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Siegfried Geyerhahn (November 30, 1879, Angern an der March, Niederösterreich, Austria-Hungary – April 30, 1960, New York, NY, USA)[1] was an Austrian lawyer who emigrated to the USA in 1939. While a law student at Vienna University Geyerhahn published a paper in which he designed an electoral system combining proportionality with personalization, which is the earliest paper on the subject.
Life
editGeyerhahn studied law at Vienna University 1898/99-1902 and was awarded the doctorate degree Dr. iur. in March 1903. He stayed in Vienna and practiced as a lawyer. Being Jewish and an active member of a Free Mason lodge, he was arrested by the Gestapo in 1938 and detained in the concentration camps at Dachau and Buchenwald. Released in 1939, Geyerhahn and his family managed to emigrate to the United States where he resumed his profession as a lawyer.[2]
Geyerhahn also served as a liaison person for the American Association of Former Austrian Jurists.
Works
editWhile student Geyerhahn published a paper proposing an electoral system intending to reconcile proportionality and personalization.[3] In his system the parliamentary seats are apportioned among parties according to proportionality; the filling of these seats then is to emphasize personalization. To this end the electoral region is subdivided into constituencies; Geyerhahn suggested to set up half as many constituencies as there are seats available. In the first place the seats of a party are filled with the candidates who garner the most votes in their constituencies. The remaining seats are assigned to the remaining candidates who are ranked by their vote tallies.
Geyerhahn foresaw the possibility that a party wins more constituencies than proportionality would justify; nowadays this instance is discussed under the heading "overhang seats". He felt this event to be no more than a rare eventuality:[4]
Man wird zugestehen, dass derartiges nur sehr selten vorkommen wird, aber es kann vorkommen, und deshalb muss für diese Eventualität ein Ausweg geschaffen werden.
- One will concede that such an event will occur only very rarely, but it can occur and therefore a course of action for this eventuality needs to be devised.
Geyerhahn offered not just one course of action, but two. His first option is to raise the house size of the parliament until all constituency winners are sustained by proportionality. The second option is to incorporate no more constituency winners than seats are provided by proportionality.
Geyerhahns paper is the oldest source of a
mit der Personenwahl verbundene Verhältniswahl
- proportional system that is combined with the election of persons
that after Worldwar II has been adopted in Germany and other countries.[5][6]
References
edit- ^ Geni Retrieved 2021-03-16
- ^ Accounts of Siegfried Geyerhahn, Claims Resolution Tribunal of the Holocaust Victim Assets Litigation. Retrieved 2021-03-15
- ^ Siegfried Geyerhahn: Das Problem der verhältnismässigen Vertretung – Ein Versuch seiner Lösung. Wiener Staatswissenschaftliche Studien, edited by Edmund Bernatzik / Eugen von Philippovich, third volume, fourth issue. Mohr, Tübingen 1902. Retrieved 2021-03-15
- ^ Siegfried Geyerhahn: Das Problem der verhältnismässigen Vertretung (see above), pp. 29-30. Retrieved 2021-03-17
- ^ Friedrich Pukelsheim: Proportional Representation, Apportionment Methods and Their Applications, With a Foreword by Andrew Duff MEP, Second Edition. Springer International Publishing AG, Cham (CH) 2017. Section 16.12 "Siegfried Geyerhahn 1879-1960" (with portrait). eBook ISBN 978-3-319-64707-4, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-64707-4, Softcover ISBN 978-3-319-64706-7
- ^ Matthew Soberg Shugart / Martin Paul Wattenberg (Editors): Mixed-Member Electoral Systems: The Best of Both Worlds? Oxford University Press, Oxford 2001. Print ISBN-13: 9780199257683, DOI:10.1093/019925768X.001.0001
{{Normdaten|TYP=p|GND=|VIAF=}} {{SORTIERUNG:Geyerhahn, Siegfried}} [[:Kategorie:Jurist]] [[:Kategorie:Österreicher]] [[:Kategorie:US-Amerikaner]] [[:Kategorie:Geboren 1879]] [[:Kategorie:Gestorben 1960]] [[:Kategorie:Mann]] {{Personendaten |NAME=Geyerhahn, Siegfried |ALTERNATIVNAMEN= |KURZBESCHREIBUNG=österreichisch-amerikanischer Jurist |GEBURTSDATUM=30. November 1879 |GEBURTSORT=[[Angern an der March]] |STERBEDATUM=30. April 1960 |STERBEORT=[[New York City|New York]] }} Repp2 (talk) 10:30, 1 April 2021 (UTC)