French and British elections show the flaws of single-choice voting and runoffs

While Americans were celebrating our republic on July 4, the United Kingdom was voting in the “most disproportionate election in history”. Three days later, France held delayed runoffs for its legislative elections, asking voters to turn out a second time to vote in the same races. Understanding the dynamics of these elections show why both voting methods are flawed – and why ranked choice voting (RCV) in multi-member districts offers a better way forward.

Vote-splitting skews representation in British elections

Like American elections, British elections use single-choice voting, where the candidate with the most votes wins even if they receive a small plurality of the vote. Yet unlike Americans, who overwhelmingly vote for one of the two major parties, British voters often split their votes across many different parties.

The latest British election helps illustrate how single-choice voting often produces unrepresentative results when voters have more than two choices on the ballot. The Labour Party won 411 seats in the 650-seat House of Commons, which is over 63% of the seats. However, Labour candidates won just 34% of the vote nationally, the largest gap between a winning party’s vote and seat share in British history.

Unrepresentative elections aren’t new for the United Kingdom. In the 21 British elections since 1945, there have been 18 in which a party won a majority of seats without a majority votes. Notably, in 2015, the Conservative Party won a majority of seats with only 37% of the vote. 

This happens because the UK’s single-choice voting method can’t accommodate voters having so many choices. In the 2024 election, there were five notable parties in England, Wales, and Scotland (the Labour Party, Conservative Party, Liberal Democrats, Reform Party, and Green Party). In addition, the Scottish National Party and Plaid Cymru fielded candidates in Scotland and Wales, respectively. In Northern Ireland, there is a completely different set of political parties – six of which performed well enough to win at least one seat.

A major dynamic in the 2024 election was the rise of Reform, a party to the right of the Conservatives. Reform received 14.3% of the vote, in third place behind Labour and the Conservatives. According to Sir John Curtice, a BBC polling expert, “most [Reform voters] certainly voted Conservative in 2019.” Despite its vote share, Reform only received five seats, which is 0.8% of the seats in the House of Commons. Put another way, Reform averaged one seat for every 800,000 votes it received – compared to Labour, which won a seat for every 24,000 votes it received. 

One notable example of “vote-splitting” in action was in South West Norfolk, where former Conservative Prime Minister Liz Truss lost her seat. Labour candidate Terry Jermy won the election with only 26.7% of the vote, narrowly beating Truss, who received 25.3%. The Reform Party candidate received 22.4% of the vote, and an independent received 14.2%. 

South West Norfolk is one of over 170 seats where the Conservative margin of defeat was smaller than the number of votes received by the Reform Party. Essentially, voters switching to a more right-wing party likely helped boost the power of the left-leaning Labour Party.

This “spoiler effect” is precisely why many Americans are hesitant to vote for third-party candidates in general elections. While Americans mostly refrain from “wasting” votes for non-major candidates in general elections, the same cannot be said for our primary elections; so far in 2024, 35 major-party nominees for House elections have won their primaries with under 50% of the vote, including 16 nominees in safe seats who are almost certain to win their general elections.

Ranked choice voting would help solve this problem, allowing voters to rank backup choices in case their top choice can’t win. Voters who backed the third-place candidate in constituencies across the country – whether that candidate was Labour, Conservative, Reform, or another party – would still be able to weigh in on the choice between the top two options. 

RCV would be especially powerful when paired with multi-member districts, allowing several Members of Parliament to be elected from each constituency to better represent the diverse viewpoints in their area. That system is already used in Ireland, Northern Ireland, and Australia to give voters better representation that reflects the diverse views of the electorate. Check out the Electoral Reform Society for great resources on how single-choice voting has failed the United Kingdom, and how different voting systems would improve representation.

France proves runoffs are no solution

While the British elections show the flaws of single-choice voting, the French elections show the flaws of delayed runoffs. 

On July 7, France completed the second round of voting in a snap legislative election. In contrast to most runoffs in the United States, voter turnout remained consistent between the first and second rounds of voting, at a respectable 66%. In races where more than two candidates advanced to the final round – a feature unique to runoffs in France – many weaker candidates dropped out to ensure they didn’t “split the vote” and help a candidate they deeply opposed win with less than a majority. 

All this could have been accomplished in a single round of voting if France allowed voters to rank the candidates on a single ballot. Instead, the French people had to turn out to the polls twice in eight days and endure even more toxic campaigning from the major left, right, and centrist factions. Each of these factions insisted that their opponents represented an existential threat to the nation – only for the centrist and left-wing factions to put their rivalry aside in the runoffs to oppose the right-wing faction. Rather than give voters a full array of choices, these runoffs encouraged candidates to drop out – and attack their opponents until the last possible second.

Put simply: France’s legislative elections were like ranked choice voting – but slower, more toxic, and with fewer choices.

Electoral reforms like ranked choice voting and multi-member districts would make a big difference for French and British elections – helping solve the “spoiler problem” and giving voters more say. The U.S. would benefit from those, too.