Thank you, Edwin, for letting me know you live in a nation with a dominant party.
You know, that makes me sad to hear you say there is a single dominant party. Sometimes voters are so focused on power resembling Unity that they almost automatically go for supporting the biggest party.
I've been surprised about India and how the National Congress party was able to continuously consolidate its power for all these years. I've been surprised about Japan and its dance with one major party in control over many years. In South Africa, the ANC has the majority.
In some systems, for instance multi-seat proportional voting (which is not the pure form of proportional voting), the centrist party can end up holding on to power for decades, think Japan. I consider that a bad form of proportional voting.
I am curious what made your country into what it is politically. Is there a president? Empowered much? Was there a foreign dominant force that was in control for decades? (I am thinking communism or colonialism.) Is there an unfriendly nation nearby that requires everyone to be on guard?
In a real proportional democracy, the single party would have fallen apart in two, within a decade or so. But if for some reason it is in the collective human nature to stick with one person only (at home it is always just Mom, or just Dad, in the community there is always just one leader, in the nation there is just the King or the President), then we are talking about a nation where the people have been instilled in a certain manner. That is not good. If there were repression such as experienced with apartheid, then it can take decades before people dare be themselves again.
People need to be people, and it is unnatural to have a table with food on it, and everyone standing on one side of the table only, long lines behind, when there are three sides near-empty and open for approaching. Something serious is going on in your nation, Edwin, and my hunch is that it is not the political system.
It sounds perhaps that your nation has a president. If so, the democratic game that should be played is then played upwards toward that one person. That would be really sad, and that is not democracy as I know it. Having a president is like having two tables and one table organized completely fair and the other table (with more food on it) organized unfairly (winner-take-all).
Scandinavian people are the happiest people in the world: one house, and one house only. No presidency, no senate. Their leader is a prime-minister, who is basically the manager and not the president. But these nations also have ten million people or less in them. A small nation can deal with proportional voting really really well.
History is important. For instance, Before WWI, there was no Poland, but there was rather a German Russian border. Today, in the political outcome of Poland, that German-Russian border is still visible, with voters voting differently, politically, on both sides. It showed me that what is inside people will get expressed in the voting system.
But no good news about their voting system either. Poland has an empowered president (winner-take-all), it has district voting for the senate (winners-taking-all) and semi-proportional voting for the house (kind of fair, but warped nevertheless). So, it is not my ideal democracy. Far from.
Poland’s history will probably play out in this restricted form of democracy for many years to come. I hope one day, they will remove their presidency and install proportional voting (but with a threshold because they are one of the larger nations in Europe). If they had picked the German system, they would have been fine today.
Edwin, good luck in your nation. My suggestion is to go help that party that is second largest (or third largest) and make it grow. I'd also vote for a party that would want to simplify your democracy. Right now, something is not right about the system and be careful not to get yourself into trouble trying to change it. Those that like their power the way it is never desire quick change. So, move slowly and try to understand where the seat of power is today. As far as I can tell, the seat of power is not in your proportional system. Something else is going on (or somethings else, plural, are going on).
P.S. In a good proportional voting system, urban vs rural is not a major issue. I've seen voters address regionalism within a large party quite successfully.
