How are party lists for elections formed in your country?

4 comments

1. Parties meet for regional party conferences in the 16 federal states and there the party delegates vote on the positions of the list.

   I believe often the state party leadership makes a proposal but it is not unco9that delegates deviate from that.

2. Varies between parties and areas a bit, but generally you’ll have the local party organisation making the decisions, but often there will be a committee and their proposition goes through 100%. Some parties have some candidates elected by members in some elections in some areas.

3. In Turkey, parties compete in general elections. They have a candidate list for each electoral district. Most electoral districts encompass an entire city, large metropolitan cities are divided into few electoral districts (three districts for Istanbul, with more than 16 million population in total).

   Among the parties, which had passed the electoral threshold of 7 percent national vote, each electoral districts’ available number of seats are divided between the parties in accordance with their share of vote in that electoral district. If Party A has obtained X number of seats in that district, the top X candidates in Party A’s list for that district become MP.

   The only national vote in Turkey is for electing the President of Turkey, which is done simultaneously with the general election, and that practice began in 2014. Before that, the President was elected only by the MP’s.

4. I don’t know exactly about national parties. Probably depends on the party. My best guess would be that most form a committee that decides who they accept for the list and what place they’ll be at and then the members can vote on it.

   As for local parties, at least speaking from my experience anyway: last election we also had one of those committees. They held interviews with each of the top candidates about their ambitions, what they could bring to the party, what their qualifications are, experience, etc. Then based on that they decide the order of the list. For list order you’ll generally want to take into account gender (you’ll usually want at least two women in the top 5 and preferably at least 1 in the top two) and for local elections also location. Age is another possible factor but that’s not listed on the ballot so more important in campaigning. Then at least in our case the candidates/members outside of the committee will also have a say.

   National parties will generally recruit from their members I assume. Local parties will also recruit from members if they have them but often also from members of the community. Especially in local elections it’s often also knowing someone who knows someone. I’m thinking about taking up the offer of an acquaintance of mine to get involved in municipal politics for example. And I know people who have had regional parties call them and ask if they’d like to be on their list for the upcoming election. They’ll generally cross levels as well, like if you’re in a local municipal party you might get asked to be on a list for the provincial government or water boards and the other way around.