Proportional representation and popular assessments of MP performance in South Africa: a desire for electoral reform?

Electoral reform has been attracting increasing interest in South Africa and a panel of experts has recommended that South Africa’s electoral system be reformed into a mixed system that would include a constituency-based electoral system as one of its components.

South Africa highlights the perils of a proportional representation (PR) system that encourages the indebtedness of Members of Parliament (MPs) to their party leadership while undermining accountability to the general public. This policy brief examines public attitudes towards MPs and, indirectly, towards the present electoral system. It is based on an Afrobarometer survey about the accessibility of MPs, satisfaction with their performance, and accountability relationships in South Africa, Benin, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Ghana, Madagascar, Malawi, Nigeria, Senegal, Tanzania and Uganda. The report compares attitudes across these 12 countries.

On MP Accessibility, the brief reports that South Africans:

• are less likely to know their MPs than respondents in any of the other 11 countries
• are less likely to know the name of their MP, but are as likely to contact an MP about an issue as in the other 11 countries
• appear to place lower priority on MP accessibility
• have lower expectations of how often MPs visit communities.
  

On MP Performance:

• MPs got a positive review of 46 percent compared to 38 percent expressing disapproval.
• PR does not appear to have made South Africans less satisfied with their MPs than others.
• Most South Africans think MPs never listen to their issues but the country falls very close to the 12-country average.
  
• PR apparently doesn’t make South African MPs any less responsive than the relatively un-responsive MPs elected in constituency-based systems.
  

On MP Accountability:

• Elections are rated as an effective mechanism of accountability in South Africa and the differences with non-PR systems are minimal across the 12 countries.
• A small number South Africans attribute accountability to voters, while many more think the president is responsible.
• South Africans are not satisfied with their MPs and the current selection system, but neither are they overwhelmingly dissatisfied, evaluations which do not differ from the (mean) average of other countries surveyed.
  

The brief concludes that electoral reform is probably not a high priority for many South Africans and that a move to a constituency-based system is no guarantee to solving the problems of accessibility and unresponsiveness.