Andrew Coyne : The fearmongers debunked

Andrew Coyne is back with another article arguing in favour of the mixed member proportional electoral system. This time, Mr. Coyne targets the myths that the group who advocate for the first-past-the-post system have dreamt up. Dreamt up, that is, after having long given up actually defending the first-past-the-post electoral system.

Indeed, apologists for the status quo have more or less given up arguing for first past the post on its merits. The pretense that it delivers “stable majorities” can no longer be sustained: recent elections in Ontario have produced, in order, NDP, Conservative, and Liberal governments, none with a majority of the votes, yet each interpreting the support of its own minority as a mandate to impose a succession of radically different policy regimes on the rest of us.

So instead first-past-the-posties have focused on raising fears about the alternative. These fall into two broad categories: fears about proportional representation in general, and fears about mixed-member proportional in particular.

Mr. Coyne systematically debunks the myths. His posts, as always, are worth the read.