Electoral reforms: The case of Serbia

Abstract

In one decade Serbia applied almost all of the most widely spread types of electoral systems. Only two electoral cycles for the central representative body were held on the same electoral model. The consequences of electoral legislation on the party system, on the functioning of the parliament and government, were not in line with the parties' expectations, while conflicts between parties in the past decade centered around the electoral system reform. Not one electoral system managed to achieve more than two of the functions that it is expected to: simplicity, participation, aggregation and effectiveness, representation and legitimacy. All electoral reforms were under the strong influence of party self-interests. The attention is now focused on the need for a thorough reform of all elements of electoral legislation, and, along with that, only on the registering of voters, the threshold and on testing the public to establish whether it would accept some of the different kinds of combined majority-proportional model. The author presents his proposals on how to make voter rolls, points to the problems that lowering the threshold could have on the fragmentation of the party system and presents his proposals on how to minimize the potential of the small parties for blackmail; he warns of the potential consequences of introducing a trench electoral model.

Srbija je u jednoj deceniji primenila gotovo sve najrasprostranjenije varijante izbornih sistema. Samo dva izborna ciklusa za centralno predstavničko telo održana su po istom izbornom sistemu. Posledice izbornog prava po stranački sistem, funkcionisanje parlamenta i vlade nisu bile u skladu sa očekivanjima stranaka, a reforme izbornog sistema bile su okosnica stranačkih konflikata u poslednjoj deceniji. Nijedan izborni sistem nije ispunio više od dve funkcije od onih koje se od njega očekuju jednostavnost, participaciju, agregaciju i efektivnost, reprezentaciju i legitimnost. Sve izborne reforme bile su pod snažnim pritiskom stranačkih interesa. Sada se, pored potrebe za celovitom reformom svih elemenata izbornog prava, pažnja fokusira samo na evidenciju birača, visinu izbornog praga i testiranje javnosti za prihvatanje neke varijante kombinovanog većinsko-proporcionalnog modela. Autor iznosi predloge za izradu evidencije birača; ukazuje na probleme koje po fragmentaciju stranačkog sistema može imati smanjivanje izbornog praga i iznosi predloge za smanjivanje "ucenjivačkog" potencijala malih stranaka; upozorava na posledice koje može proizvesti uvođenje rovovskog izbornog modela.