Practice of election systems of Ukraine in political and legal aspects.

Abstract

The article provides political and legal characteristic of electoral systems of Ukraine. The considered problem lies in finding an optimal electoral system for Ukraine. Also, the article analyzes the experience of applying the majoritarian, proportional and mixed electoral systems in the parliamentary elections in the period of 1988 to 2018 years.

Amendments, which have been made to the electoral law prior to each parliamentary elections, have shown instability of the law regulating such issue. Only after introducing the mixed electoral system in 1997 political parties have become full-fledged participants of the political life. Earlier members of parliament were elected according to the majoritarian system in single-member constituencies. This procedure led to ineffectiveness of such elections. Exclusive proportional system, which has been existed from 2004 till 2011, resolved this problem. However, citizens did not have a right to influence on personal parliament composition. These circumstances impeded expression of actual will of electorate. Mixed system applicable at the present time, is a compromise decision for admirers of both majoritarian and proportional systems. Problems, which followed Ukrainian elections even prior to getting an independence, remain unresolved.

Adoption of the bill of Electoral Code of Ukraine on November 07, 2017 prescribes implementation of the proportional system with “open” lists or preferential vote for the elections of members of parliament of Ukraine. There is a necessity to justify the relevance of new electoral system proposed for use in parliamentary elections. In this regard, the article considers positive and negative characteristics of the majority and proportional electoral systems. It has been clarified that the electoral system should promote the real will of the electorate, as well as comply with generally established standards of democratic elections. The article proposes alternatives to the proportional electoral system with “open” lists that preserves the merits of majoritarian and proportional systems, and most accurately expresses the real will of the citizens.