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" GUYS THIS IS NON INFORMATIAL !!!!!!!!!!"''''Bold text Addressed to the anon: The changes you're making to "Variations and concept in-depth" are too verbose and stretch the definition beyond what anyone understands the definition to be. The "decision to have representatives" makes no sense, and is, at best, POV. Further, let's keep the verbosity out of this article. Let's let it settle down for a while. -- Stevietheman 19:36, 4 Aug 2004 (UTC)
It seems like the amount of text devoted to covering the situation in Sri Lanka in this article is a bit excessive, perhaps the result of someone applying his recent thesis? Either way, it feels very unencyclopedic for a general article and should probably be deleted.
— Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.146.21.117 ( talk) 13:24, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
As long as english is not my native language I cannot express my self easily
The definition of majority rule is : A rule that requires at least 50% plus one person of community members to agree and to vote for a measure in order for the whole community to make a decision on that measure. Also that majority is not allowed to prevent for a new majority to emerge anytime, thus not allowed to exclude any minority from democratic process.They dont fulfill the needs and wishes of minority.
So someone may say that representatives, as long as their role is obviously to decide for a measure before 50% of the people being asked or beeing able cast a vote for the specific measure, any decisions made by those representatives is against the 50% plus one rule. So the concept of representatives is against majority rule.
I the other hand, as long as the only restriction of majority rule is that majority is not allowed to prevent a new majority to emerge, it is possible for a majority to decide in favour of representatives or even in favor to monarchy and against majority rule. In that case, what I am trying to say is that in a pure majoritarian state, this new majority (which is against majority rule) is allowed to destroy majority rule and give full power to representatives or even to a king, but this very first majority decision (against majority rule) should be kept alive and respected and beeing able to change anytime, by any new majority that will be possibly emerge in futute. And also, any minority should not be exclude to vote using majority rule in this very first and last poll, that keeps the majoritarian state alive and running.
Even if too verbose, do you understand what I am trying to say?
We recently saw a lot of changes to this article that some may call "fast and loose". At any rate, since this article is relatively hardened, we need to take it slower and discuss any major changes before making them. Any major changes should be reverted that aren't discussed here first and also have the support of a consensus to include. I think this is fair.
That said, I believe the recent changes appeared to be very tilted toward a POV and also introduced a lot of questionable grammar that would have taken quite a bit of work to correct. Hopefully, the author will bring his material here and defend it. I'm (and I'm sure others) will be very open-minded to looking at it. -- Stevietheman 17:08, 3 Oct 2004 (UTC)
Just out of curiosity, where does the magic number "50%" come from? Are there articles on the various magic numbers used in voting? For example, many measures require "two-thirds majority" before they take effect; others require 100% Unanimity. -- DavidCary 18:35, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)
The article tyranny of the majority redirects here, but this article really does not seem to address that subject, which has nothing to do with debates over representative versus direct democracy. Someone redirected here from the link in judicial review is not likely to get very far in this article before stumbling over rare idioms like "initialized majoritarianism" and wondering "what the !@#$% is this nonsense?" (I admit to not having been a poli.sci. major, but I do take an interest in government and political philosophy and I have never heard or read that turn of phrase in my life.) 18.26.0.18 04:35, 16 Jan 2005 (UTC)
There have been recent concerns about original research in voting schemes which are alleged to have been contributed by user:iasson and his/her Wikipedia:sockpuppets. In a recent discussion thread, he boasted "I have created 11 voting theories in Wikipedia. Go find them and delete them all!" This article was edited by anonymous users who also contributed to some of the other suspect articles. As a result of that investigation, I am now questioning significant portions of this article. For example,
If anyone can definitively source the use of these terms and definitions, please do so either here or in the article. I do not pretend to be an expert in this field and look forward to learning more. However if they can not be independently sourced, they must be removed as unverifiable. Thanks.
By the way, I agree with the comment above that this article does not do a very good job of explaining tyranny of the majority. Either this article needs a significant rewrite (probably) or we need to find a better redirect. Rossami (talk) 00:18, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
The section on "Reform and Backlash" violates Wikipedia guidelines for NPOV. It is written in a partisan tone that reflects the author's bias in favour of majoritarianism. It can, however, be easily re-written so as to convey the polarity of majoritarianism vs. multiculturalism in an NPOV manner. I would urge the author to do so, so as to avert an edit war. Wandering Star 02:40, 28 February 2006 (UTC)
I know that the authors of Wikipedia's guidelines recommend against making sweeping criticisms about an article, but I find myself in a difficult situation. I am admittedly rather ignorant when it comes to majoritarianism -- or at least it's a term that doesn't pop up too often in my reading. However, I have read enough about voting theory to know that this article suffers from at least two major problems:
No doubt, part of the problem is that this article is entirely unsourced. This also makes it difficult for me to read about majoritarianism and offer criticism of this article that is more constructive. So can anyone recommend to me primary or secondary sources of information about majoritarianism? If you could recommend something that can be read for free on the Web or something I'm likely to find in a public library, that would be great. (I've googled, but that didn't lead to much that seemed relevant.) -- SgtSchumann ( talk) 23:49, 12 November 2008 (UTC)
I do agree with SgtSchumann that this article is quite confused. For a start the sentence "his traditional view has come under growing criticism and democracies have increasingly [...]" is historically wrong. In fact, in the constitutional debates in the US as well as in France the idea of human rights was put down (bill of rights; Déclaration des droits de l'homme et du citoyen) to prevent the "tyranny of the majority" as de Tocqueville put it. The awareness of this problem and was there from the first moments of modern democracy. Frankly, I have no idea where the authors of the quoted section and a few related parts want to go with this article. Are they proposing that the legal system accumulates legislation constraining present governments? Yes, of course this takes place but the legislative can simply replace it with new legislation. (This is of course different in those political systems where the executive is not elected by the majority of the parliament, e.g. the USA.) And if the executive decides to ignore existing legislation constraining government (e.g. because a 2/3 vote is required) they might get called back by some constitutional court (e.g. supreme court of the US or the Federal Constitutional Court of Germany). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.141.28.137 ( talk) 22:59, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
Here are some sources to help others improve this article (I don't expect to be putting any more work into this article myself).
First, Dictionaries:
Definitions noun
a form of democracy which upholds the rule of the majority Example Sentences Including 'majoritarianism'
The impact of this stultifying majoritarianism was the creation of a society that frowned on the liberty to be different. Roper, Jon DEMOCRACY AND ITS CRITICS - ANGLO-AMERICAN DEMOCRATIC THOUGHT IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY
Definition of MAJORITARIANISM
First Known Use of MAJORITARIANISM
1942
noun 1. rule by a majority, especially the belief that those constituting a simple majority should make the rules for all members of a group, nation, etc. Origin Expand 1960-19651960-65; majoritarian + -ism
Examples from the web for majoritarianism Expand Majority rule or government by the consent of the governed becomes a crude form of majoritarianism. While majority rule is the bedrock principle upon which democracy rests, simple majoritarianism has its own drawbacks.
Sources got by googling 'majoritarianism' in Google Books:
Correction: The 2 Essex University academics are just editors of the book. The Majoritarianism entry is by Dutch political scientist Arend Lijphart.
Tlhslobus ( talk) 17:07, 2 January 2015 (UTC) NOTHING IS INFORMATIAL BLAH! BLAH! BLAH! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 27.116.18.8 ( talk) 12:29, 13 July 2015 (UTC)
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An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect Dominant majority. Please participate in the redirect discussion if you wish to do so. signed, Rosguill talk 19:46, 13 January 2020 (UTC)
I believe a majoritarian
electoral system is one in which candidates require a majority of votes to be elected, such as a Two-Round (top two) or Instant Runoff. Yet this article asserts majoritarian systems use a mere plurality vote, which seems like an error:
"This should not be confused with the concept of a majoritarian electoral system, which is a simple electoral system that usually gives a majority of seats to the party with a plurality of votes. A parliament elected by this method may be called a majoritarian parliament (e.g., the Parliament of the United Kingdom and the Parliament of India)."
Parliament of the U.K. I don't believe is majoritarian electoral system as classified by political scientists, rather it's a plurality system—i.e. each representative can be elected without a majority vote.
Filingpro (
talk) 18:49, 29 September 2021 (UTC)
Hello, just a quick side note before I begin and that is that I am a new user so if I make mistakes please be patient this is in fact my first attempted edit. I believe this article should be merged with direct democracy because their is no real practical difference between the two. As mentioned the example in the majoritarian article Athenian Democracy is direct democracy and what makes it a direct democracy also by definition makes it majoritarian. Direct democracy and/or majoritarian democracies/societies are distinct from what we would call representative democracies which often have constitutional protections and judiciaries which can sideline or overthrow the people and reject their decisions. A classic example would be same-sex marriage as in ballot initiatives it failed the vast majority of times it was put on the ballot ( /info/en/?search=U.S._state_constitutional_amendments_banning_same-sex_unions) and that includes even if you include legalizations that were not via sate constitutional amendment ( https://www.cnn.com/2012/11/07/politics/pol-same-sex-marriage/index.html) and note where the CNN article mentions that they "lost at the ballot box more than 32 times" compared to the three states that legalized same sex marriage over the 32 who choose to ban it. However the will of the people at the time (it has not been put on the ballot since Obergefell) was overthrown via supreme court decisions such as Obergefell V. Hodges and Hollingsworth v. Perry. This was able to happen particularly because of the United States being a representative democracy and in many ways these judges are representatives. That the will of the people (which is always understood to mean the majority) was overthrown over constitutional concerns. The direct democracies article mentions referendums and initiatives and later lists these aspects of the United States that have semblance to a direct democracy or have direct democratic aspects to them. In other words in order for a direct democracy to vote everyone must vote (not through representatives but everyone (or at least every citizen or person with voting rights)) and what ever comes out of the voting becomes law via majority wins. Switzerland's Landsgemeinde system mentioned in the direct democracy article is another example which shows this where it is a direct democracy where the citizens vote and majority wins and then by definition is also majoritarian as is pretty much all other systems mentioned in the article of direct democracy and what makes them a direct democracy by definition also makes them majoritarian. So I hope to initiate the process to merge the Majoritarianism article to the Direct Democracy article and please respond with your doubts if you have any. Additionally since I am new and this is literally my first attempted edit I would invite more experienced users to make minor edits to my post to be more in compliance with Wikipedia's standards and let me know what they are so I can improve. — Preceding unsigned comment added by ALSBBAB1234 ( talk • contribs) 07:10, 8 April 2022 (UTC)
![]() | This article is rated Start-class on Wikipedia's
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" GUYS THIS IS NON INFORMATIAL !!!!!!!!!!"''''Bold text Addressed to the anon: The changes you're making to "Variations and concept in-depth" are too verbose and stretch the definition beyond what anyone understands the definition to be. The "decision to have representatives" makes no sense, and is, at best, POV. Further, let's keep the verbosity out of this article. Let's let it settle down for a while. -- Stevietheman 19:36, 4 Aug 2004 (UTC)
It seems like the amount of text devoted to covering the situation in Sri Lanka in this article is a bit excessive, perhaps the result of someone applying his recent thesis? Either way, it feels very unencyclopedic for a general article and should probably be deleted.
— Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.146.21.117 ( talk) 13:24, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
As long as english is not my native language I cannot express my self easily
The definition of majority rule is : A rule that requires at least 50% plus one person of community members to agree and to vote for a measure in order for the whole community to make a decision on that measure. Also that majority is not allowed to prevent for a new majority to emerge anytime, thus not allowed to exclude any minority from democratic process.They dont fulfill the needs and wishes of minority.
So someone may say that representatives, as long as their role is obviously to decide for a measure before 50% of the people being asked or beeing able cast a vote for the specific measure, any decisions made by those representatives is against the 50% plus one rule. So the concept of representatives is against majority rule.
I the other hand, as long as the only restriction of majority rule is that majority is not allowed to prevent a new majority to emerge, it is possible for a majority to decide in favour of representatives or even in favor to monarchy and against majority rule. In that case, what I am trying to say is that in a pure majoritarian state, this new majority (which is against majority rule) is allowed to destroy majority rule and give full power to representatives or even to a king, but this very first majority decision (against majority rule) should be kept alive and respected and beeing able to change anytime, by any new majority that will be possibly emerge in futute. And also, any minority should not be exclude to vote using majority rule in this very first and last poll, that keeps the majoritarian state alive and running.
Even if too verbose, do you understand what I am trying to say?
We recently saw a lot of changes to this article that some may call "fast and loose". At any rate, since this article is relatively hardened, we need to take it slower and discuss any major changes before making them. Any major changes should be reverted that aren't discussed here first and also have the support of a consensus to include. I think this is fair.
That said, I believe the recent changes appeared to be very tilted toward a POV and also introduced a lot of questionable grammar that would have taken quite a bit of work to correct. Hopefully, the author will bring his material here and defend it. I'm (and I'm sure others) will be very open-minded to looking at it. -- Stevietheman 17:08, 3 Oct 2004 (UTC)
Just out of curiosity, where does the magic number "50%" come from? Are there articles on the various magic numbers used in voting? For example, many measures require "two-thirds majority" before they take effect; others require 100% Unanimity. -- DavidCary 18:35, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)
The article tyranny of the majority redirects here, but this article really does not seem to address that subject, which has nothing to do with debates over representative versus direct democracy. Someone redirected here from the link in judicial review is not likely to get very far in this article before stumbling over rare idioms like "initialized majoritarianism" and wondering "what the !@#$% is this nonsense?" (I admit to not having been a poli.sci. major, but I do take an interest in government and political philosophy and I have never heard or read that turn of phrase in my life.) 18.26.0.18 04:35, 16 Jan 2005 (UTC)
There have been recent concerns about original research in voting schemes which are alleged to have been contributed by user:iasson and his/her Wikipedia:sockpuppets. In a recent discussion thread, he boasted "I have created 11 voting theories in Wikipedia. Go find them and delete them all!" This article was edited by anonymous users who also contributed to some of the other suspect articles. As a result of that investigation, I am now questioning significant portions of this article. For example,
If anyone can definitively source the use of these terms and definitions, please do so either here or in the article. I do not pretend to be an expert in this field and look forward to learning more. However if they can not be independently sourced, they must be removed as unverifiable. Thanks.
By the way, I agree with the comment above that this article does not do a very good job of explaining tyranny of the majority. Either this article needs a significant rewrite (probably) or we need to find a better redirect. Rossami (talk) 00:18, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
The section on "Reform and Backlash" violates Wikipedia guidelines for NPOV. It is written in a partisan tone that reflects the author's bias in favour of majoritarianism. It can, however, be easily re-written so as to convey the polarity of majoritarianism vs. multiculturalism in an NPOV manner. I would urge the author to do so, so as to avert an edit war. Wandering Star 02:40, 28 February 2006 (UTC)
I know that the authors of Wikipedia's guidelines recommend against making sweeping criticisms about an article, but I find myself in a difficult situation. I am admittedly rather ignorant when it comes to majoritarianism -- or at least it's a term that doesn't pop up too often in my reading. However, I have read enough about voting theory to know that this article suffers from at least two major problems:
No doubt, part of the problem is that this article is entirely unsourced. This also makes it difficult for me to read about majoritarianism and offer criticism of this article that is more constructive. So can anyone recommend to me primary or secondary sources of information about majoritarianism? If you could recommend something that can be read for free on the Web or something I'm likely to find in a public library, that would be great. (I've googled, but that didn't lead to much that seemed relevant.) -- SgtSchumann ( talk) 23:49, 12 November 2008 (UTC)
I do agree with SgtSchumann that this article is quite confused. For a start the sentence "his traditional view has come under growing criticism and democracies have increasingly [...]" is historically wrong. In fact, in the constitutional debates in the US as well as in France the idea of human rights was put down (bill of rights; Déclaration des droits de l'homme et du citoyen) to prevent the "tyranny of the majority" as de Tocqueville put it. The awareness of this problem and was there from the first moments of modern democracy. Frankly, I have no idea where the authors of the quoted section and a few related parts want to go with this article. Are they proposing that the legal system accumulates legislation constraining present governments? Yes, of course this takes place but the legislative can simply replace it with new legislation. (This is of course different in those political systems where the executive is not elected by the majority of the parliament, e.g. the USA.) And if the executive decides to ignore existing legislation constraining government (e.g. because a 2/3 vote is required) they might get called back by some constitutional court (e.g. supreme court of the US or the Federal Constitutional Court of Germany). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.141.28.137 ( talk) 22:59, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
Here are some sources to help others improve this article (I don't expect to be putting any more work into this article myself).
First, Dictionaries:
Definitions noun
a form of democracy which upholds the rule of the majority Example Sentences Including 'majoritarianism'
The impact of this stultifying majoritarianism was the creation of a society that frowned on the liberty to be different. Roper, Jon DEMOCRACY AND ITS CRITICS - ANGLO-AMERICAN DEMOCRATIC THOUGHT IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY
Definition of MAJORITARIANISM
First Known Use of MAJORITARIANISM
1942
noun 1. rule by a majority, especially the belief that those constituting a simple majority should make the rules for all members of a group, nation, etc. Origin Expand 1960-19651960-65; majoritarian + -ism
Examples from the web for majoritarianism Expand Majority rule or government by the consent of the governed becomes a crude form of majoritarianism. While majority rule is the bedrock principle upon which democracy rests, simple majoritarianism has its own drawbacks.
Sources got by googling 'majoritarianism' in Google Books:
Correction: The 2 Essex University academics are just editors of the book. The Majoritarianism entry is by Dutch political scientist Arend Lijphart.
Tlhslobus ( talk) 17:07, 2 January 2015 (UTC) NOTHING IS INFORMATIAL BLAH! BLAH! BLAH! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 27.116.18.8 ( talk) 12:29, 13 July 2015 (UTC)
Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified one external link on Majoritarianism. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
This message was posted before February 2018.
After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than
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An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect Dominant majority. Please participate in the redirect discussion if you wish to do so. signed, Rosguill talk 19:46, 13 January 2020 (UTC)
I believe a majoritarian
electoral system is one in which candidates require a majority of votes to be elected, such as a Two-Round (top two) or Instant Runoff. Yet this article asserts majoritarian systems use a mere plurality vote, which seems like an error:
"This should not be confused with the concept of a majoritarian electoral system, which is a simple electoral system that usually gives a majority of seats to the party with a plurality of votes. A parliament elected by this method may be called a majoritarian parliament (e.g., the Parliament of the United Kingdom and the Parliament of India)."
Parliament of the U.K. I don't believe is majoritarian electoral system as classified by political scientists, rather it's a plurality system—i.e. each representative can be elected without a majority vote.
Filingpro (
talk) 18:49, 29 September 2021 (UTC)
Hello, just a quick side note before I begin and that is that I am a new user so if I make mistakes please be patient this is in fact my first attempted edit. I believe this article should be merged with direct democracy because their is no real practical difference between the two. As mentioned the example in the majoritarian article Athenian Democracy is direct democracy and what makes it a direct democracy also by definition makes it majoritarian. Direct democracy and/or majoritarian democracies/societies are distinct from what we would call representative democracies which often have constitutional protections and judiciaries which can sideline or overthrow the people and reject their decisions. A classic example would be same-sex marriage as in ballot initiatives it failed the vast majority of times it was put on the ballot ( /info/en/?search=U.S._state_constitutional_amendments_banning_same-sex_unions) and that includes even if you include legalizations that were not via sate constitutional amendment ( https://www.cnn.com/2012/11/07/politics/pol-same-sex-marriage/index.html) and note where the CNN article mentions that they "lost at the ballot box more than 32 times" compared to the three states that legalized same sex marriage over the 32 who choose to ban it. However the will of the people at the time (it has not been put on the ballot since Obergefell) was overthrown via supreme court decisions such as Obergefell V. Hodges and Hollingsworth v. Perry. This was able to happen particularly because of the United States being a representative democracy and in many ways these judges are representatives. That the will of the people (which is always understood to mean the majority) was overthrown over constitutional concerns. The direct democracies article mentions referendums and initiatives and later lists these aspects of the United States that have semblance to a direct democracy or have direct democratic aspects to them. In other words in order for a direct democracy to vote everyone must vote (not through representatives but everyone (or at least every citizen or person with voting rights)) and what ever comes out of the voting becomes law via majority wins. Switzerland's Landsgemeinde system mentioned in the direct democracy article is another example which shows this where it is a direct democracy where the citizens vote and majority wins and then by definition is also majoritarian as is pretty much all other systems mentioned in the article of direct democracy and what makes them a direct democracy by definition also makes them majoritarian. So I hope to initiate the process to merge the Majoritarianism article to the Direct Democracy article and please respond with your doubts if you have any. Additionally since I am new and this is literally my first attempted edit I would invite more experienced users to make minor edits to my post to be more in compliance with Wikipedia's standards and let me know what they are so I can improve. — Preceding unsigned comment added by ALSBBAB1234 ( talk • contribs) 07:10, 8 April 2022 (UTC)