Kayla Molina
5/04/22
Professor Cantu
Essay 2
There are many political institutional systems that make up every country's
government. There are electoral systems, party systems, government types and many
more. The United States is made up of a presidential, federal political system, a
bipartisan party system, and a majoritarian electoral system. If I were to make changes
to the United States government I would change our presidential system to a
parliamentary system and change our majoritarian electoral system to a consensus
electoral system. The biggest examples of both of these come from the UK and the
satisfaction of the citizens by these types of governments.
A change from a presidential system to a parliamentary system would be
beneficial to the United States. Presidential systems are prone to dictatorships because
too much power is placed in the president's hands. Not only is he the head of state he
is also the head of government unlike in a parliamentary system where the power is
spread more evenly. This can lead to abuse of power which creates instability in the
government making it vulnerable to becoming a failed democracy. A big problem that
the United States has is its inability to create laws in an effective manner because of
how many steps it has to go through due to separation of power. Although it has
Kayla Molina
5/04/22
Professor Cantu
proven to create balance it hinders real progress that could be made by the
government and leaves citizens unsatisfied and feeling like the government is not
doing enough. A parliamentary system would trade in accountability for more
representation. Both of these things are important but here in the United States, one of
the most diverse countries in the world, representation should come before all. This
would change our bipartisan system because if more parties were allowed power there
would be more voices to be heard and a different system would need to be used for the
government to come to agreements. Since we have a bipartisan party system and the
party divide in the United States is so strong and almost split evenly in half it becomes
extremely hard for anything to be agreed upon. A parliamentary system would allow
for every political group to have a say. No one ever votes for the third party
candidates because they feel as though they will never win and so the same unpopular
two party system that we have had continues. The change in systems would create
room for a multiparty system representing all of the people who feel unrepresented
with a poll saying six in ten Americans do not feel represented by either the
Democrats or Republicans strict list of beliefs. Parliament would help to lessen the
split of America caused by party divide and allow for more of America’s diverse
voices to be heard or at least be given a chance to be heard.
Kayla Molina
5/04/22
Professor Cantu
Another change I would make to the United States government would be
changing the majoritarian system to a consensus system. The United States would be
better off with a consensus system for many of the same reasons this country would
be better off with a parliamentary system. Starting with the fact that there is less
concentrated power to one person in a consensus system. In a majoritarian system the
winner of the election implements their own policies whereas in a consensus system
the elected teams have to bargain over what policies should be implemented. Just like
a parliament a consensus also allows for more representation at the cost of some
accountability. Since whole teams are elected rather than just individuals. This could
be an issue due to the fact that a lot of politicians are corrupt in some ways so it would
be hard to determine who was at fault when there is a whole team contributing to the
hypothetical scandal. But that does not mean that accountability is completely
unattainable because there is still the option to put blame on the entire party as a
whole especially if there continues to be corruption associated with that group. This
could allow for a new and better party to rise or be created. Despite the difficulty of
holding corrupt individuals accountable, citizens under a consensus system have a
better selection and more available selection when choosing their representatives
because these people are elected based on the fact that they will fight for the interests
of those who voted for their whole term in office. On the other hand in a majoritarian
Kayla Molina
5/04/22
Professor Cantu
system citizens get to influence policy decisions only during election times. A
consensus democracy was actually created in the response to a majoritarian
democracy because of the perceived danger of tyranny of the majority. A consensus
system prioritizes a government that is ruled by as many people as possible in order to
ensure a more inclusive government. Another similarity between parliament and
consensus is their ability to make laws in a more timely manner. Presidential systems
struggle due to the party divide and the separation of powers and a majoritarian
system struggles due to its policies being determined by what the majority of citizens
want rather than policies representing as many citizens as possible. There are too
many sub groups in America for there to be a majority all the time. Plus a majoritarian
system makes it much harder for minority groups to obtain representation because
they don’t have enough representation and are usually in a position where the majority
is opposed to their rights. Which has been one of the biggest problems in America to
this day.
As talked about, the United States would be much more representative to its
diverse citizens if a parliamentary system and consensus system were to be put into
place rather than the slow and restrictive presidential system and majoritarian system.
Both presidential and majoritarian systems have been proven to be worse for
Kayla Molina
5/04/22
Professor Cantu
democracy in the long run. There are many successful countries with more satisfied
citizens in countries that practice parliament and consensus systems in their
government that America cannot compare to.