The comparative study of electoral systems has, for the most part, been confined to aggregate national-level returns, for the simple reason that these are the data that are available in machine- readable form. This pilot study seeks to compile electoral results at the district level for a range of democratic countries. The investigator will then code the results and make the resulting machine-readable datasets available to the scholarly community and public. The proposal also seeks to investigate the relationship between electoral structure and the number of parties (an area long dominated by what is called Duverger's Law) with a deliberate district level focus. The pilot study should substantially enhance our understanding of the topic.
