Closed list describes the variant of party-list proportional representation where voters can (effectively) only vote for political parties as a whole and thus have no influence on the party-supplied order in which party candidates are elected. If voters have at least some influence then it is called an open list.
In closed list systems the party has pre-decided on who will receive the votes for the political parties in the elections, that is, the candidates positioned highest on this list tend to always get a seat in the parliament while the candidates positioned very low on the closed list will not.
However, the candidates "at the water mark" of this specific party are in the position of either losing or winning their seat, depending on the specific total closed list votes for this party. "The water mark" is defined as the number of seats a specific party can be expected to achieve, in reference to how the party produces their closed lists, that is, the candidates who might or might not get a seat.
Read more about Closed List: List of Countries With Closed List Proportional Representation, Criticism
Famous quotes containing the words closed and/or list:
“Don: Why are they closed? They’re all closed, every one of them.
Pawnbroker: Sure they are. It’s Yom Kippur.
Don: It’s what?
Pawnbroker: It’s Yom Kippur, a Jewish holiday.
Don: It is? So what about Kelly’s and Gallagher’s?
Pawnbroker: They’re closed, too. We’ve got an agreement. They keep closed on Yom Kippur and we don’t open on St. Patrick’s.”
—Billy Wilder (b. 1906)
“The advice of their elders to young men is very apt to be as unreal as a list of the hundred best books.”
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. (1841–1935)