Well, it’s been a while since I moseyed through these here parts, but after perusing SERVEL’s site, I have not come up with any info with regards to the Chilean electoral system.
This is my first time voting for legislature and executive reps in Chile. I’ve only voted for Rechazo on the first plebiscite and for a representative in the election for the constituent council for the second plebiscite. I was abroad for the second plebiscite vote.
I’ve looked through sample ballots, and I’m trying to understand how seat allocation works for the legislative bodies (i.e. consejeros and consejales). Gobernadores and alcaldes seem straightforward.
I’m from a purely proportionally representative parliamentary system, so voting is easy. You just pick your party, votes are tallied and the seats are allocated proportionally by party support in the relevant chamber. We don’t vote for candidates. The parties choose them internally. Heads of executive, ie, mayors, provincial premiers and the president are elected by the legislatures.
I’m struggling to understand how seats are allocated when there are multiple candidates for one party. Let’s take the following ballot example from 2021:
UDI has five candidates listed 323 - 327. But you can only pick one.
OK, which one should you pick? Let’s say you’re diligent and you go and research all these people’s backgrounds etc, and you decide that 323 best represents your interests. Based on what, who the hell knows? I still don’t understand how the system translates your support for that one candidate into a seat.
Let’s consider, for simplicity’s sake, that there are 5 council seats. Let’s also say that there are 10 voters in this comuna. 6 of them vote for Candidate 323, while the other 4 voters give one vote each to Candidates 328, 329, 330 and 331. Candidates 324 to 327 get 0. So, what happens now? UDI gets one seat and the SocDems get four? It can’t be that stupid. First Past the Post-based constituency voting is dumb, but this is retardation on another level. What am I missing?
Any Chileans, Yanks, Canucks or Poms that can explain, I’d appreciate it. Thanks.
EDIT: Wait a minute. I think I just figured it out.
Those party labels mean nothing other than affiliation, I guess. By that I mean, the parties don’t put candidates up. The candidates put themselves up under the banner of the party they are registered with. So, this comuna will be represented by ONE individual listed on that whole ballot? Have I got that right?