Proportional electoral system with nationwide electoral district and territorial representation of the parliament - The cases of Serbia, the Netherlands and Israel

Abstract

This paper analyzes the problem of poor territorial representation of parliaments elected through a proportional electoral system with a nationwide electoral district. The subject of analysis are the representative bodies of Serbia, the Netherlands, and Israel, with the claim that their geographical representativeness is dominantly influenced by factors that have no direct connection with election rules, such as the ethnic diversity of society and the number of party lists that win seats in parliament. It is established that there is no single regularity that has an equal effect on the geographical composition of the parliament in each of these countries. Instead of that, the key factors of territorial representation are different depending on the social context in which the electoral system exists.