The first category covers the rules governing how the elector exercises his or her right to vote. As far as this area is concerned, electoral systems have to provide a response to five questions, and several responses are possible:
- What electors do you want to call to the ballot box and hence what sort of suffrage is to be applied? Direct universal suffrage, indirect universal suffrage or multi-tiered elections?
- What guiding principle should the vote be based upon? Is the intention to give preference to the majority principle, proportional representation or “hybrid” systems?
- How is the electorate to be divided up between constituencies/electoral districts?
- What method of voting is to be available to electors? Here we can distinguish between “categorical” voting methods (electors are asked to make an absolute choice by indicating their preference for one party or one political movement to the exclusion of all others) and “ordinal” ones (under which electors may qualify their choice).
- How many times must electors vote? This is a question of deciding how many rounds the vote should be spread over.