Madrid (EFE) – and they are more difficult for the third force and almost impossible for the fourth.
The analysis of the results of the last general elections, those of November 10, 2019, reveals that in these 21 constituencies -19 provinces plus Ceuta and Melilla-, which are 40% of the 52 into which the Congress and the Senate are divided , but they group 19.4% of the 350 seats in the lower house, socialists and popular obtained around a quarter of their deputies.
Large parties get more deputies in small constituencies
Specifically, the PSOE, the party with the most votes in those elections, obtained 28 of its 120 seats in those constituencies, more than 23%, a proportion that rises to about 26% if the 12 of the PSC are not included; and the PP, then the second political force, 24 of its 89 deputies, almost 27% of its seats in Congress.
However, the third national formation in votes, Vox got just over 18% of its representatives in the chamber -nine of 52-; the fourth, Podemos-IU, only added one of its 35 parliamentarians in these provinces, less than 3%; and the fifth, Ciudadanos, did not win a single one of its ten seats in those 21 constituencies.
In addition, ERC won two deputies and Junts, PNV, EH Bildu and Teruel There is one each formation.
For these purposes, it would have an added repercussion on the results of the elections on July 23, which formation of the national ones is the most voted for and which is second and, above all, which party obtains third place after the two that remain in head since 1982 and which is relegated to fourth place.
In the general elections of November 10, 2019, Vox was third and Unidas Podemos fourth, but the latest CIS barometer, made public on the 16th, gave Sumar, already with Podemos in the coalition, 14.3% of the votes , above the party of Santiago Abascal, with 10.6 percent.
Province to province
In the last general elections, in the only province with two deputies, Soria, the PSOE and PP shared them out.
In the eight circumscriptions with three deputies, PSOE and PP divided them alone into three, Cuenca, Huesca and Palencia, but a third force entered the remaining five: Vox in Ávila, Guadalajara, Segovia and Zamora and Teruel It exists in the province in which this citizen movement was born.
Of the ten provinces with four deputies, the PSOE and PP seats were also divided two by two in four -Burgos, Lugo, Ourense and La Rioja-, while in another four Vox entered as the third force -Albacete, Cáceres, León, Salamanca -.
In addition, in Lleida the ERC was the group that won two seats, ahead of Junts and the PSC, and in Áraba/Álava four candidates entered -PNV, PSOE, Podemos-IU and EH-Bildu- with one representative each.
In the two circumscriptions with a single deputy, Vox took the one from Ceuta and the PP the one from Melilla.
The size of constituencies, a decisive factor
For decades it has been reflected in analyzes of electoral systems, such as those of James Hogan, Dieter Nohlen or Douglas W. Rae, that the “decisive feature” of proportional representation is the size of the constituencies: the larger they are, the more the more deputies they elect, the closer the results will be to proportionality, and the smaller the constituency, the more radical the deviation from proportionality.
Professor Francisco Fernández Segado already wrote 30 years ago -in the Political Studies magazine-, after studying the results of the first five general elections of democracy, that “the serious distortions of proportionality that the Spanish electoral system triggers in the The election of the Congress of Deputies does not respond so much to the legislator’s choice of the D’Hondt formula as to the size of the constituencies”, which he considered “very small”.
He also downplayed the legal barrier of a minimum of 3% of votes to have representation, which he considers to be “null in practice” effective.
Fernández Segado demonstrated that a party with “a solid establishment in the smaller constituencies can touch the absolute majority of the seats with a global electoral support throughout the country of just over a third of the valid votes cast.”
His calculations also revealed that “electoral overrepresentation also occurs with respect to the second state political formation”, while the third and fourth forces at the state level are “remarkably affected”.
It also revealed that “nationalist parties are also, in general, the great beneficiaries of the system, and in a very particular way those that have greater electoral implantation in their respective autonomous territories.”