Month: September 2025

A parliamentary vote is when voters choose their local Member of Parliament (MP). In most countries with this system, the person who gets the most votes in each constituency becomes the MP.

After a general election, the Sovereign asks the leader of the party with the most seats to form a government that will run the country. This person is known as the Prime Minister. If no party wins a majority of seats, the parties usually enter into coalition governments with other parties.

In the United Kingdom, general elections to the UK Parliament (which are called a ‘General Election’) take place every 5 years. There are 650 Members of Parliament (MPs), who are elected using the ‘first past the post’ electoral system.

The most senior people in a government are called Ministers and they work in different departments in the executive. The Prime Minister appoints these Ministers and they attend Cabinet meetings. If a new government does not win a majority of seats in the House of Commons, it is described as ‘a hung parliament’.

In some parliamentary systems the MPs are chosen from individual constituencies, while in others they are chosen by using a party list. Some systems combine the two, for example West Germany after World War II pioneered a hybrid system called’mixed-member proportional’ (MMP) where some of the MMP representatives are elected from single-member districts while other are from party lists. This ensures that the number of seats that parties receive in MMP is more or less proportional to the overall percentage of votes they get nationally.

The 2024 elections saw unprecedented turnouts around the world in democratic elections for parliamentary bodies, local governments and national legislatures. The results were often surprising, in part because previous research has shown that electoral expectations are heavily influenced by partisan biases, and are especially strong when voters are exposed to discrepant polling information (Delavande and Manski 2012).

The fact that so many races were unexpected also speaks to the challenges of making sense of complex election data. The aggregators of vote totals are constantly updating their projections as they get new data. In addition, the actual voting process may take days or even weeks to finish, and this is often a mystery to voters. Despite these challenges, the EAC’s work on this issue has contributed to a more transparent and accurate election night reporting process.

After the polls close, news outlets will make their predictions about the results based on their own vote counting systems. These projections are often updated throughout the night and into the days and weeks after Election Day, and they check against full results that will be certified once every ballot has been counted.

In the ANES surveys, respondents are asked about their perception of the fairness of this process by rating how often they believe votes are counted fairly: very often, fairly often, sometimes, or not at all often. Across all these years, we have seen that voters are increasingly dissatisfied with the way their votes are counted, including in places where they are confident that elections are fair and accurate.

A resolution is a decision or declaration voted on by all UN member states in the General Assembly and adopted by a majority vote. It may impose obligations or authorise the use of coercive measures, including force. Resolutions begin with an unnumbered preambular clause, which sets the context and often includes references to previous actions. The operative clauses are numbered and end with semicolons (or a full stop/period). The name of the issuing body is typically placed above the preambular, though this can be moved to below, and the names of the sponsors may also be included. The words in a resolution are usually written in plain language but are often underlined, italicised or bold. Preambular phrases tend to start with verbs, and operative clauses start with nouns or adjectives.

This resolution was initiated by the Council’s ten elected members (E10) and called for an immediate, unconditional, and permanent ceasefire in Gaza, as well as the immediate and dignified release of all hostages held by Hamas and other groups. It was adopted by 14 votes in favour and one abstention (US). This resolution calls on States to “exercise vigilance in the supply, sale or transfer of major military systems to Iran to ensure that such goods cannot be used for nuclear-related activities.” It also urges them to limit their interactions with Iranian financial institutions. It further calls on Iran to ratify the IAEA’s Additional Protocol. It also requires all UN bodies and the IAEA to report on Iran’s compliance with the provisions of this resolution within 90 days of its adoption.

Governments are responsible for providing public services, maintaining law and order, regulating the economy, and protecting the environment. The goals of these activities are often shaped by the needs and expectations of citizens. To meet these requirements, governments create policies through laws, regulations, programs, and funding initiatives.

A policy is an initiative created to achieve specific societal goals and objectives. To create and implement policy, the following steps are taken:

Problem Identification: Identifying issues that require action. This involves evaluating how serious the issue is and what it means to society. This is a subjective process, influenced by the political ideology of those in power. Agenda Setting: Selecting issues that are of sufficient importance to warrant government attention. This step involves evaluating various aspects of an issue, including its impact on the community, the nation, and the world.

Policy Formulation: Developing alternatives for addressing the identified problems. This step involves evaluating the costs and benefits of each alternative, as well as the short-term and long-term implications for society. Decision-Making/Adoption: Selecting a course of action from among the alternative solutions. This step requires obtaining input and feedback from stakeholders and interested parties.

Implementation: Putting the policy into practice. This includes establishing procedures and protocols to ensure that policies are conducted in the proper manner. It also includes identifying the intent, background, and other information that was used to create the policy. This information is helpful if the policy must be interpreted in a court case or in other ambiguous situations.

For many, hearing about the stock market feels like listening to a foreign language. But it’s actually a very important part of our economy, and something that everyone should understand at least a little bit better.

The stock market is the collection of physical and electronic markets where people can buy and sell shares of companies. Companies raise money through stock issues by selling shares to investors who then become partial owners of the company. The value of the shares rises or falls based on the fortunes of the business and other market factors. Investors can invest in stocks through individual companies, mutual funds or exchange-traded funds (ETFs), which track a group of companies across multiple industries.

Most Americans learn about the stock market through indexes like the Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500, which show how the overall market is performing at a given time. These indexes are often used on news programs because they provide a quick snapshot of Wall Street.

In the late 1700s, a group of merchants met under a buttonwood tree on Wall Street and signed an agreement that would eventually lead to the New York Stock Exchange. Today, the NYSE is one of the largest exchanges in the world and has an immense impact on global economies.

A stock trade is only completed once a buyer and seller agree on a price. There is usually a period of a few days before a share is officially considered owned by the buyer.

GDP measures the monetary value of all final goods and services produced in a country during a specified period of time (such as a quarter or a year). It includes all market and some non-market production, such as defense or education services provided by government. GDP is commonly measured on a per-capita basis, meaning that each person’s share of GDP is proportionate to his or her share of the population. GDP is a very important statistic for many reasons. It is calculated frequently, widely, and consistently; it is used to evaluate the economic performance of governments, businesses, and individuals; and it is often compared between countries in order to understand their relative wealth.

The primary reason why GDP is so important is that it provides a snapshot of the overall economic activity in a country. It is a good measure of the size of an economy and can help determine whether an economy is growing, contracting, or stagnating. It is also used to make long-term economic plans and goals. The White House and Congress use it to plan spending, the Federal Reserve uses it to set monetary policy, and business people use it when making decisions about jobs, expansion, and investments.

However, the reliance on recorded transactions and official data means that GDP underestimates the value of some economic activity. It does not account for under-the-table activities such as black-market transactions, or unrecorded informal economic activity such as leisure time and household production. It also does not include the value of new products and quality improvements.