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If voters want their voices to count, they have to choose between two large, boring parties.
Excitable fringe groupings and a smallish third party, spread thinly across the country, struggle to make their mark.
In return for putting up with such rank unfairness, Britons are promised strong, stable governments that can get things done.
Plenty of countries have thought that trade-off worth copying.
But with three months to go until a general election, the mechanism is broken.
In 1951 the Conservative and Labour parties together scooped 97% of the vote; in May, opinion polls suggest, they will each win barely a third.
http://www.economist.com/news/leader...gitimacy-great
Excitable fringe groupings and a smallish third party, spread thinly across the country, struggle to make their mark.
In return for putting up with such rank unfairness, Britons are promised strong, stable governments that can get things done.
Plenty of countries have thought that trade-off worth copying.
But with three months to go until a general election, the mechanism is broken.
In 1951 the Conservative and Labour parties together scooped 97% of the vote; in May, opinion polls suggest, they will each win barely a third.
http://www.economist.com/news/leader...gitimacy-great