The political mess in which Israel finds itself after two Knesset elections in 2019 raises yet again questions about the need to change the system of government, or at least the system of elections. But if we review the proposed changes, we find that they have more disadvantages than advantages.
Many people want to adopt the presidential system, under the assumption that it is more effective and efficient than a parliamentary one. That is incorrect. A president who loses his or her parliamentary majority, which often happens in the US and less often in France, is paralyzed and cannot implement his policies. Whereas in presidential regimes in which lawmakers are elected based on proportional representation, as in most South American countries, the president must receive the support of several parties to promote legislation and implement policy.
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The three times when Israel elected its prime minister in a direct election, there might have been a clear decision, but nothing improved in terms of governability. The opposite – the double ballot, one for a party, and other for prime minister, revoked the incentive to vote for one of the two big parties, and thereby increased the rifts in the Knesset and the prime minister's dependence on his coalition partners. When Ehud Barak lost his coalition in 2000, he was left unable to govern. The fact that he was elected directly became irrelevant.
Another proposal is to adopt regional elections, which tend to create two big parties and wipe out sectoral parties almost entirely, thus allowing the prime minister to depend on his own party and releasing him from coalition pressures. Other than that portrayal of the system being incorrect (in Britain, the prime minister sometimes needs a coalition, like David Cameron in 2010 and Theresa May in 2017), so the limitations of the regional system are greater than its strong points – especially in a divided society like Israel.
Because the regional system keeps entire sectors from being represented, because only representatives of districts that receive the largest numbers of votes are elected to parliament, it increases social tension and encourages radical moves. The yellow vest movement in France, for example, took to the streets and shut down the country because – among other reasons – they had marginal if any representation in Parliament, which is controlled by French President Emmanuel Macron's party. In addition, excluding large sectors, some of them extremist, from parliament, spurs them on to "occupy" one of the two big parties and radicalize its members.
This phenomenon is growing stronger in recent years in countries like the US and Britain. In Britain, the Conservative Party is controlled by supporters of Brexit, who were once considered an extremist minority, and is has lost classic Conservatives, such as the grandson of former prime minister Winston Churchill. The Labour Party, which moved to the Center and in effect ceased to be socialist under former prime minister Tony Blair, was taken over by radical Marxists. In the US, meanwhile, most of the Democratic candidates for president espouse ideas that used to be outside the consensus, while the Republican Party is under unprecedented influence by Evangelical Christians and opponents of free trade.
In Israel, a system in which representation is proportional to votes is vital to offer all sectors fair representation and ensure peace. The system does tend to give little parties "extortionate" power, but on the other hand, it also creates checks and balances against the prime minister. It is by no means a perfect system, but the attempt to improve it by raising the minimum electoral threshold turned out to be a mistake because reducing the number of parties through a higher minimum threshold actually increased the power of mid-sized parties to extort. This happened because the more parties we have, thanks to a small or nonexistent minimum threshold, the more coalition options the prime minister has, which makes him or her less vulnerable to political extortion.
The Israeli electoral system is not flawless, and it sometimes creates a political mess. But instituting more reforms that could become part of the good intentions that pave the way to hell is not the way to overcome the current crisis.
