THE SELECTION OF AN ELECTORAL SYSTEM: LESS CONSENSUS, MORE HERESTHETICS

1. THE SELECTION OF AN ELECTORAL SYSTEM: LESS CONSENSUS, MORE HERESTHETICS José Ramón Montero Universidad Autónoma de Madrid and Instituto Juan March Ignacio Lago Universitat Pompeu Fabra

2. TOPIC OF THIS PAPER The Spanish electoral systems as a dependent variable, Or the preferences and strategies behind the choice of the electoral system for the Congress by party elites in the period 1976-1985.

3. Why electoral systems as dependent variables? • The most specifically manipulable instrument in the political system” – Sartori (1986: 273). • “Choosing the electoral system is one of the most important decisions –if not the single most important decision- of all the constitutional decisions facing democracies” – Lijphart (1992: 207). • The lack of “a substantial body of theoretically driven comparative work to explain why one electoral system is chosen over another” – Shugart (2005:21).

4. Why Spain? 1. The success of the present electoral systems in contrast with that of the Second Republic. • 2. First attempt of an analytical reconstruction of the preferences and strategies of Spanish parties regarding the choice of an electoral system. • Preferences are more complex than those deductive theories on the choice of electoral systems claim (i.e., Boix 1999).

5. THE SPANISH ELECTORAL SYSTEM, BY O. ALZAGA The Spanish electoral system is completely original (…) and rather Machiavellian. (…) This system, formally accorded between the pre-democratic government and the opposition forces, was designed by experts (…) whose real political aim was to draw up a law which would allow the government to obtain an absolute majority. Given that the pre-electoral surveys yielded UCD 36-37% of the votes, the aim was to design a law by which an absolute majority could be obtained by them with approximately that same percentage of votes. It would also include a mechanism that would partly favour rural areas, where according to the pre-electoral surveys the UCD had greater support than in industrial areas, the latter being where the Socialist Party had greater support (...). [Moreover,] the law sought to ensure that an absolute majority for the Socialist Party would require not 36-37% of the votes, but 39-40%.

6. STAGES IN THE SELECTION OF THE SPANISH ELECTORAL SYSTEM • January-June 1976: the initial formulation of still vague preferences under the government of Arias Navarro • * Manuel Fraga and the Consejo Nacional del Movimiento. • * Issues were centred on how to achieve best electoral results for themselves and the worts possible ones for their adversaries playing with magnitude of districts, small size of the Parliament, and provinces as constituencies.

7. STAGES IN THE SELECTION OF THE SPANISH ELECTORAL SYSTEM • The Ley para la Reforma Política: the crystallisation of preferences. • * Adolfo Suárez vis-à-vis the Francoist Cortes. • * The electoral system as “the most fundamental problem”. • * Issues were the general principle of PR and the “dipositivos correctores” for “avoiding inconvenient fragmentations of the Chambers” (and gaining support from procuradores).

8. STAGES IN THE SELECTION OF THE SPANISH ELECTORAL SYSTEM 3. The Decree-Law of March 1977: the birth of the electoral system. * Adolfo Suárez Adolfo Osorio, and representatives of the opposition parties. * Government’s preferences are definitively translated into specific rules. * Issues were their acceptance by the opposition parties, and the “appearances of a negotiation”.

9. STAGES IN THE SELECTION OF THE SPANISH ELECTORAL SYSTEM 4. Constitution (art. 68) and LOREG: Continuity * UCD, PSOE, and the politics of consensus. * Alzaga: “the formula reached was characteristically a compromise [on magnitude, provincial districts, and malapportionment]”. * Continuity as institutionalisation. * The “law” of the stability of electoral systems (Lijphart).

10. In conclusion… • More heresthetics than consensus: UCD was able to impose a particularly advantageous electoral system that at he same time was supported by all parties. • Preferences are usually endogeneous, and need to be analytically reconstructed. • Preferences are not per force solely instrumental. • And preferences and strategies are not independent from the context.