Small Margins, Major Implications
In recent years, election results in many of the world’s most important countries have led to major shifts in policy and major changes to the political and economic systems that have predominated in the world for many decades. When these election results have not led to major changes, they have often instead led to political gridlock, with presidential systems resulting in weak and ineffectual leaders and with parliamentary systems struggling to form stable and consequential governments as the number of political parties represented in the legislature keeps rising.
In fact, while policies and governments are changing dramatically, the elections that are producing these changes are often very close run affairs. As a result, massive political and economic changes are being implemented, or at least formulated, despite deeply divided electorates. As such, dissatisfaction with the resulting governments is rising and this is proving to be a major threat to the future of democracy.
There are many examples of how closely-fought elections are leading to major dramatic changes in political and economic policies in countries around the world. The most notable example is, of course, in the United States, where the populist Donald Trump has been attempting to dramatically change the direction of US policy in an array of fields ranging from the environment to free trade, despite losing the popular vote in last year’s election. Likewise, recent referendums in the United Kingdom and Turkey have led to dramatic changes for both countries, despite the fact that only a very small majority of voters backed these drastic changes in each referendum.
Historically, there are many other examples of very close-run elections leading to major shifts in policymaking, such as the Bush-Gore presidential election in the US in 2000. However, with the possible exception of a series of very close US presidential elections in the 1870s and 1880s, it is hard to find a time when so many important elections and referendums were being consistently decided by such narrow margins.
It is clear that recent trends in terms of the spread of information, changes in demographics and the expansion of the number of political parties and movements, is resulting in the creation of electorates that are increasingly divided and entrenched. At the same time, the number of voters who consider themselves to be centrists or independents is shrinking in most countries, further cementing the divided nature of these electorates. Meanwhile, voter turnout levels in many countries are on the decline, with only more hard-line voters turning out at high rates. Demographically, younger voters are tending to lean ever-more to the political left. However, older voters continue to lean to the political right on many issues, and as populations age, this voter segment is offsetting the leftwards shift of younger voters. Altogether, these changes are a major reason why elections have proven to be so close in so many countries in recent years.
This unprecedented run of close-fought elections offers grounds for both hope and concern. For example, the deep divisions that existed in the post-Civil-War United States and that led to so many close-run presidential elections were eventually overcome, allowing the US to finally reunite in the wake of the Civil War. Likewise, these close-run elections are boosting the level of political engagement for many segments of society and this could be the boost the democracy needs in the 21st century.
On the other side, the implementation of major political and economic changes without a strong mandate could prove to be very detrimental to the future of democracy. This is particularly true in countries with weak democratic institutions that are unable to prevent or moderate efforts to dramatically overall political and economic policy without a strong mandate from the public. Altogether, it appears that the recent run of tight election results is likely to continue as electorates become more entrenched and as presidential and parliamentary systems of government continue to grow more fragmented. This will be interesting for election-watchers, but potential dangerous for democracy.