Electoral district

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"Constituency" redirects here. For other uses, see Constituency (disambiguation).
For electoral divisions of UK local authorities, see Wards and electoral divisions of the United Kingdom.

An electoral district (also known as a constituency, legislative district, riding, ward, division, electoral area or electorate) is a territorial subdivision for electing members to a legislative body. Generally, only voters (constituents) who reside within the district are permitted to vote in an election held there. From a single district, a single member or multiple members might be chosen. Members might be chosen by a first-past-the-post system or a proportional representative system, or another voting method entirely. Members might be chosen through a direct election under universal suffrage, an indirect election, or another form of suffrage.


The names for electoral districts vary across countries and, occasionally, for the office being elected. The term constituency is commonly used to refer to an electoral district; it can also refer to the body of eligible voters within the represented area. Similarly, in Australia and New Zealand, electoral districts are called electorates, however elsewhere the term electorate generally refers specifically to the body of voters. In India electoral districts are referred to as "Chûnāô Kshetra" (Hindi: चुनाव क्षेत्र) in Hindi, which can be literally translated to English as "electoral area" though the official English translation for the term is "constituency". The term "Chûnāô-Kshetra" is used while referring to an electoral district in general irrespective of the legislature. When referring to a particular legislatorial constituency, it is simply referred to as "Kshetra" along with the name of the legislature, in Hindi (e.g.-'Lok Sabha Kshetra' for a Lok Sabha Constituency). Electoral districts for municipal or other local bodies are called "wards". In Canada, districts are colloquially called ridings (stemming from an earlier British geographical subdivision); in French, circonscription or (colloquially) comté, "county." Local electoral districts are sometimes called wards, a term which also designates administrative subdivisions of a municipality. In local government in the Republic of Ireland voting districts are called "electoral areas".

District magnitude[edit]


Representatives from electoral districts typically have offices in their respective districts. This photo shows the office of Michael Moore, a Member of Parliament (MP) in the UK.

Under proportional representation systems, district magnitude is an important determinant of the makeup of the elected body. With a larger number of winners, candidates are able to represent proportionately smaller minorities; a 10% minority in a given district may secure no seats in a 5-member election but would be guaranteed a seat in a 9-member one because they fulfill a Droop quota.


Apportionment and redistricting[edit]

Main articles: Apportionment and Redistricting





Main article: Gerrymandering

Gerrymandering is the manipulation of electoral district boundaries for political gain. By creating a few "forfeit" districts where opposing candidates win overwhelmingly, gerrymandering politicians can manufacture more, but narrower, wins for themselves and their party. Gerrymandering relies on the wasted-vote effect, effectively concentrating wasted votes among opponents while minimizing wasted votes among supporters. Consequently, gerrymandering is typically done under voting systems using single-member districts, which have more wasted votes.

While much more difficult, gerrymandering can also be done under proportional-voting systems when districts elect very few seats. By making three-member districts in regions where a particular group has a slight majority, for instance, gerrymandering politicians can obtain 2/3 of that district's seats. Similarly, by making four-member districts in regions where the same group has slightly less than a majority, gerrymandering politicians can still secure exactly half of the seats.


Swing seats and safe seats[edit]

Main articles: Marginal seat and Safe seat

Sometimes, particularly under non-proportional winner-take-all voting systems, electoral districts can be prone to landslide victories. A safe seat is one that is very unlikely to be won by a rival politician due to the makeup of its constituency. Conversely, a swing seat is one that could easily swing either way. In United Kingdom general elections and United States presidential and congressional elections, the voting in a relatively small number of swing seats usually determines the outcome of the entire election. Many politicians aspire to have safe seats. In large multi-party systems like India, swing seats can lead to a Hung assembly like situation if a significant number of seats go for regional parties instead of the larger national parties who are the main competitors at the national or state level, as was the situation in the Lok Sabha (Lower house of The Parliament of India) during the decade of the 1990s.

Constituency work[edit]

Elected representatives may spend much of the time serving the needs or demands of individual constituents, meaning either voters or residents of their district. This is more common in assemblies with many single-member or small districts than those with fewer, larger districts. In a looser sense, corporations and other such organizations can be referred to as constituents, if they have a significant presence in an area.


Special constituencies with additional membership requirements[edit]


Voting without constituencies[edit]

Not all democratic political systems use separate districts or other electoral subdivisions to conduct elections. Israel, for instance, conducts parliamentary elections as a single district, while the 26 electoral districts in Italy and the 20 in the Netherlands have a role in the actual election, but no role whatsoever in the division of the seats. Ukraine elected half of the Verkhovna Rada (the Ukrainian Parliament) in this way in the elections in October 2012.[2]

See also[edit]