THE ELECTION PROCESS - USA AND CHINA

By Ruma Dubey

This is a historic world as far as ‘world events’ are concerned. Two of the largest economies of the world, USA and China are electing their leader. And today we live in a flat world, where every global occurrence makes a difference in our economic equations.

USA goes to polls today and in a capitalist economy the way they elect their President is very different from the way in which we in India, or even the Communist country, China.  Assuming, we all know our election process, here are a few things about the election process in USA and China.

USA

Eligibility:

The President and the Vice-President are elected every 4 years and the candidates need to be of minimum 35 years of age, Amercian citizens and should have lived in USA for at least 14 years.

This time around Obama, a Democratic candidate and Mitt Romney, Republican are running for Presidency. Vice President candidates are Joe Biden, a Democratic and Paul Ryan, a Republican. If Obama gets re-elected for the second time, he cannot run for the third time.

Timing of election:

It is always held in November right since the 1845 when the Congress established the timing.  At that time, as majority of the population were farmers, and crops were harvested by then, November was considered to be the best time.  Elections have been held since 1792 and calculating every four years henceforth, 2012 is naturally an election year, the 57th Presidential race.  And it always happens on a Tuesday, after the first Monday was established to prevent elections from falling on the first day of the month. The first date of the month was typically reserved for court business at the county seat and would not make a good day to hold elections.

Relevance of debates:

The practice of debate started in 1960 when the first televised Presidential debate between John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon took place. There were four debates in all. After that, there were no debates till 1976, between President Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter. 

Electoral College:

Like our Prime Minister, the Presidents are not elected by the voters but it is the electoral college which elects the President. While voting in the 51 states, voters actually vote for the electors who are pledged to one ticket. And these electors make up the Electoral College. There will be more electors in a more densely populated state. The candidate who wins a majority of the popular vote wins all of that state’s electoral votes. There are 538 electoral votes thus 270 or more is the magic figure.

Red States v/s Blue states:

On TV, we often see that the map of USA is marked by spots of red and blue. Red indicates that the state is largely considered to be Republican and blue means Democratic.

Are there only two parties in USA?

The electoral scene is dominated by Republican and Democratic but there are other parties too – third parties. And this time, in 2012, there are four third parties and the candidates are - Gary Johnson of the Libertarian Party, Jill Stein of the Green Party, Rocky Anderson of the Justice Party and Virgil Goode of the Constitution Party. They are basically like our ‘Independent’ candidate who split the votes. The most famous third party candidate was Ralph Nader, who in 2000, took away critical votes from Democrat Al Gore in Florida. Gore lost Electoral College votes and many say, that cost him the election.

Do they have electronic voting?

Electronic voting is a contentious issue in USA, post the Florida debacle when Bush was elected. Prone to hacking and software issues, not many states have electronic voting in USA. Every registered voter gets a specimen ballot in the mail, 5 to 10 days prior to election and that removes all confusion when they actually go to vote. They have a punch-card voting system.

The newly elected President will be sworn in on 20th January 2013 and this date is fixed as per the Constitution of USA.

CHINA

There is no election as such, so the over one billion people of China have no say about who their new President will be. The new presumed-President-in-waiting of China is Xi Jinping, the current Vice-President and the ruling Communist Party will hold a massive meeting called a Congress to decide who should take charge. The party's been in power since 1949 and this is the first change in leadership for 10 years. Governors, mayors, and heads of counties, districts, townships and towns are elected by the respective local People's Congresses.

So no brouhaha in China but the leader who will be sworn in, both in China and USA will have major implications for India.