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Originally Posted by ianch99
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You are factually incorrect. The UK's approach was perfectly standard, evidence based and well supported by research.
There is some relevant discussion here, from the Scottish Parliament, where such things are obviously of ongoing interest:
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http://www.parliament.scot/ResearchB.../PB19-1754.pdf
The Constitution Society argued in written evidence to the Independent Commission on Referendums that the UK’s ‘strong majoritarian tradition’ meant that referendum thresholds would be unlikely to command public support. The Independent Commission on Referendums noted in its report that “Though supermajority thresholds are used in legislatures in many countries for constitutional amendments...they are strikingly rare in referendums”. The Commission’s report recommended against the use of supermajority or thresholds in referendums in the UK.
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You last point is self evident: in a FPTP system, of course the two main parties would get the majority of the votes. That is the natural evolution of such an electoral system
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The strength of the system is that it forces major political parties to become broad coalitions. Arguments over policy take place within these parties prior to an election, and a manifesto is produced which the winning party can then be judged against.
Proportional systems encourage fragmentation of politics into narrow interest groups which then fight for influence after an election. The policy programme of the resulting coalition government is the result of closed-doors negotiations that take place after the election. It becomes increasingly difficult to hold any of the participants to account; it also becomes more difficult for the electorate to choose a radically different direction at the following election because many of the same small parties will still be courted for their support, in return for implementing aspects of their own agendas, even though those agendas received minimal electoral support.
Mass participation in a two party system is, I believe, better than the endless rainbow coalitions of PR.