Electoral Reform committee  Absolutely.

Electoral Reform committee  Yes, that's a problem. I would say too that changing the system or increasing diversity doesn't ensure increased participation and engagement either. There are a lot of things that come together. The question is complex, which is again why I'm not super-envious of your job. The important thing for me as an instructor, as a political scientist, as a voter, and as a citizen is that I don't think it's good enough to say that because there are progressive white men who believe in women's rights, we don't need women in the legislature.

Electoral Reform committee  I think there are two things. In nerdy political science terminology, we talk about symbolic representation and substantive representation, so there's a separating out about how we look from our ideas. For example, we often point to Thatcher. She was a woman, but obviously not great for women.

Electoral Reform committee  It could also be two tandem pathways. I didn't hear Jim's testimony, so I can't speak to that specifically. I think it's certainly the case that the rules of the game affect how we play, and I suspect that there are probably some governing caucus members who would support having more diverse members elected, including women.

Electoral Reform committee  As a voter, I would say that I would probably be confused about what the mandate is. As a political scientist who follows things a bit more closely, I would say that I think it's a big job you've been given. I don't envy you, in a sense, having to figure out what to do, and I think that's challenging for sure, especially if there isn't a lot of clear guidance up front about the specific problems.

Electoral Reform committee  You mean the magic bullet.

Electoral Reform committee  I would say a few things. First of all, I think you're right that voter engagement is a major problem. It's especially a problem among youth. If we look at the voter turnout rates there, we see it's a huge problem. It went up a little bit in the last election, and that's a good sign.

Electoral Reform committee  I guess I like happy puppies. That's a good start. There's no magic bullet, and that's kind of the thing. All of these factors are factors, and yes, it is the case that often in a proportional system we tend to see more women, we tend to see more minority groups, we tend to see a greater dispersion of parties, lots of variety, and we tend to see more collaboration, more co-operation, more coalition governments.

Electoral Reform committee  I'm not against the idea of a maximum term. I do think that having a maximum term would prevent certain individuals who are doing a good job from continuing, though. There are a lot of folks who wish Obama could continue right now, for example. Whether you set those kinds of strict rules—term limits, fixed election dates—those are reforms we can make that may or may not make huge changes.

Electoral Reform committee  My main area of expertise is voters and voting behaviour. Part of the problem for voters is that they often don't have information. Voters need parties as a shortcut. We need you to tell us what you think, because that helps us figure out what we think. It's perfectly okay to take a partisan stance or even take a stance within the party that conflicts with the party, because then as voters we're getting information that we need to make decisions.

Electoral Reform committee  I feel that every answer I give begins with “It's tricky“. Voters don't know that much about what's happening, they don't know much about electoral reform, and they don't know about systems. When I ask my first-year students what we use, they think we have PR. They have no idea what's going on.

Electoral Reform committee  Super briefly, no small task there. I would say that probably the easiest way to look at this would be doing something similar to Robert's suggestion in that you have ridings where you add proportionality into the mix. You still have a clear regional representative however you choose to elect, whether it's by a system like his, some kind of mixed system, and so on.

Electoral Reform committee  You don't have to make a choice between those two things. Sorry, I totally interrupted you. Often we tend to see those two things as being in opposition to one another, but certainly Mr. Ring's suggestion, and other mixed systems, could achieve some of those similar goals.

Electoral Reform committee  Thank you to the committee for inviting me to speak today. I've been studying elections and voting for a number of years now. While my primary focus is voting behaviour, both in Canada and other contexts, I do spend a great deal of time thinking about the rules of the game that affect how parties, candidates, and voters interact, how they understand their roles, and how they make decisions.

Electoral Reform committee  That's a great question. This is one of those answers that may or may not satisfy the committee at the end of the day. For every problem, there are multiple solutions. You could go wholeheartedly into massive changes that might address some of the solutions and then might create their own problems, or you could try to tweak little things along the way.