Electoral System (Political)
According to Election Commission Thailand, the current election system in Thailand (Feb, 2011) consists of
500 of House of Representatives
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Source: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/politics
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Getting Prime Minister (PM) The house of representatives will elect who will be the Prime Minister of the country while the Senator will help balance the power when it comes to issuing new legislation, releasing the country's annual bill and also investigating affairs happening in the Parliament. |
Now let's think a bit....
What are the weaknesses of this electoral system which leads candidate to go buy votes from the people?
Can you think of an answer? In fact, there is no perfect electoral system in this world whether direct or indirect, all of them have weaknesses. However, it is not the system that fosters vote buying, it is how independent the organizations are. But in Thailand, the Election Commission applied the system into the action causing vote buying.
Many researchers such as Torsten Persson, Guido Tabellini, Francesco Trebbi, who wrote a paper called Electoral Rule and Corruption, found that the more distance in relationship there is between candidate and voters, the higher the chance that vote buying will occur/exist. Why? Because, since voters do not know much about the background, capabilities, achievements, past doings and etc. of the politicians, the candidates can use this gap to pitch promising campaigns.
Moreover, when it comes to party list, there are two drawbacks. First, people or supporters of each party do not have a choice to elect the potential candidate to be enlisted. The politicians in the list are selected by each party. By doing this, voters do not have a chance to get to know the enlisted politicians and more often than so voters are not even familiar with the candidates' names. . Secondly, most of the candidates in party's list are important to the party and are the first, second, third and so on in line to be elected as Prime Minister in the future if their parties win. Also, another policy that we fail to comprehend is the fact that there is no official debate held between potential future Prime Ministers.
These problems lead to the reduction of electoral and political involvement, opening the room for corrupted politicians to offer money or promising campaign to voters.
What are the weaknesses of this electoral system which leads candidate to go buy votes from the people?
Can you think of an answer? In fact, there is no perfect electoral system in this world whether direct or indirect, all of them have weaknesses. However, it is not the system that fosters vote buying, it is how independent the organizations are. But in Thailand, the Election Commission applied the system into the action causing vote buying.
Many researchers such as Torsten Persson, Guido Tabellini, Francesco Trebbi, who wrote a paper called Electoral Rule and Corruption, found that the more distance in relationship there is between candidate and voters, the higher the chance that vote buying will occur/exist. Why? Because, since voters do not know much about the background, capabilities, achievements, past doings and etc. of the politicians, the candidates can use this gap to pitch promising campaigns.
Moreover, when it comes to party list, there are two drawbacks. First, people or supporters of each party do not have a choice to elect the potential candidate to be enlisted. The politicians in the list are selected by each party. By doing this, voters do not have a chance to get to know the enlisted politicians and more often than so voters are not even familiar with the candidates' names. . Secondly, most of the candidates in party's list are important to the party and are the first, second, third and so on in line to be elected as Prime Minister in the future if their parties win. Also, another policy that we fail to comprehend is the fact that there is no official debate held between potential future Prime Ministers.
These problems lead to the reduction of electoral and political involvement, opening the room for corrupted politicians to offer money or promising campaign to voters.