April 28th, 2010 by Chanan

As Lebanon prepares for municipal elections in the first of a multi-staged process this upcoming weekend, Karam Karam, the program director at the Lebanese Center for Policy Studies, offers a frustrating account of the missed opportunities to enact much-needed reform of the electoral process. “The issue of reform has been raised before and after each of the elections held since 1990 without ever being translated into concrete measures, and the same is true this time around,” he writes.

A bill put forward late last year by the Ministry of Interior and Municipalities that would have changed the current majoritarian system into a system of proportional representation replete with expanded municipal powers, greater opportunities for female legislators and a more fair balloting system was stunted by political parties concerned about its impact on “the patronage networks and favoritism that have dominated politics since the establishment of the Lebanese Republic.” Even though these parties are aware of the benefits to a revised electoral system, “the inertia of the present system is too great to overcome.”

Posted in Elections, Lebanon, Political Parties, Reform, Uncategorized, Women |