Democratic states are founded on the rule of law and access to democratically elected institutions. Repressive or authoritarian states, on the other hand, rarely cite these principles, since they are not founded on the principle of people holding the political power accountable by casting their ballots. These countries stand out from democratic countries in that their political stability derives from suppressing or eliminating the opposition, at times under the pretext of a threat to public stability and, at others, under the pretext of a threat to internal security and peace. The result is a fragile stability that can only be secured by the ability of political power to suppress society’s desires for peaceful change of government.
Periodic elections not only reflect the democratic openness of a political system, but also promote a culture of citizenship and good governance. Community forces can change rulers if these do not meet the wishes of the governed by applying the principle of accountability in elections. In addition, «accountability» subjects rulers to the civic authority of voters, i.e. it is a kind of continuous «accountability» in the development of appropriate public policies.
How does the electoral system affect political stability?
There is global academic consensus that the «electoral system» in use has a direct impact on the political and party system. When the legislature adopts «proportional representation» for electing representatives of the people to the legislative branch, the primary objective is to represent all segments of society to reflect their popular presence. On the other hand, the adoption of a majoritarian system aims to represent the segment with the popular majority to take over the legislative branch and thus form a one-party government. This is the inverse of proportional representation, which, by nature, often leads to the formation of coalition governments that include a particular group of parties that may sometimes reach compromises between the center-right and center-left. At the party level, the electoral system enhances the chances of a single party to win a majority, as is the case with the UK, which has a «two-party» system. While proportional representation enhances the opportunities of several political parties and some regional and local whereas emerging, as is the case with Italy.
The nature of the new Lebanese electoral system
More than 80 years after the adoption of majoritarian electoral systems, whereby a single party wins all the seats allocated in the various constituencies, the Lebanese legislature passed a proportional representation system to apply for the coming elections. Lebanon’s case over the past ten years demonstrates the importance of choosing the appropriate electoral system, as Parliament’s term was extended for more than five years due to the lack of a consensus on an electoral system.
Although the proportional representation, whose results we will experience next spring, involves better «representational justice» than previous systems, justice will still fall short of the required level. This is the result not of the size and high number of constituencies in relation to the very small size of the country, but rather of the fact that some of these constituencies have been redistricted into several smaller constituencies, we mean the exclusivity of preferential voting at the district (qadaa) level, such as the constituencies of Saida; Jezzine; Tyre-Zahrani; Bint Jbeil-Marjeyoun-Hasbaya-Nabatieh; Chouf-Aley; Kesrouan-Jbeil; Batroun-Koura; Zgharta-Bcharri; and Tripoli-Minieh-Danniyeh. The adoption of the electoral quotient as a threshold for representation is going to be very high, as it will range between 10% and 20% of the number of voters, which means that the forces that do not receive these figures would not be able to enter the Parliament. The threshold of representation is globally under 5% to represent as many political and social orientations as possible. Moreover, the method of adopting the preferential vote, as stipulated by the law, will lead to exacerbating sectarian tensions on the one hand, and to giving local leaders leverage to sway the process in favor of a certain list, on the other. The preferential vote that is used in the open-list system facilitates the formation of political alliances, since it is the voters who determine the ranking order of candidates on the list through their preferential votes. That is in contrast with the closed-list system, whereby a strong party in the coalition determines the order of candidates on its list. Not to mention that retaining the sectarianism of the seats in Parliament, as is the case of Lebanon, coupled with preferential voting, will make the competition spread within a single list, which will not facilitate the formation of homogenous electoral alliances.
Moreover, the electoral law does not generally include electoral reforms that would enhance the presence of young people and women in political life. The «women quota» was not adopted to represent women, nor was the voting age brought down to 18 for youth representation. Consequently, these two social groups remain marginalized in decision-making within the legislative institution.
How will the Lebanese proportional representation formula affect Lebanese political and social stability?
For the aforementioned reasons, it can be said that the new system has «distorted» proportional representation and brought it closer to majority systems. It can also be said that proportional representation as currently adopted in Lebanon is not in favor of the political forces currently not represented in the legislature. These will be able to enter the Parliament with no more than10 seats at best. The change that Lebanon’s proportional representation brings will be within the political forces currently in power, in the sense of only strengthening the presence of a political party at the expense of another.
Given that parliamentary elections are an opportunity for citizens and opposition forces to hold accountable the officials through the ballot, the proportional representation mechanisms in use will not allow these forces to form a broad national coalition that can capture seats and form parliamentary blocs capable of transferring the «objection» vote from the street into the Parliament. On the contrary, the current electoral alliances have shown that proportional representation, in its «distorted» form, has reinforced «pragmatic» alliances established to win more votes and not electoral alliances between homogeneous forces with alternative political programs.
Will the Lebanese parliamentary elections strengthen civil peace?
Proportional representation has practically been introduced only to strengthen alternative local leaders from among those who have been at the heart of power in Lebanon’s recent history. The power relations and balance have not only been founded on the principle of power-sharing among different religious groups, but these groups were endorsing the local leaders entrenched across the Lebanese territory. Although the «parties» resulting from the era of modernity entered Lebanon early with the formation of the state, they have always remained on the sidelines of the formation of power and the re-formulation of the centers of power within it.
The current election law, which some officials have described as «strange» and which was the outcome of last-minute negotiations, has pleased the large political blocs, on the one hand, and the local leaders, on the other. Thus, the upcoming elections will maintain political power based on the parties of traditional leaders who have derived their strength primarily from local entrenchment and secondly from sectarian entrenchment. The new social forces will remain on the sidelines of the formation of power as they have been in the past, leaving the arena open to traditional forces that could not or did not wish to take the country to the required political and social stability. The current sectarian conflict will carry on, if not be strengthened, as long as current proportional representation does not contribute to the building of cross-sectarian and cross-regional alliances based on party programs.
Given that the permanent civil peace is based on resolving conflicts through state institutions, headed by the executive and legislative branches, it will remain conditional on the current political tug of war.