Elections where the winning party lost the popular vote.
       |           

Welcome, Guest. Please login or register.
Did you miss your activation email?
March 19, 2024, 04:30:35 AM
News: Election Simulator 2.0 Released. Senate/Gubernatorial maps, proportional electoral votes, and more - Read more

  Talk Elections
  General Politics
  International General Discussion (Moderators: afleitch, Hash)
  Elections where the winning party lost the popular vote.
« previous next »
Pages: [1] 2 3
Author Topic: Elections where the winning party lost the popular vote.  (Read 16208 times)
Sakrum
Newbie
*
Posts: 8
United States


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« on: January 19, 2015, 08:48:31 AM »

Sorry if this topic has been done before, but I did a search and didn't see anything, so like the thread's title asks: What are some elections where a political party won the most seats in a legislature, but lost the popular vote?

Pretty much all the examples I could find were from Canada, the UK, and the US. That's because these places still use the FPTP voting system, which can allow a political party to become the majority in its state/provincial/territorial delegation, or even win an overall election and take power, despite coming in second place.

I'm sure there's more, but here's some examples I found (organized by country):

Canada

British Columbia Provincial Elections, 1996

The NDP is re-elected to government with 39 seats, 6 more than the Liberals. However, the latter party receives over 37,000 more votes.

Quebec Provincial Elections, 1998

The Parti Quebecois is re-elected with almost 30 more seats than the Liberals, 76-48. This is despite the fact Liberal candidates received over 27,000 more votes.

Federal Elections in Quebec, 2000

Pretty similiar to the 1998 provincial election. Almost 152,000 more Quebecers vote for Liberal candidates to reperesent them in Ottawa than they do for the Bloc, but the nationalists again win more seats (38-36).

New Brunswick Provincial Elections, 2006

Shawn Graham is elected Premier, with his party (the Liberals) getting 29 seats. However, the Progressive Conservatives win about 1,334 more votes, but only 26 are elected.

---

United Kingdom

General Elections, 1929

Labour wins 287 seats, despite the Tories getting over 203,000 more votes, but only 260 are elected.

General Elections, 1951

Winston Churchill is re-elected as Prime Minister, with the Conservatives and their allies the National Liberals winning 321 seats. This is despite Labour candidates receiving over 230,000 more votes, and only 295 going to Westminster.

General Elections, Feb. 1974

Harold Wilson is elected as Prime Minister with a minority government, with 4 more seats than the Tories (301-297). This is despite the latter party receiving over 226,000 more votes.

General Elections in England, 2005

Even though Labour wins the most seats in England (286) over 64,000 more English voters cast their ballot for a Conservative candidate, but only 194 are sent to Westminster (although Labour still wins the popular vote UK-wide).

---

United States

U.S. House of Representatives, 1942

Democrats keep their House majority, despite over a million more ballots being cast for Republican candidates.

U.S. House of Representatives, 1952

Republicans take back the House with 221 seats, despite Democratic candidates receiving almost 249,000 more votes.

U.S. House of Representatives 1996

Both parties get about 48.2% of the national vote, with less than 60,000 votes between them, and it's a virtual tie. Even though Democrats win more votes, it's not enough for them to take back the House, and the Republicans keep their majority.

U.S. House of Representatives, 2012

Democrats win about 1.4 Million more votes, but because of gerrymandering, flaws in the FPTP system in general, and the relatively close national vote (48.8% D to 47.6% R), Republicans keep their majority.

Any more examples, or thoughts on these election results?
Logged
Helsinkian
Jr. Member
***
Posts: 1,824
Finland


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #1 on: January 19, 2015, 01:18:04 PM »
« Edited: January 19, 2015, 01:20:30 PM by Helsinkian »

I know at least one example from a proportional system:

Finland

Parliamentary election, 1929

Social Democrats get most votes (27.4 percent), while the Agrarian League comes second (26.2 percent). However, the Agrarian League gets 60 seats, while the Social Democrats get 59 seats.

(Yay, first post!)
Logged
Famous Mortimer
WillipsBrighton
Junior Chimp
*****
Posts: 6,010
United States


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #2 on: January 19, 2015, 01:35:14 PM »

The HUGE one is South Africa 1948, when the National Party won despite losing the popular vote by 10%.
Logged
Famous Mortimer
WillipsBrighton
Junior Chimp
*****
Posts: 6,010
United States


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #3 on: January 19, 2015, 01:40:33 PM »

Also, in Sri Lanka 1970, the United National Party won a plurality but actually came in third in terms of seats.

This was due to an electoral pact between the Sri Lanka Freedom and a Trotskyite party. That alliance together won even more than UNP, so it wasn't totally unfair in this case.
Logged
Stand With Israel. Crush Hamas
Ray Goldfield
Junior Chimp
*****
Posts: 7,559


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #4 on: January 19, 2015, 01:42:50 PM »

I know a few election cycles ago in Israel, Kadima won the most seats by a narrow margin over Likud, but the right wing had scored a clear majority in the Knesset. Thus despite having a plurality, Livni wasn't asked to form a government as she had no chance at success.

This seems like it's more common in a parliamentary system, where it's the winning bloc that matters, not the party.
Logged
Famous Mortimer
WillipsBrighton
Junior Chimp
*****
Posts: 6,010
United States


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #5 on: January 19, 2015, 01:53:04 PM »

I know a few election cycles ago in Israel, Kadima won the most seats by a narrow margin over Likud, but the right wing had scored a clear majority in the Knesset. Thus despite having a plurality, Livni wasn't asked to form a government as she had no chance at success.

This seems like it's more common in a parliamentary system, where it's the winning bloc that matters, not the party.

That's a different issue entirely and it's way more common. Social Democrats in Scandinavia basically always come in first in every election but they don't always form a government for this reason.

I think OP was talking about winning the most seats (regardless of whether they form a government or not) but getting less votes than another party. In order for this to happen, you basically HAVE to have FPTP, or at least mixed member PR with some of the members elected via FPTP.

The recent Ukrainian election saw the Popular Front win the most votes of any party but the Poroshenko Bloc won more seats because they were a close second but won way more FPTP constituency seats. Even this is somewhat less dramatic and outrageous though as when you combine the party list votes with the constituency votes, Poroshenko Bloc deserved to come in first.

Really truly undemocratic sh!t only happens with pure FPTP.
Logged
🦀🎂🦀🎂
CrabCake
Atlas Icon
*****
Posts: 19,181
Kiribati


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #6 on: January 19, 2015, 01:53:12 PM »

Malaysia 2013

The conservative Barisan Nasional (dominated by the Malay ethnic party) fell below the opposition alliance (a trio of equal size parties - the moderate Islamists of PAS, the liberals of the PJP and the leftists of DAP) for the first time in the history of Malaysian democracy, but the BN still enjoyed a healthy 133 - 89 margin.

South Australia 2010 and 2014

For two elections running, the South Australian Labour party has trailed the LNP in the TPP vote, but still have remained in government. The Liberals keep running up their margins in the base, but cannot quite grab the all important marginals.

Queensland under Joh Bjelke Petersen was also amusingly gerrymandered to the benefit of rurals, so the ALP often won the popular vote but was kept out of office.
Logged
Velasco
andi
Junior Chimp
*****
Posts: 5,681
Western Sahara


WWW Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #7 on: January 19, 2015, 03:04:44 PM »


I think OP was talking about winning the most seats (regardless of whether they form a government or not) but getting less votes than another party. In order for this to happen, you basically HAVE to have FPTP, or at least mixed member PR with some of the members elected via FPTP.


Not really. Malapportionment can produce that type of results in PR systems. I can provide you several examples of regional elections held in Spain (PR-D'Hondt in all cases).

Basque Country, 1986

Basque Nationalis Party (PNV) gets 23.71% of the vote and wins 17 seats; Basque Socialists (PSE-EE) come second getting 22.05% and winning 19 seats.

Reason: Every one of the three provinces returns 25 seats to the Basque Parliament regardless of population. The population of Biscay is nearly 4 times higher than the population of Álava, and it happens that is in Biscay where the PNV is traditionally stronger.

PNV and PSE formed a coalition government with a nationalist premier.

Catalonia 1999 and 2003

1999: Pasqual Maragall, of the Socialist's Party of Catalonia (PSC), challenges patriarch Jordi Pujol, of the Convergence and Union (CiU) nationalist federation.

The alliance led by PSC gets 37.85% of the popular vote and wins 52 seats; the CiU gets 37.7% and wins 56 seats.

Jordi Pujol remains as premier propped up by the People's Party.

2003: Pasqual Maragall runs again for the PSC, whereas Jordi Pujol is replaced by Artur Mas in CiU.

PSC gets 31.16% of the vote and wins 42 seats; CiU gets 30.94% and wins 46.

PSC, ERC and ICV formed a coalition government and Pasqual Maragall is elected premier.

Reason: Inner Catalan provinces (Girona, Lleida and Tarragona) are overrepresented in the Parliament of Catalonia. The Barcelona province has nearly 3/4 of the population, but only returns 63% of the seats (85/135). PSC was traditionally stronger than CiU in Barcelona, whereas the inner provinces use to lean nationalist.

However, the more surrealistic examples of results distorted by malapportionment can be found in the Canarian regional elections. I'll put a sample, although in this case the result was a draw in terms of parliamentary seats.

Canarian parliamentary election, 2011:

People's Party (PP) gets 31.84% winning 21 seats; the Canary Coalition (CC) gets 24.89% and wins 21 seats.

CC and PSOE deal a coalition government.

Reason: the allocation of seats in the Canary Islands Parliament follows a principle called "triple parity", with the result of a huge disproportion in the 'cost' of a seat between the different electoral districts (in this case islands instead of provinces). In other words, a seat in the most populated island represents about 20 times more votes than a seat in the less populated.
Logged
Boston Bread
New Canadaland
YaBB God
*****
Posts: 3,636
Canada


Political Matrix
E: -5.00, S: -5.00

Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #8 on: January 19, 2015, 06:54:41 PM »
« Edited: January 19, 2015, 06:56:58 PM by New Canadaland »

In Alberta 1921 the United Farmers won a majority government despite trailing 34-29 to the liberals.
Come to think of it, 29% is the lowest vote % that has gotten a party a majority of seats in any election I can think of.
Logged
jaichind
Atlas Star
*****
Posts: 27,051
United States


Political Matrix
E: 9.03, S: -5.39

Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #9 on: January 19, 2015, 07:31:00 PM »

Australia 1969 (in 2PP vote)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_federal_election,_1969

Australia 1990 (in 2PP vote)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_federal_election,_1990

Australia 1998 (in 2PP vote)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_federal_election,_1998
Logged
RogueBeaver
Atlas Star
*****
Posts: 20,058
Canada
Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #10 on: January 19, 2015, 07:43:51 PM »

Some Canadian examples.

BC 1952: Socreds won 19 seats and 27.48% to the CCF's 18 seats and 34.3%. Formed a minority government.

Ontario 1919: United Farmers win 44/111 seats despite winning 21.9% of the vote, compared to the incumbent Tories' 34.9% and 25 seats.

Quebec 1966: Unionists win a majority with 57/108 seats and 40.71% to the outgoing Liberals' 47.29% and 50 seats.

Canada 1925: Mackenzie King's Liberals win 101 seats and 39.74% to the Tories' 46.13% and 116 seats. King formed a minority government with Progressive and independent support.

Canada 1957: Liberals win 40.5% and 105 seats to the Tories' 112 seats and 38.5%.

Canada 1979: Tories win 136 seats and 35.89% to the Liberals' 114 seats and 40.11%.

Logged
jaichind
Atlas Star
*****
Posts: 27,051
United States


Political Matrix
E: 9.03, S: -5.39

Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #11 on: January 19, 2015, 08:01:11 PM »

Japan 2010 upper house elections

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_House_of_Councillors_election,_2010

In the prefecture district seats the ruling DPJ-PNP won 39.25% of the vote but won only 28 seats versus the LDP-NKP-NRP who got 38.33% of the vote but won 42 seats.  This is mostly because DPJ nominated 2 candidates in a bunch of 2 seat districts in an attempt wipe out the LDP-NKP-NRP there.  It failed but these extra candidates where able to help push up the vote share for DPJ-PNP even in an election where DPJ-PNP lost the election.
Logged
Knives
solopop
Jr. Member
***
Posts: 1,460
Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #12 on: January 20, 2015, 12:13:54 AM »

uhhhhm 2000 Presidential Election...
Logged
Beezer
Jr. Member
***
Posts: 1,902


Political Matrix
E: 1.61, S: -2.17

Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #13 on: January 20, 2015, 05:02:42 AM »
« Edited: January 20, 2015, 05:05:38 AM by Beezer »

In 2009, the CDU/FDP coalition got a majority of the seats in the Schleswig-Holstein state parliament despite winning fewer votes than the remaining parties in parliament. This was due to the overhang seats obtained by the CDU and the insufficient number of neutralizing seats given to the other parties.

CDU + FDP = 46.4% and 48 out of 95 seats
SPD/Greens/Left Party/SSW = 48.1% and 47 out of 95 seats
Logged
YL
YorkshireLiberal
YaBB God
*****
Posts: 3,507
United Kingdom


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #14 on: January 20, 2015, 05:36:04 AM »

South Australia 2010 and 2014

For two elections running, the South Australian Labour party has trailed the LNP in the TPP vote, but still have remained in government. The Liberals keep running up their margins in the base, but cannot quite grab the all important marginals.

Queensland under Joh Bjelke Petersen was also amusingly gerrymandered to the benefit of rurals, so the ALP often won the popular vote but was kept out of office.

That was once the case in South Australia too (the "Playmander").  Indeed it seems to have been something the Australian Right were rather keen on.
Logged
Phony Moderate
Obamaisdabest
Atlas Icon
*****
Posts: 12,298
United States


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #15 on: January 20, 2015, 06:45:37 AM »

The technical term is 'spurious majority' I believe.
Logged
muon2
Moderators
Atlas Icon
*****
Posts: 16,778


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #16 on: January 20, 2015, 09:05:56 AM »

There are generally two categories of circumstances where this happens.

One is where the districts are malapportioned so that there are more voters per seat in the jurisdictions favoring the popular vote winner. It can be due to constitutional apportionments, so it becomes a structural feature of that legislature. It can also be due to party strategies in multimember districts. This tends to be the cause of a spurious majority in PR-based elections. Its occurrence in US districts before 1960 gave rise to the one-man-one-vote decisions.

The other one is where the partisan voters of one party are inefficiently distributed. It can be a natural geographic occurrence, such as when one party has a primarily urban (or rural) base. It can also be the result of successful gerrymandering to pack one party's base into as few districts as possible. This tends to be the cause in FPTP-based elections. OH in 2012 is a good example of both gerrymandering and natural inefficiency combining to give the Pubs 12 of 16 House seats as Obama won the state overall.
Logged
MaxQue
Atlas Icon
*****
Posts: 12,588
Canada


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #17 on: January 20, 2015, 02:55:12 PM »

In Canada and its provinces it's almost always the latter case. Quebec is quite prone to it because of English-speaking areas, which are very Liberal.
Logged
Citizen Hats
lol-i-wear-hats
Jr. Member
***
Posts: 680
Canada


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #18 on: January 20, 2015, 03:22:46 PM »

BC 1952 was a minority government
Logged
Insula Dei
belgiansocialist
YaBB God
*****
Posts: 4,326
Belgium


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #19 on: January 20, 2015, 04:25:34 PM »

There are generally two categories of circumstances where this happens.

One is where the districts are malapportioned so that there are more voters per seat in the jurisdictions favoring the popular vote winner. It can be due to constitutional apportionments, so it becomes a structural feature of that legislature. It can also be due to party strategies in multimember districts. This tends to be the cause of a spurious majority in PR-based elections. Its occurrence in US districts before 1960 gave rise to the one-man-one-vote decisions.

The other one is where the partisan voters of one party are inefficiently distributed. It can be a natural geographic occurrence, such as when one party has a primarily urban (or rural) base. It can also be the result of successful gerrymandering to pack one party's base into as few districts as possible. This tends to be the cause in FPTP-based elections. OH in 2012 is a good example of both gerrymandering and natural inefficiency combining to give the Pubs 12 of 16 House seats as Obama won the state overall.

Not running a full slate of candidates can help as well.
Logged
Famous Mortimer
WillipsBrighton
Junior Chimp
*****
Posts: 6,010
United States


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #20 on: January 20, 2015, 06:21:20 PM »

There are generally two categories of circumstances where this happens.

One is where the districts are malapportioned so that there are more voters per seat in the jurisdictions favoring the popular vote winner. It can be due to constitutional apportionments, so it becomes a structural feature of that legislature. It can also be due to party strategies in multimember districts. This tends to be the cause of a spurious majority in PR-based elections. Its occurrence in US districts before 1960 gave rise to the one-man-one-vote decisions.

The other one is where the partisan voters of one party are inefficiently distributed. It can be a natural geographic occurrence, such as when one party has a primarily urban (or rural) base. It can also be the result of successful gerrymandering to pack one party's base into as few districts as possible. This tends to be the cause in FPTP-based elections. OH in 2012 is a good example of both gerrymandering and natural inefficiency combining to give the Pubs 12 of 16 House seats as Obama won the state overall.

Not running a full slate of candidates can help as well.

Yep, that's what happened in the Sri Lanka case I mentioned.
Logged
Smid
Junior Chimp
*****
Posts: 6,151
Australia


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #21 on: January 20, 2015, 10:07:40 PM »

South Australia 2010 and 2014

For two elections running, the South Australian Labour party has trailed the LNP in the TPP vote, but still have remained in government. The Liberals keep running up their margins in the base, but cannot quite grab the all important marginals.

Queensland under Joh Bjelke Petersen was also amusingly gerrymandered to the benefit of rurals, so the ALP often won the popular vote but was kept out of office.

That was once the case in South Australia too (the "Playmander").  Indeed it seems to have been something the Australian Right were rather keen on.

Nothing to do with the Australian Right. In Queensland, Bjelke-Petersen merely extended what had been initially instituted by the Labor Party, who allowed regional cities such as Rockhampton, Mackay, Cairns, Townsville, etc, to be under-represented (incidentally, Labor polled very well in the regional cities at that time). Bjelke-Petersen extended it to include rural areas as well as regional cities (and rural areas to be over-represented even more than the regional cities were), but it was still Labor that had introduced this malapportionment.
Logged
Tender Branson
Mark Warner 08
Atlas Institution
*****
Posts: 58,172
Austria


Political Matrix
E: -6.06, S: -4.84

Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #22 on: January 21, 2015, 11:04:00 AM »

In 2 federal elections in the 1950s, the SPÖ won the popular vote but the ÖVP got a seat more.
Logged
solarstorm
solarstorm2012
Jr. Member
***
Posts: 1,637
United States
Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #23 on: February 15, 2015, 08:15:44 PM »

In 2009, the CDU/FDP coalition got a majority of the seats in the Schleswig-Holstein state parliament despite winning fewer votes than the remaining parties in parliament. This was due to the overhang seats obtained by the CDU and the insufficient number of neutralizing seats given to the other parties.

CDU + FDP = 46.4% and 48 out of 95 seats
SPD/Greens/Left Party/SSW = 48.1% and 47 out of 95 seats

There were two further elections in Schleswig-Holstein where the winner lost:

In 1987, the formation of government ended in deadlock.
The SPD had 36 seats and the SSW (which is not bound to the 5% threshold) 1 seat in the state parliament, tying with the CDU (33 seats) and the FDP (4 seats).
The SSW representative refused to back any CDU candidate due to the "Barschel affair" (the German Watergate scandal). As a result, Interior Minister Henning Schwarz administered the official duties of the minister president till the new elections one year later, where the same SPD candidate, Björn Engholm, won.

In 1992, Engholm stayed minister president without forming a coalition government, even though the other parties represented in the state parliament received more votes in total:
SPD           46,20     45
CDU           33,84     32
DVU            6,27       6
FDP             5,58       5
SSW           1,90       1
That's because the Greens just missed the 5% threshold with 4,97%.
Logged
Barnes
Roy Barnes 2010
Junior Chimp
*****
Posts: 6,556


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #24 on: February 15, 2015, 11:14:56 PM »
« Edited: February 16, 2015, 12:30:22 AM by Barnes »

The Georgia Gubernatorial Election of 1966

Lester Maddox (Dem) - 450,626
Bo Callaway (Rep) - 453, 665
Ellis Arnall (Dem, write-in) - 69,025

A bitter Democratic primary between Maddox and Arnall - representing the conservative and liberal wings of the party, respectively - led to Arnall leading an insurgent write-in campaign.  At the same time, Callaway, marking a resurgent Republican Party in Georgia, became the party's first viable candidate for Governor in living memory.

As a result, the three-way contest failed to produce a winner with an overall majority.  At the time, if a candidate failed to win a majority at the election, the General Assembly would choose the governor - much as the federal House of Representatives still does under the electoral college.  

Of course, Democrats made up the overwhelming faction of the legislature at the time and easily chose Maddox as Governor, even though he won 3,000 fewer votes than Callaway.

EDIT: Just remembered that this is technically the International General Discussion board, but I thought this result was too interesting to fail to mention.
Logged
Pages: [1] 2 3  
« previous next »
Jump to:  


Login with username, password and session length

Terms of Service - DMCA Agent and Policy - Privacy Policy and Cookies

Powered by SMF 1.1.21 | SMF © 2015, Simple Machines

Page created in 0.06 seconds with 11 queries.