which was not envisaged in the beginning. At all events, the Parliament was always dominated by only one parliamentary group (or two forming one electoral block in the line case between 1978 and 2002, then represented by the Rassemblement for the Republic and UDF) having an absolute majority of seats (or almost, cf 1988) for a share much weaker of voice with the first turn.

In addition, the risk exists to see the mobilization of the electorate exhausting itself between the first and the second round. Certain provisions are sometimes implemented to mitigate this risk, of which:

• the obligation of vote
• the nullity so less than 50% of the voters were expressed ( quorum general meetings)

When the number of candidates to the first turn is very important, the vote of the voters is diluted then very strongly. A French saying said that “ with the first turn one chooses, with the second one eliminates ”, but then the risk should not be underestimated to find with the second round only candidates whom one all would have eliminated. At the time of the French presidential election of 2002, the presence of sixteen candidates led to a dilution of the votes and the maintenance with the second turn of a candidate that 82% of the voters will reject. The maintenance of a third candidate to the second turn, or the absence of some others with the first turn, would undoubtedly have led to a different result.

The blank votes indicate the not expressed votes. Those are not taken into account by the political community, whereas they are obviously the sign of a dissension of the citizen on the choice which is proposed to him. Certain theorists then propose the option “  NOTA  ” which would make it possible to express a vote against all the people who present (“  Nun off the Above  ”, translated into French by “  None of those là  ”). He would make it possible to the citizens to oblige a new behavior of election, with new candidates.

The majority uninominal system with two turns does not respect the criterion of Condorcet: with the first turn, one is likely to eliminate a candidate who would however have gained all his duels vis-a-vis the other candidates.

Example:

On 21 voters, here the choices (by order preferably)

* 7 voters choose: With then C then B,

* 8 voters chooses: B then C then has,

* 6 voters choose: C then has then B.

In this system, the candidate C is eliminated as of the first turn whereas it would have gained his duel against has (has: 7 and C: 14) and its duel against B (b: 8 and C: 13).

Nicolas de Condorcet is one of the first to have highlighted this inconsistency of the vote at plurality.

The majority uninominal system with two turns does not respect the criterion of monotony: by retrogressing a candidate losing, one can allow him to gain the elections

Exemple:

On a population of 17 voters and 3 candidates has, B and C, here the choices (by order preferably):

* 8: With then C

* 5: B then has

* 4: C then B

the candidate C is eliminated with the first turn, B is elected with the second turn (a: 8 and b: 9)

Maintenant imagine that, among the 8 voters who preferred has, two of them retrogress has compared to C. We thus have:

* 6: With then C

* 2: C then has

* 5: B then has (unchanged)

* 4: C then B (unchanged)

the candidate B is then eliminated with the first turn and has is elected with the second turn (a: 11 and C: 6)

the inconsistency appears then: the fact that two voters do not want to vote any more for has made elect A.

These various inconsistencies pushed certain theorists of the voting systems to propose votes by classification (Méthode Condorcet, alternative Vote) or by weighting. Besides these methods avoid voting twice, the first is enough to determine in an unquestionable way the most popular person.

External bond

Project ACE: Project Administration and cost of the elections

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