Electoral Reform Society - History

History

The ERS was founded in January 1884 as the Proportional Representation Society by the Victorian naturalist, archaeologist and polymath John Lubbock. The founding members included academics, barristers, and an equal number of Conservative and Liberal MPs. Famous early members included Charles Dodgson (better known as Lewis Caroll), C.P. Scott, editor of the Manchester Guardian and Thomas Hare, the inventor of STV.

The Society campaigned for the introduction of STV until 1888. It then became inactive until 1904. It resumed campaigning for STV, succeeding in getting it introduced in local elections in Ireland, and in numerous religious, educational and professional organisations.

After World War II the Society suffered from financial problems and a lack of public interest in electoral reform. It was kept going for many decades by its Director, Enid Lakeman, an inveterate pamphleteer, public speaker and writer of letters to newspapers about STV. When Fianna Fáil twice (1959 and 1968) put to a referendum a proposal to abolish STV in Ireland and revert to first-past-the-post, Lakeman led a successful ERS campaign to keep STV there. In 1973 STV was introduced in Northern Ireland for elections to local councils and to the new Northern Ireland Assembly, and the Society and its staff were called upon to advise in the programme of education set up by the government to train returning officers in the new techniques and raise public awareness in the Province of the implications of the newly introduced voting method.

Interest in proportional representation revived sharply in Britain in 1974, and from then on the Society was able to secure a higher public profile for its campaign.

In 1983 the Society was recognised by the United Nations Economic and Social Council as a Non-Governmental Organisation with Consultative Status.