ABSTRACT
This is a subject of such political importance that it deserves a separate chapter, although its mechanics are implicit in what has. already been said. The last chapter was written in terms of the rules for constituting a list of voters; but voters can act only within constituencies each returning one or several members. Such constituencies may be delimited on a territorial basis, or on some other basis, or on a mixture of bases. It is assumed nowadays that the normal practice is that of a single set of territorial constituencies; but we have seen that in Britain until 1948 there existed alongside the general territorial constituencies a set of non-territorial graduates’ constituencies. A system of communal representation is one which gives first place to non-territorial considerations in forming constituencies: it links together voters from the whole country on the basis of characteristics other than that of attachment to a particular locality. The ‘communal rolls’ thus formed may be subdivided territorially for purposes of an election: but the ‘communal’ characteristic is given priority over the ‘general’ characteristic which everyone may possess, that of attachment to some locality.
