Thai Parliament dissolved, new elections underway

[ag]

Some observations.

1.  According to Washington Post, Thai Rak Thai candidates were unopposed in a majority of districts because of the boycotte.  So, losing was not on the agenda anyway.

2. To be elected a candidate needs, besides a simple plurality of votes cast, the support of, at least, 20% of the total votes eligible. Thus, if the turnout is under 20% even an unopposed candidate is not elected.

3. In many of the districts where Thai Rak Thai is unopposed, it seems, the turnout is under 20%, so elections would have to be repeated there.

4. By Thai law, the parliament cannot be constituted, nor the government formed unless all members are elected.

5. If the opposition manages to repeatedly hold the turnout in at least 1 district to under 20%, it seems, there is a real constitutional crisis in the offing.

[ag]

Some observations.

1.  According to Washington Post, Thai Rak Thai candidates were unopposed in a majority of districts because of the boycotte.  So, losing was not on the agenda anyway.

2. To be elected a candidate needs, besides a simple plurality of votes cast, the support of, at least, 20% of the total votes eligible. Thus, if the turnout is under 20% even an unopposed candidate is not elected.

3. In many of the districts where Thai Rak Thai is unopposed, it seems, the turnout is under 20%, so elections would have to be repeated there.

4. By Thai law, the parliament cannot be constituted, nor the government formed unless all members are elected.

5. If the opposition manages to repeatedly hold the turnout in at least 1 district to under 20%, it seems, there is a real constitutional crisis in the offing.

Didn't the Ukraine have this problem in its first set or two of elections?

It was not uncommon in early post-Soviet elections - in Russia, as well as in the Ukraine - not to have all seats filled on the election day, even after the run-off (either because of the low turnout, or because of the large "non-of-the-above" vote). But this never really was a problem, since you only needed a simple majority of members elected for the parliament to be constituted. The Thai peculiarity seems to be that you cannot form the government unless ALL members are elected.

[ag]

According to BBC Thai Rak Thai has won 57% of the vote and 349 out of 500 seats (down from 377 last time). In 278 constituencies (out of 400 - another 100 seats are allocated by PR) their candidate was the only one because of the boycotte, though.

But in 38 constituencies the leading (probably, the only) candidate got the support of less then 20% of the total number of eligible voters. Most of these are in the opposition strongholds. These have to be filled within 30 days for the parliament to be constituted. The electoral commission is promising 2 rounds of by-elections within this period.  I have a feeling, there will be another election called in May.

[ag]

The Constitutional Court just nullified the election results and has called for new ones: http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/05/08/asia/web.0508thai.php

Looks like we'll finally get relatively fair elections now hopefully, and best of all, without Thaksin.

I don't think that an election without the man who would likely have won months ago even if the opposition had run can be described, with a straight face, as "fair".

What is your definition of a "fair election"?

[ag]

You clearly have a challenging definition . Unfortunately, full compliance would, in most cases, result in prolonged periods of no government whatsoever (frequent elections + PR + 50% vote requirement to establish a government - unless the country is as homogenous as a single rural Norwegian province, this is a recipe for a disaster). In fact, I would conjecture, that a fairly democratic country in your definition wouldn't have a government most of the time . Furthermore, who forms the government - when this actually happens - would, most of the time, be determined not by by the voter preferences but either by chance or by some unelected authority, such as an electoral commission (there are, in fact, very solid theoretical grounds why that's would be the case).  Actually, the old Athenian democracy by throughing lots would, probably, fit your bill the best.

[ag]

You clearly have a challenging definition . Unfortunately, full compliance would, in most cases, result in prolonged periods of no government whatsoever (frequent elections + PR + 50% vote requirement to establish a government - unless the country is as homogenous as a single rural Norwegian province, this is a recipe for a disaster). In fact, I would conjecture, that a fairly democratic country in your definition wouldn't have a government most of the time . Furthermore, who forms the government - when this actually happens - would, most of the time, be determined not by by the voter preferences but either by chance or by some unelected authority, such as an electoral commission (there are, in fact, very solid theoretical grounds why that's would be the case). 

The electoral commission? How so? (Oh and btw - inability to form a stable government is nothing a stable country can't handle. Hessen didn't have one for about two years in the early 80s. )

Because what you are describing is (for a bunch of theoretical reasons) bound to be extremely manipulable and dependent on all sorts of minor decisions by everyone and their grandmother. Basically, when no government can be formed subject to you constraints (that is, most of the time), something has to occur, and that something will be rather random, dependent on things you'd consider minor technicalities. Since the electoral commission has a key role in making technical decisions, de facto, most of the time it will be the commission that wil ldecide who rules without any reference to the voter will. In reality, the country will be ruled by unelected bureaucracy, since the elected representatives will be incapable of ruling. It won't exactly look like that, but that is what will really happen.

By the way, the country will only be stable if it has strong and legitimate bureaucracy. Few countries will remain stable under the circumstances.