Editing Electoral threshold (section)

==Notable cases==
{{see also|Vote splitting}}
An extreme example occurred in Turkey following the [[2002 Turkish general election]], where almost none of the 550 incumbent MPs were returned. This was a seismic shift that rocked Turkish politics to its foundations. None of the political parties that had passed the threshold [[1999 Turkish general election|in 1999]], passed it again: [[True Path Party|DYP]] received only 9.55 percent of the popular vote, [[Nationalist Movement Party|MHP]] received 8.34 percent, [[Young Party|GP]] 7.25 percent, [[Democratic People's Party (Turkey)|DEHAP]] 6.23 percent, [[Motherland Party (Turkey)|ANAP]] 5.13 percent, [[Felicity Party|SP]] 2.48 percent and [[Democratic Left Party (Turkey)|DSP]] 1.22 percent. The aggregate number of [[wasted vote]]s was an unprecented 46.33 percent (14,545,438). As a result, [[Recep Tayyip Erdoğan|Erdoğan]]'s [[Justice and Development Party (Turkey)|AKP]] gained power, winning more than two-thirds of the seats in [[Grand National Assembly of Turkey|the Parliament]] with just 34.28 percent of the vote, with only one opposition party ([[Republican People's Party|CHP]], which by itself failed to pass threshold in 1999) and 9 independents.

Other dramatic events can be produced by the loophole often added in [[mixed-member proportional representation]] (used throughout Germany since 1949, New Zealand since 1993): there the threshold rule for party lists includes an exception for parties that won 3 (Germany) or 1 (New Zealand) [[single-member districts]]. The party list vote helps calculate the desirable number of MPs for each party. Major parties can help minor ally parties overcome the hurdle, by letting them win one or a few districts:
* [[2008 New Zealand general election]]: While [[New Zealand First]] received only 4.07 percent of the list vote (so it was not returned to parliament), [[ACT New Zealand]] won 3.65 percent of the list vote, but its leader won an electorate seat ([[Epsom (NZ electorate)|Epsom]]), which entitled the party to list seats (4). In the [[2011 New Zealand general election|2011 election]], leaders of the [[New Zealand National Party|National Party]] and ACT had tea together before the press to promote the implicit alliance (see [[tea tape scandal]]). After their victories, the Nationals passed a [[confidence and supply]] agreement with ACT to form the [[Fifth National Government of New Zealand]].
* In Germany, the post-communist [[Party of Democratic Socialism (Germany)|PDS]] and its successor [[Die Linke]] often hovered around the 5 percent threshold: [[1994 German federal election|In 1994]], it won only 4.4 percent of the party list vote, but won four districts in [[East Berlin]], which saved it, earning 30 MPs in total. In [[2002 German federal election|2002]], it achieved only 4.0 percent of the party list vote, and won just two districts, this time excluding the party from proportional representation. This resulted in a narrow red-green majority and a [[Schröder Cabinet II|second term for Gerhard Schröder]], which would not have been possible had the PDS won a third constituency. In [[2021 German federal election|2021]], it won only 4.9 percent of the party list vote, but won the bare minimum of three districts ([[Berlin-Lichtenberg]], [[Berlin-Treptow-Köpenick]], and [[Leipzig II]]), salvaging the party, which received 39 MPs.

The failure of one party to reach the threshold not only deprives their candidates of office and their voters of representation; it also changes the [[Banzhaf power index|power index]] in the assembly, which may have dramatic implications for coalition-building.
* Slovakia, [[2002 Slovak parliamentary election|2002]]. The [[True Slovak National Party]] (PSNS) split from [[Slovak National Party]] (SNS), and [[Movement for Democracy (Slovakia)|Movement for Democracy]] (HZD) split from the previously dominant [[People's Party – Movement for a Democratic Slovakia]]. All of them failed to cross the 5 percent threshold with PSNS having 3.65 percent, SNS 3.33 percent and HZD 3.26 percent respectively, thus allowing a center-right coalition despite having less than 43 percent of the vote.
* Norway, [[2009 Norwegian parliamentary election|2009]]. The [[Liberal Party (Norway)|Liberal Party]] received 3.9 percent of the votes, below the 4 percent threshold for [[leveling seats]], although still winning two seats. Hence, while right-wing opposition parties won more votes between them than the parties in the governing coalition, the narrow failure of the Liberal Party to cross the threshold kept the governing coalition in power. It crossed the threshold again at the [[2013 Norwegian parliamentary election|following election]] with 5.2 percent.
* In the [[2013 German federal election]], the [[Free Democratic Party (Germany)|FDP]], in Parliament since 1949, received only 4.8 percent of the list vote, and won no single district, excluding the party altogether. This, along with the failure of the right-wing eurosceptic party [[Alternative for Germany|AfD]] (4.7%), gave a left-wing majority in Parliament despite a center-right majority of votes ([[CDU/CSU]] itself fell short of an absolute majority by just 5 seats). As a result, Merkel's CDU/CSU formed a [[grand coalition]] with the [[Social Democratic Party of Germany|SPD]]. 
* Poland, [[2015 Polish parliamentary election|2015]]. The [[United Left (Poland)|United Left]] achieved 7.55 percent, which is below the 8 percent threshold for multi-party coalitions. Furthermore, [[Liberty (Poland)|KORWiN]] only reached 4.76 percent, narrowly missing the 5 percent threshold for individual parties. This allowed the victorious [[Law and Justice (Poland)|PiS]] to obtain a majority of seats with 37 percent of the vote. This was the first parliament without left-wing parties represented.
* Israel, [[April 2019 Israeli legislative election|April 2019]]. Among the 3 lists representing right-wing to far-right Zionism and supportive of Netanyahu, only one crossed the threshold the right-wing government had increased to 3.25 percent: the [[Union of the Right-Wing Parties]] with 3.70 percent, while future Prime Minister Bennett's [[New Right (Israel)|New Right]] narrowly failed at 3.22 percent, and [[Zehut]] only 2.74 percent, destroying Netanyahu's chances of another majority, and leading to snap elections in [[September 2019 Israeli legislative election|September]].
* Czech Republic, [[2021 Czech legislative election|2021]]. [[Přísaha]] (4.68%), [[Czech Social Democratic Party|ČSSD]] (4.65%) and [[Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia|KSČM]] (3.60%) all failed to cross the 5 percent threshold, thus allowing a coalition of [[Spolu (Czech Republic)|Spolu]] and [[Pirates and Mayors|PaS]]. This was also the first time that neither ČSSD nor KSČM had representation in parliament since [[1992 Czech legislative election|1992]].

=== Memorable dramatic losses due to electoral threshold ===
* In the [[1990 German federal election]], the Western Greens did not meet the threshold, which was applied separately for former East and West Germany. The Greens could not take advantage of this, because the "[[Alliance 90]]" (which had absorbed the East German Greens) ran separately from "The Greens" in the West. Together, they would have narrowly passed the 5.0 percent threshold (West: 4.8%, East: 6.2%). The Western Greens returned to the Bundestag in 1994.
* Israel, [[1992 Israeli legislative election|1992]]. The extreme right-wing [[Tehiya]] (Revival) received 1.2 percent of the votes, which was below the threshold which it had itself voted to raise to 1.5 percent. It thus lost its three seats.
* In Bulgaria, the so-called "blue parties"<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.weser-kurier.de/politik/prowestliche-parteien-sind-bulgariens-grosse-wahlverlierer-doc7e49jadmko08guyr1g6 |title=Prowestliche Parteien sind Bulgariens große Wahlverlierer |date=28 March 2017 |website=Weser-Kurier |access-date=15 October 2022}}</ref> or "urban right"<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.euronews.com/2022/09/30/bulgaria-election-all-you-need-to-know-about-countrys-fourth-vote-in-just-18-months |title= Bulgaria election: All you need to know about country's fourth vote in just 18 months Access to the comments |website=[[Euronews]] |date=2 October 2022|access-date=15 October 2022}}</ref> which include [[Union of Democratic Forces (Bulgaria)|SDS]], [[Democrats for a Strong Bulgaria|DSB]], [[Yes, Bulgaria!]], [[Bulgaria for Citizens Movement|DBG]], [[United People's Party (Bulgaria)|ENP]] and Blue Unity frequently get just above or below the electoral threshold depending on formation of [[electoral alliance]]s: In the [[2007 European Parliament election in Bulgaria|EP election 2007]], DSB (4.74%) and SDS (4.35%) were campaigning separately and both fell below the natural electoral of around 5 percent. In [[2009 Bulgarian parliamentary election]], DSB and SDS ran together as [[Blue Coalition]] gaining 6.76 percent. In [[2013 Bulgarian parliamentary election]], campaigning separately DGB received 3.25 percent, DSB 2.93 percent, SDS 1.37 percent and ENP 0.17 percent, thus all of them failed to cross the threshold this even led to a tie between the former opposition and the parties right of the centre. In the [[2014 European Parliament election in Bulgaria|EP election 2014]], SDS, DSB and DBG ran as [[Reformist Bloc]] gaining 6.45 percent and crossing the electoral threshold, while Blue Unity campaigned separately and did not cross the electoral threshold. In [[2017 Bulgarian parliamentary election]], SDS and DBG ran as Reformist Bloc gaining 3.06 percent, "Yes, Bulgaria!" received 2.88 percent, DSB 2.48 percent, thus all of them failed to cross the electoral threshold. In the [[2019 European Parliament election in Bulgaria|EP election 2019]], "Yes, Bulgaria!" and DBG ran together as [[Democratic Bulgaria]] and crossed the electoral threshold with 5.88 percent. In [[2021 Bulgarian general election|November 2021]], electoral alliance Democratic Bulgaria crossed electoral threshold with 6.28 percent.
* Slovakia, [[2010 Slovak parliamentary election|2010]]. Both the [[Party of the Hungarian Community]] which (including their predecessors) hold seats in parliament since the [[Velvet Revolution]] and the [[People's Party – Movement for a Democratic Slovakia]], which dominated in the 1990s, received 4.33 percent and thus failed to achieve the 5 percent threshold.
* Slovakia, [[2016 Slovak parliamentary election|2016]]. The [[Christian Democratic Movement]] achieved 4.94 percent missing only 0.06 percent votes to reach the threshold which meant the first absence of the party since the [[Velvet Revolution]] and the first democratic elections in [[1990 Slovak parliamentary election|1990]].
* Slovakia, [[2020 Slovak parliamentary election|2020]]. The coalition between [[Progressive Slovakia]] and [[TOGETHER – Civic Democracy|SPOLU]] won 6.96 percent of votes, falling only 0.04 percent short of the 7 percent threshold for coalitions. This was an unexpected defeat since the coalition had won seats in the [[2019 European Parliament election in Slovakia|2019 European election]] and won the [[2019 Slovak presidential election|2019 presidential election]] less than a year earlier. In addition, two other parties won fewer votes but were able to win seats due to the lower threshold for single parties (5%). This was also the first election since the [[Velvet Revolution]] in which no party of the Hungarian minority crossed the 5 percent threshold.
* Lithuania, [[2020 Lithuanian parliamentary election|2020]]. The [[Electoral Action of Poles in Lithuania – Christian Families Alliance|LLRA–KŠS]] won only 4.80 percent of the party list votes.
* Madrid, Spain, [[2021 Madrilenian regional election|2021]]. Despite achieving 26 seats with 19.37 percent of the votes in the [[2019 Madrilenian regional election|previous election]], the liberal [[Ciudadanos]] party crashed down to just 3.54 percent in the 2021 [[snap election]] called by [[Isabel Díaz Ayuso]], failing to get close to the 5 percent threshold.
* Slovenia, [[2022 Slovenian parliamentary election|2022]]. [[Democratic Party of Pensioners of Slovenia]] only achieved 0.62 percent of the vote. This was the first time when DeSUS did not reached the 4 percent since 1996 which was part of almost every coalition since its foundation.
* Germany, [[2022 Saarland state election]]. [[Alliance 90/The Greens]] fell 23 votes or 0.005 percent short of reaching representation. [[The Left (Germany)|The Left]] fell from 12.8 percent to below the electoral threshold with 2.6 percent in their only western stronghold. Total percentage of votes not represented was 22.3 percent.<ref>{{cite web |title=Results 2022 Saarland state election|url=https://wahlergebnis.saarland.de/LTW/|publisher=German State Statistical Officer}}{{in lang|de}}</ref>
* Israel, [[2022 Israeli legislative election]]. [[Meretz]] fell to 3.16 percent thus failed to cross the threshold for the first time.
* Germany, [[2025 German federal election|2025]]. Both the [[Free Democratic Party (Germany)|Free Democratic Party]] (FDP) – part of the previous government coalition – and the [[Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance]] (BSW) – formed by a recent party split – fell just short of the threshold, with the FDP on 4.33% and BSW on 4.97%, just 0.03% short.

===Coalitions due to electoral thresholds===
There has been cases of attempts to circumvent thresholds:
* Slovakia, [[1998 Slovak parliamentary election|1998]]. [[Slovak Democratic Coalition]] ran as a single political party to help its component parties get over the threshold.
* Turkey, [[2007 Turkish general election|2007]] and [[2011 Turkish general election|2011]]. The [[Democratic Society Party|DTP]]/[[Peace and Democracy Party|BDP]]-led [[Thousand Hope Candidates]] and [[Labour, Democracy and Freedom Bloc]] only gained 3.81 percent (2007) and 5.67 percent (2011) of the vote not crossing the 10 percent threshold but because they ran as independents they won 22 and 36 seats.
* Poland, [[2019 Polish parliamentary election|2019]]. After the United Left and KORWiN failed to cross the thresholds in 2015 both of them with their new alliances bypassed the coalition threshold by either running under [[Democratic Left Alliance (Poland)|SLD]] label ([[The Left (Poland)|Lewica]]) or registering their alliance as a party itself ([[Confederation Liberty and Independence|Confederation]]). Similarly to Lewica, the [[Polish Coalition]] ran under [[Polish People's Party]] label. Lewica and Polish Coalition would have crossed the coalition threshold of 8 percent with 12.56 percent and 8.55 percent respectively while Confederation only gained 6.81 percent of the vote.
* Czechia, [[2021 Czech legislative election|2021]]. The [[Tricolour Citizens' Movement|Tricolour]]–[[Svobodní]]–[[Freeholder Party of the Czech Republic|Soukromníci]] alliance tried to bypass the coalition threshold by renaming Tricolour to include the names of their partners but they only received 2.76 percent, failing to cross the usual 5 percent threshold.

===Number of wasted votes===
{{Main|Wasted vote#History of wasted votes in proportional representation}}
Electoral thresholds can sometimes seriously affect the relationship between the percentages of the popular vote achieved by each party and the distribution of seats. The proportionality between seat share and popular vote can be measured by the [[Gallagher index]] while the number of [[wasted vote]]s is a measure of the total number of voters not represented by any party sitting in the legislature.

The failure of one party to reach the threshold not only deprives their candidates of office and their voters of representation; it also changes the [[power index (disambiguation)|power index]] in the assembly, which may have dramatic implications for coalition-building.

The number of wasted votes changes from one election to another, here shown for New Zealand.<ref name="results">{{cite web |url= https://electionresults.govt.nz/electionresults_2020/statistics/index.html |title= 2020 GENERAL ELECTION – OFFICIAL RESULTS AND STATISTICS |website= ElectionResults.govt.nz |publisher= [[Electoral Commission (New Zealand)|Electoral Commission]] |date= 30 November 2020}}</ref> The wasted vote changes depending on voter behavior and size of effective electoral threshold,<ref>{{cite journal | doi=10.1017/gov.2021.17 | title=The Choice of Electoral Systems in Electoral Autocracies | year=2023 | last1=Chang | first1=Eric C.C. | last2=Higashijima | first2=Masaaki | journal=Government and Opposition | volume=58 | pages=106–128 | s2cid=235667437 | doi-access=free }}</ref> for example in [[2005 New Zealand general election]] every party above 1 percent received seats due to the electoral threshold in New Zealand of at least one seat in first-past-the-post voting, which caused a much lower wasted vote compared to the other years.
<!--{{Graph:Chart|width=400|height=160|type=rect|xAxisTitle=Year of New Zealand general election |yAxisTitle=wasted vote in %|yAxisMin=0|yAxisMax=10
|x=1996, 1999, 2002, 2005, 2008, 2011, 2014, 2017, 2020
|y1Title=wasted vote|y1=7.54,6.03,4.89, 1.5, 6.46, 3.31, 6.1, 4.62, 7.71
|colors=#99ccff}}-->

In the [[1995 Russian legislative election|Russian parliamentary elections in 1995]], with a threshold excluding parties under 5 percent, more than 45 percent of votes went to parties that failed to reach the threshold. In 1998, the Russian Constitutional Court found the threshold legal, taking into account limits in its use.<ref>[http://www.law.edu.ru/judicial/judicial.asp?judicialID=1161582&subID=100050463,100050486,100050488 Постановление Конституционного Суда РФ от 17 ноября 1998 г. № 26-П – см. пкт. 8]{{in lang|ru}} {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080421084628/http://www.law.edu.ru/judicial/judicial.asp?judicialID=1161582&subID=100050463,100050486,100050488 |date=21 April 2008 }}</ref>

After the first implementation of the threshold in Poland in [[1993 Polish parliamentary election|1993]] 34.4 percent of the popular vote did not gain representation.

There had been a similar situation in [[Turkey]], which had a 10 percent threshold, easily higher than in any other country.<ref name=cTokerBaraj>{{cite web |last=Toker |first=Cem |title=Why Is Turkey Bogged Down? |url=http://www.turkishpolicy.com/images/stories/2008-01-turkey/CemToker.pdf |work=Turkish Policy Quarterly |publisher=Turkish Policy |access-date=27 June 2013 |year=2008}}</ref> The justification for such a high threshold was to prevent multi-party coalitions and put a stop to the endless fragmentation of political parties seen in the 1960s and 1970s. However, coalitions ruled between 1991 and 2002, but mainstream parties continued to be fragmented and in the [[2002 Turkish general election|2002 elections]] as many as 45 percent of votes were cast for parties which failed to reach the threshold and were thus unrepresented in the parliament.<ref>In 2004 the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe declared this threshold to be manifestly excessive and invited Turkey to lower it (''Council of Europe Resolution 1380 (2004)''). On 30 January 2007 the European Court of Human Rights ruled by five votes to two (and on 8 July 2008, its Grand Chamber by 13 votes to four) that the 10 percent threshold imposed in Turkey does not violate the right to free elections, guaranteed by the European Convention of Human Rights. It held, however, that this same threshold could violate the Convention if imposed in a different country. It was justified in the case of Turkey in order to stabilize the volatile political situation which has obtained in that country over recent decades. The case is ''[[Yumak and Sadak v. Turkey]], no. 10226/03.'' See also B. Bowring [https://www.webcitation.org/5hRos9CTv?url=http://www.bbk.ac.uk/law/about/ft-academic/bowring/negatingpluralistdemocracy Negating Pluralist Democracy: The European Court of Human Rights Forgets the Rights of the Electors] // KHRP Legal Review 11 (2007)</ref> All parties which won seats in 1999 failed to cross the threshold, thus giving [[Justice and Development Party (Turkey)|Justice and Development Party]] 66 percent of the seats.

In the [[2006 Ukrainian parliamentary election|Ukrainian elections of March 2006]], for which there was a threshold of 3 percent (of the overall vote, i.e. including invalid votes), 22 percent of voters were effectively [[disenfranchised]], having voted for minor candidates. In the [[2007 Ukrainian parliamentary election|parliamentary election]] held under the same system, fewer voters supported minor parties and the total percentage of disenfranchised voters fell to about 12 percent.

In Bulgaria, 24 percent of voters cast their ballots for parties that would not gain representation in the elections of [[1991 Bulgarian parliamentary election|1991]] and [[2013 Bulgarian parliamentary election|2013]].

In the [[2020 Slovak parliamentary election]], 28.47 percent of all valid votes did not gain representation.<ref>{{cite web |title=Results 2020 Slovak parliamentary election|url=https://volby.statistics.sk/nrsr/nrsr2020/en/data01.html|publisher=Statistical Office of the Slovak Republic}}</ref> In the [[2021 Czech legislative election]] 19.76 percent of voters were not represented.<ref>{{cite web |title=Results 2021 Czech legislative election|url=https://www.volby.cz/pls/ps2021/ps2?xjazyk=EN|publisher=Czech Statistical Office}}</ref> In the [[2022 Slovenian parliamentary election]] 24 percent of the vote went to parties which did not reach the 4 percent threshold including several former parliamentary parties ([[List of Marjan Šarec|LMŠ]], [[Let's Connect Slovenia|PoS]], [[Party of Alenka Bratušek|SAB]], [[Slovenian National Party|SNS]] and [[Democratic Party of Pensioners of Slovenia|DeSUS]]).

In the Philippines where party-list seats are only [[Sectoral representation in the House of Representatives of the Philippines|contested in 20 percent]] of the 287 seats in the lower house,{{clarify|date=October 2013}} the effect of the 2 percent threshold is increased by the large number of parties participating in the election, which means that the threshold is harder to reach. This led to a quarter of valid votes being wasted, on average and led to the 20 percent of the seats never being allocated due to the 3-seat cap{{clarify|date=October 2013}} In [[2007 Philippine House of Representatives elections|2007]], the 2 percent threshold was altered to allow parties with less than 1 percent of [[Hare quota|first preferences]] to receive a seat each and the proportion of wasted votes reduced slightly to 21 percent, but it again increased to 29 percent in [[Philippine House of Representatives party-list election, 2010|2010]] due to an increase in number of participating parties. These statistics take no account of the wasted votes for a party which is entitled to more than three seats but cannot claim those seats due to the three-seat cap.{{clarify|date=October 2013}}

Electoral thresholds can produce a [[spoiler effect]], similar to that in the [[Plurality voting system|first-past-the-post voting system]], in which minor parties unable to reach the threshold take votes away from other parties with similar ideologies. Fledgling parties in these systems often find themselves in a [[vicious circle]]: if a party is perceived as having no chance of meeting the threshold, it often cannot gain popular support; and if the party cannot gain popular support, it will continue to have little or no chance of meeting the threshold. As well as acting against extremist parties, it may also adversely affect moderate parties if the political climate becomes polarized between two major parties at opposite ends of the political spectrum. In such a scenario, moderate voters may abandon their preferred party in favour of a more popular party in the hope of keeping the even less desirable alternative out of power.

On occasion, electoral thresholds have resulted in a party winning an outright majority of seats without winning an outright majority of votes, the sort of outcome that a proportional voting system is supposed to prevent. For instance, the Turkish [[Justice and Development Party (Turkey)|AKP]] won a majority of seats with less than 50 percent of votes in three consecutive elections (2002, 2007 and 2011). In the [[2013 Bavarian state election]], the [[Christian Social Union in Bavaria|Christian Social Union]] failed to obtain a majority of votes, but nevertheless won an outright majority of seats due to a record number of votes for parties which failed to reach the threshold, including the [[Free Democratic Party of Germany|Free Democratic Party]] (the CSU's coalition partner in the previous state parliament). In Germany in [[2013 German federal election|2013]] 15.7 percent voted for a party that did not meet the 5 percent threshold.

In contrast, elections that use the [[Ranked voting systems|ranked voting system]] can take account of each voter's complete indicated ranking preference. For example, the [[single transferable vote]] redistributes first preference votes for candidates below the threshold. This permits the continued participation in the election by those whose votes would otherwise be wasted. Minor parties can indicate to their supporters before the vote how they would wish to see their votes transferred. The single transferable vote is a proportional [[voting system]] designed to achieve [[proportional representation]] through [[Ranked voting systems|ranked voting]] in ''multi-seat'' (as opposed to single seat) organizations or [[electoral district|constituencies]] (voting districts).<ref>{{cite web |title=Single Transferable Vote |url=http://www.electoral-reform.org.uk/single-transferable-vote |publisher=Electoral Reform Society}}</ref> [[Ranked voting systems]] are widely used in Australia and [[Ireland]]. Other methods of introducing ordinality into an electoral system can have similar effects.