Institute of Public Policy releases its sixth Policy Paper: The introduction of preferential voting in Portugal: an electoral experience (and respective Appendix A) (in Portuguese), by Marina Costa Lobo, José Santana Pereira, and João Tiago Gaspar.
This paper analyses the results of an electoral experiment conducted in the general election of October 4, 2015 to study the feasibility of a preferential voting system in Portugal. An exit poll was held in the constituencies of Beja, Braga and Lisbon. In each constituency, the sample was divided into 3 groups who voted using one of three ballots. Ballot A was similar to the official ballot and was comprised of the names of all parties; in ballot B voters could choose either a party or a candidate; and in ballot C voters were asked to choose one candidate.