An Analysis Of Politics In Macedonia Politics
The excessive rule of the political leaders in the country is a substantial problem for the democracy in Republic of Macedonia. Therefore, if the country is not already turned into particracy, certainly there are inclinations towards becoming a particracy. This model of governance also exists due to the current electoral model of proportional representation with six electoral districts for election of Macedonian MPs which with the absence of intra-party democracy creates assumptions for absolute power of several political party leaders in the country. Under such conditions, it is not surprising that most important issues are neither being resolved in the state institutions nor it is possible to reach national consensus regarding certain issues without organizing the so-called meetings of the political party leaders, institutionalised as one form of „tribal council in the country".
Changing the electoral model for MPs, whereby the current model of closed candidate lists would be replaced with open lists, would probably be the only solution to this situation. The new model, enabling the votes to be cast for individuals, and accordingly for the respective political party, would resulted in more responsible compilation of candidate lists by political party leaders and bodies, but it would also enable the citizens to determine the final ranging of the party representatives for entry in the Parliament.
Such electoral model would not only increase the responsibility of the MPs before the electorate, but also would enable greater quality drafting of the legislation.
Since the first parliamentary elections, Macedonia has experienced three electoral models for members of the Macedonian Parliament.
Majority election system - in 120 electoral districts (1990 and 1994).
Mixed electoral model, whereby in 1998, 85 MPs were elected according to majority electoral model and 35 MPs according to the proportional representation model from the list of political parties, and Macedonia representing one electoral district
Proportional representation model since 2002 until present, with the elections for the MPs are held in six electoral districts with equal mandates; 20 candidates are elected from the party lists. The political parties that participate in the elections are listed on the ballots as well as the carriers of the list. The number of mandates is calculated according to the D`Hondt's formula, and the threshold for a seat in the parliament is 4%.
This last model is not complicated for the voters, and up until now according to the results it provides rather high representation of the ethnic structure of the population in Macedonia - which is an important precondition for stable democracy in a multiethnic country such as Macedonia, as well as representation on the basis of the regional disposition of the population. The newly introduced obligation for the political parties to include at least one third of female representatives on each list and to make the female representatives equally positioned in all parts of the political party lists, Macedonia is now on the way towards full gender representation of the population.
However, the current perception of the citizens is that year after year the parliament's composition is increasingly becoming a body comprised of „the political parties soldiers" fully aware that they were elected as a candidate on a party lists thus neglecting their responsibility towards the constituency, yet remaining cautious to be in favour of the political leader. They are aware that depend on the political leader not only whether they will be on the list of candidates following the mandate expiry but also about the respective place on the list which determines the prospects for being elected.
This kind of power of the political parties and their leaders as well as the electoral model, make it possible for the citizens to decide whether to express their support for the political parties, but still without any major possibility to influence the parliamentarian composition. Therefore, given the conditions, successful political parties and their leaders include completely anonymous figures or completely incompetent people behind the names of the carriers of lists, usually becoming members of the parliament only because citizen's votes for party concerned, on whose lists they are placed. Most of the elected MPs according to this electoral model in the course of the whole mandate - as shown by the research conducted by the non-governmental organization MOST - remain rather inactive, i.e. their only activity is being disciplined member of the political voting machine in the Assembly. []
Improving the intra-party democracy and introduction of direct elections for the political party candidates, i.e. organization of so-called „premature elections" in order to identify the best party candidates, may eliminate to a certain extent this flaw of the electoral model. However, it is very likely that it can be achieved with the replacement of the current electoral model of closed lists with electoral model of open lists.
With regard to the current proportional representation model in Republic of Macedonia for MPs, the changes would imply that the citizens instead of voting for the political party by circling the carrier of the list from the respective election district, would be able to vote for any candidate of the party list, as well as to indicate their second or third choice from the candidate list for the same or other political parties.
This electoral model, known as The Single Transferable Vote (STV), was invented in the 19th century by Tomas Hare from Great Britain and Carl Andrea from Denmark. Although it is not prevalent, this model still generates very good results in Ireland (model applied for all elections, except for the presidential), in Malta, in Australia for the election of the Senate, in Estonia since 1990 and in some other countries. []
To the end of easier elections for the citizens and much simplified electoral system, with this model the electoral districts are designed to provide mostly up to 5-6 mandates. In Macedonia's case, that would mean that each of the current 6 electoral districts could be divided into 4-5 electoral districts, whereby within each district, five or four candidates could be elected for the future Assembly composition. Thus, according to this model, Macedonia would have 24-30 electoral districts with equal number of mandates.
Тhe names of all candidates of political parties participating in elections should be on the ballot so as to enable citizens to vote for as many candidates as is the number of seats in the Assembly. At the same time, by placing the numbers from 1 to 5 in front of the candidates' names, the citizens could optionally rank their choice.
Example of ballot according to this model:
State Election Committee
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