Presentation within the Roundtable “Possibility of Introducing a Proportional Electoral System with Direct Candidate Voting in Serbia: Advantages and Disadvantages”
Within parts of the academic community, as well as among certain political actors, there exists an overabundance of optimism and a belief in a strict determinism between electoral system reform and the resolution of a specific set of problems in our political life. However, the extent to which a particular institutional design will demonstrate its potential positive and negative effects when implemented under real-world conditions is far from straightforward and depends on a multitude of factors.
To begin with, it is frequently argued that introducing direct voting for candidates in local constituencies would cause citizens to decide primarily on the basis of the individual candidates offered from their local communities. On the other hand, we see that even in countries with deeply established majoritarian electoral systems, party identification—along with party leaders and platforms—continues to play an exceptionally dominant role. The election results in the United States and the United Kingdom demonstrate this quite clearly.
Proponents of reform emphasize that the current system lacks a link between voters and their elected representatives. Members of parliament themselves confirm in surveys that it is unclear to them whom they represent. Nevertheless, there is no real justification for this stance among MPs. Nothing in either current law or political practice prevents them right now from communicating with citizens in their local communities and fighting to solve their problems. Indeed, positive examples exist in certain parts of Serbia where MPs maintain strong connections with voters from their respective towns and municipalities.
Furthermore, the expectation is that because people know each other at the local level, voters will be guided exclusively by a candidate’s actual qualities—such as expertise, track record, integrity, and community reputation—thereby using this competition to curb the rise of “local sheriffs.” However, even with small constituencies, if a local environment lacks free media and a vibrant civil society to mediate between citizens seeking accountability and those representing them, we will inevitably revert to the present situation.
The advantages of establishing a large number of constituencies are also frequently cited in terms of electoral geography. Yet it is precisely in this segment that one of the greatest challenges arises: how to regulate the representation of the territory of Kosovo and Metohija. This shortcoming would be heavily highlighted in any future public debate, and failing to find a viable solution would significantly diminish the appeal of the entire proposal.
Despite all of the above, the proposal to transition to a proportional electoral system with direct candidate voting—modeled after the system in Slovenia—remains a solid basis to open new perspectives and provide positive incentives. It can help us incrementally address existing problems. The system offers viable answers to two of the largest current issues: centralization and the degradation of the position of MPs. Nothing can be transformed overnight, but our society undeniably needs a step forward in this area.
It is simply a matter of tempering the expectations surrounding electoral system reform. There is no constitutional or legal mechanism that could, for instance, prevent the practices currently employed by the Serbian Progressive Party. When a political system and society as a whole face problems of this magnitude, they cannot be erased simply by altering institutional design.
Currently, two favorable social conditions increase the likelihood of achieving electoral reform in the foreseeable future. The first is that citizens in every survey articulate a clear need for change in this domain. A high percentage report that they do not know who represents them in parliament today and express a desire for their voice to be heard more directly. The second is that when conducting research among MPs, representatives of nearly all political options express a positive attitude toward electoral reform in interviews. A consensus has existed for quite some time among actors dealing with this topic that, in principle, the proportional system should be retained while simultaneously moving toward some form of personalization and direct voting for candidates.
The strongest opponents of introducing such a system would be party oligarchies, but the aforementioned consensus could eventually overcome their resistance—especially if party leaderships are reassured that, following reform, negative consequences for their positions are unlikely to manifest for at least one or two election cycles.