Diamond In The Rough: How Cyprus Can Become A Stable Democracy
...nearly forty years the island has been divided between Greeks and Turks. Is there any way the groups could ever unite and become democratic? And even if that were possible, how long would the unsteady peace last? These questions pose a difficult problem but not an impossible one. The reunification of Cyprus is a challenge for those involved to learn from past mistakes and move beyond division and towards cooperation. However, the people of Cyprus cannot accomplish this without strong government institutions based upon a new constitution. This new constitution will consist of a proportional electoral system, a federal division of power, an independent judiciary, and a presidential executive branch. For each of these institutions I will outline how they should stand in the constitution and then give my arguments as to why they are important for the reunification of Cyprus.
By far the most essential part of the new Cypriot constitution will be the proportional electoral system. However, this will be in the form of a mixed-member proportional system. This means that half of the candidates will be elected from single-member districts through plurality to the Senate. The other half will be elected by list proportional system to the Chamber of Representatives. In addition, the chambers will be different sizes; the Senate will hold 50 seats and the Chamber will hold 100 seats.
At first glance this mixed-member system seems counter-productive. Why use plurality at all? Simply, when they tried to write a constitution in 1960 they used plurality, which indicates that they have a predisposition towards it in their political culture. Overlooking this point would be shortsighted. Instead of switching completely from one system to another, it makes more sense to use both and not cause undue stress on the country. On the other hand, since both the power struggle between the...
View Full Essay
