VOA慢速英语2020--其他国家是如何选举领导人的?

Americans did not vote directly for Joe Biden or Donald Trump¹ on Election Day on November 3. That makes the United States different from most democracies.

Instead, they voted for electors who meet over a month later to officially choose the president. Those electors met Monday to officially choose Joe Biden as the nation's next president.

The system is known as the Electoral College.

In other democratic countries, national leaders are either directly elected by voters or by a parliamentary system. In a parliamentary system, the party that wins the most seats in a national congress selects the head of government.

Here is a look at how democracies worldwide choose their leaders.

South Africa

In 1994, South Africa held its first elections in which citizens of all races were permitted to vote. South Africans vote for political parties rather than for candidates. The party that won the majority of seats in the National Assembly would then be able to elect its own leader as president of South Africa.

Nelson Mandela, the leader of the African National Congress (ANC), became president in 1994. The party has controlled the country's politics ever since. However, the ANC won with its smallest majority yet in 2019, with 57 percent of the vote.

Poland

Poland's democracy was reborn in 1989 after the fall of communism across eastern Europe. In Poland, a candidate who gets at least 50 percent of the popular vote becomes president. If no candidate gets at least 50 percent, the top two candidates face each other in a second round.

There has only been one first-round winner, with the re-election in 2000 of Aleksander Kwasniewski. Even Lech Walesa, the famous founder² of Poland's anti-communist Solidarity³ movement, needed a second-round vote to become Poland's first popularly elected president.

Britain

Queen Elizabeth II is the head of state. But British voters choose the head of government, the prime minister.

Voters elect a lawmaker for their local area. Then, the party that wins the largest number of the 650-seat Parliament generally takes power, with the party leader becoming prime minister.

A coalition⁴ government might be formed if no party wins a majority of seats. The winning party is almost always the one that took the biggest share of the popular vote. It is rare for any party to win a majority of the popular vote because several parties compete.

Boris Johnson's Conservative Party only got 44 percent of the popular vote in the 2019 election. But his party won an 80-seat majority in Parliament, permitting him to remain as prime minister.

Brazil

Brazil chooses its president through direct election. The election is usually held in two rounds unless the first-round winner gets more than 50 percent of the accepted votes.

Voting is required in Brazil. This leads to high voter turnout but also a number of incorrect or empty ballots⁵. The fine for failing to vote is less than one U.S. dollar. In 2018, Jair Bolsonaro became president after winning more than 50 percent of the votes in the second round.

South Korea

The president of South Korea is directly elected by a single-round, popular vote. The candidate who gets the most votes wins the presidency⁶. A person must be at least 40 years old to run for the office.

The country's current president, Moon Jae-in, won a special election in May 2017. The election was held two months after South Korea's Constitutional Court removed Park Geun-hye from office for corruption⁷. She is now serving time in prison for abuse of power, bribery⁸ and other crimes.

New Zealand

New Zealand's prime minister is chosen by other lawmakers and is usually the leader of the party that gains the most votes in the election. Under New Zealand's voting system, parties must often form alliances to command a majority in the parliament.

Although New Zealand is a fully⁹ independent and democratic nation, its head of state remains¹⁰ Britain's Queen Elizabeth II. That means the prime minister must officially be approved by the Queen's representative in New Zealand, the governor-general.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, the leader of the Labor¹¹ Party, has been in office since October 2017. She won a second term in October of this year.

India

India, with nearly 1.4 billion people, is often called the world's largest democracy. The head of government is the prime minister. He or she is elected by members of the majority party of the Lok Sabha, the lower house of Parliament. In 2014, Narendra Modi became prime minister when his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won the general election.

The president in India acts as the ceremonial head of state who can "advise, encourage and warn" the elected government. The president is indirectly¹² selected by elected members of Parliament and state legislatures. In 2017, nearly 5,000 lawmakers voted to select Ram¹³ Nath Kovind as president.

Words in This Story

communism - n. a way of organizing a society in which the government owns the things that are used to make and transport products (such as land, oil, factories, ships, etc.) and there is no privately¹⁴ owned property

bribery - n. the act or crime of giving or accepting a bribe -- something given in order to get someone to do something

1 trump   

n.王牌，法宝；v.打出王牌，吹喇叭

参考例句：

• He was never able to trump up the courage to have a showdown.他始终鼓不起勇气摊牌。
• The coach saved his star player for a trump card.教练保留他的明星选手，作为他的王牌。

2 Founder   

n.创始者，缔造者

参考例句：

• He was extolled as the founder of their Florentine school.他被称颂为佛罗伦萨画派的鼻祖。
• According to the old tradition,Romulus was the founder of Rome.按照古老的传说，罗穆卢斯是古罗马的建国者。

3 solidarity   

n.团结；休戚相关

参考例句：

• They must preserve their solidarity.他们必须维护他们的团结。
• The solidarity among China's various nationalities is as firm as a rock.中国各族人民之间的团结坚如磐石。

4 coalition   

n.结合体，同盟，结合，联合

参考例句：

• The several parties formed a coalition.这几个政党组成了政治联盟。
• Coalition forces take great care to avoid civilian casualties.联盟军队竭尽全力避免造成平民伤亡。

5 ballots   

n.投票表决( ballot的名词复数 )；选举；选票；投票总数v.（使）投票表决( ballot的第三人称单数 )

参考例句：

• They're counting the ballots. 他们正在计算选票。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The news of rigged ballots has rubbed off much of the shine of their election victory. 他们操纵选票的消息使他们在选举中获得的胜利大为减色。 来自《简明英汉词典》

6 presidency   

n.总统(校长，总经理)的职位(任期)

参考例句：

• Roosevelt was elected four times to the presidency of the United States.罗斯福连续当选四届美国总统。
• Two candidates are emerging as contestants for the presidency.两位候选人最终成为总统职位竞争者。

7 corruption   

n.腐败，堕落，贪污

参考例句：

• The people asked the government to hit out against corruption and theft.人民要求政府严惩贪污盗窃。
• The old man reviled against corruption.那老人痛斥了贪污舞弊。

8 bribery   

n.贿络行为，行贿，受贿

参考例句：

• FBI found out that the senator committed bribery.美国联邦调查局查明这个参议员有受贿行为。
• He was charged with bribery.他被指控受贿。

9 fully   

adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地

参考例句：

• The doctor asked me to breathe in,then to breathe out fully.医生让我先吸气，然后全部呼出。
• They soon became fully integrated into the local community.他们很快就完全融入了当地人的圈子。

10 remains   

n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹

参考例句：

• He ate the remains of food hungrily.他狼吞虎咽地吃剩余的食物。
• The remains of the meal were fed to the dog.残羹剩饭喂狗了。

11 labor   

n.劳动，努力，工作，劳工；分娩；vi.劳动，努力，苦干；vt.详细分析；麻烦

参考例句：

• We are never late in satisfying him for his labor.我们从不延误付给他劳动报酬。
• He was completely spent after two weeks of hard labor.艰苦劳动两周后，他已经疲惫不堪了。

12 indirectly   

adv.间接地，不直接了当地

参考例句：

• I heard the news indirectly.这消息我是间接听来的。
• They were approached indirectly through an intermediary.通过一位中间人，他们进行了间接接触。

13 ram   

(random access memory)随机存取存储器

参考例句：

• 512k RAM is recommended and 640k RAM is preferred.推荐配置为512K内存，640K内存则更佳。

14 privately   

adv.以私人的身份，悄悄地，私下地

参考例句：

• Some ministers admit privately that unemployment could continue to rise.一些部长私下承认失业率可能继续升高。
• The man privately admits that his motive is profits.那人私下承认他的动机是为了牟利。