The following is an extract from our short explainer “Things You Might Not Know About Elections.” You can find the entire explainer here: https://cffad.org/things-you-might-not-know-about-elections/
Who may vote: Some systems, like ours, place a high value on placing power in the people and holding power accountable to the people – and therefore highlight the universal right to vote. (More on this in later posts).
Other systems limit voting to just a small circle or eligible sub-population. For example, many labor unions allow only their members to vote for their union leaders even though their policies and actions may affect all employees.
Some elections are limited to certain subsets of voters who have specific qualifications. In the Vatican, for example, only cardinals under the age of 80 may vote to choose the next Pope, who serves as the de facto monarch of Vatican City. In another example, only Native Americans can vote in tribal elections, which elect leaders who govern and set policies on tribal nation territories. (Some indigenous tribes, such as the Iroquois, were self-governing democracies before the American Revolution.) Similarly, New Zealand allows native Māori peoples the right to vote in their own separate parliamentary district to ensure that they can elect native representatives. Other systems offer additional, compensatory electoral power to historically disenfranchised populations. For example, India reserves a fixed number of parliamentary seats for those at the bottom of the formerly enforced caste system.
If you want to learn more about elections, we have a 9-part course, each part is a 20 minute read. Easy! Click here: https://cffad.org/things-you-might-not-know-about-elections/
