Is our electoral system truly democratic? How Australia stacks up on 4 key measures

By Stephen Morey, Senior Lecturer, Department of Languages and Linguistics, La Trobe University

In Australia, we choose our political representatives and governments through a democratic electoral system.

Generally, these systems should have four main aims. These are to:

secure easy access to voting for everyone of voting age
ensure the party whose candidates attract the most votes wins a majority in parliament
establish a parliament that, as much as possible, represents the opinions of all voters
uphold the equal value of each individual vote.

With a federal election fast…

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