Lower/Single House Elections in the World's Democracies
This chart lists the different voting systems used by full-fledged
democracies defined as nations with a Freedom House Average Freedom
score of 1 or 2 and a population of at least two million. Proportional
voting systems are by far the most common. Of the eight nations
that do not use proportional voting for their most
powerful national legislative body, three (Australia, France and the
United Kingdom) use it for at least one national election.| Country | Proportional Voting | Single-Member Districts | Mixed SMD-PV |
| Argentina | PV | ||
| Australia | SMD (irv) | ||
| Austria | PV | ||
| Belgium | PV | ||
| Benin | PV | ||
| Brazil | PV | ||
| Bulgaria | PV | ||
| Canada | SMD | ||
| Chile | PV | ||
| Costa Rica | PV | ||
| Croatia | PV | ||
| Czech Republic | PV | ||
| Denmark | PV | ||
| Dominican Republic | PV | ||
| Finland | PV | ||
| France | SMD (mr) | ||
| Germany | PV (mmpv) | ||
| Ghana | SMD | ||
| Greece | PV | ||
| Hungary | Mixed (pv) | ||
| Ireland | PV (choice) | ||
| Israel | PV | ||
| Italy | Mixed (smd) | ||
| Japan | Mixed (smd) | ||
| Korea, South | Mixed (smd) | ||
| Latvia | PV | ||
| Lithuania | Mixed (equal) | ||
| Mali | SMD (mr) | ||
| Mongolia | SMD | ||
| Namibia | PV | ||
| Netherlands | PV | ||
| New Zealand | PV (mmpv) | ||
| Norway | PV | ||
| Panama | PV | ||
| Poland | PV | ||
| Portugal | PV | ||
| Romania | PV | ||
| Slovakia | PV | ||
| Slovenia | PV | ||
| South Africa | PV | ||
| Spain | PV | ||
| Sweden | PV | ||
| Switzerland | PV | ||
| Taiwan | Mixed (smd) | ||
| United Kingdom | SMD | ||
| United States | SMD | ||
| Uruguay | PV | ||
| Total | 33 | 8 | 6 |
Democracy = A 2007 Freedom House Average Freedom score of 2 or less.
Includes only countries with more than two million inhabitants.
IRV: Instant Runoff Voting (also called "alternative vote")
MMPV: Mixed-Member Proportional Voting
MR: Majority Runoff
PV: Proportional Voting
SMD: Single-Member Districts
Choice Voting: Also called "Single-Transferable Vote" (STV)
Note: For the Mixed Systems, SMD or PV signifies that the SMD or PV component is dominant.
Source: Mark P. Jones, Professor of Political Science, Rice University