Why do democracies outside of the US hate the Electoral College?

Answer 1

Some other countries (such as Italy, for example) have indirect election of the head of state or executive of government. The US' model is unique; it is as though the President were elected by the two houses of Congress (similar to Italy), but with "electors" selected specifically for this purpose. The complex method was designed by the founders of the Constitution to separate the election of the Presidency both from direct voting by the public, and from Congress--perhaps they could anticipate how the role has grown in magnitude over the years and wanted to reduce the chances that a demagogue could seize power. Nevertheless, their design was far from perfect and had to be changed substantially in 1800 after a disastrous, confusing result.

Answer 2

How do you assume what people outside the US think? Are you omniscient or something. I have lived in different countries outside the US all my life and have never even heard much opinion about the US Electoral College, let alone hatred of it.

Answer 3

Similar to Charlie N., I have lived in several democracies other than the United States and, like him, I have never heard any remarks of hatred or disgust towards the institution of the US Electoral College. I have actually only ever heard such remarks within the United States, usually from US citizens in states that are disadvantaged by the Electoral College system. Those US citizens generally fall into two categories: those who come from states that are clearly red states or blue states and hold that their votes do not matter because their Electoral votes are already decided AND/OR come from states with large populations and therefore have a lower Electoral College seat to population ratio, so their votes are actually worth less. Since Non-Americans are not affected by these problems, their ire is not similarly stoked.

Perhaps the questioner is confusing the failure to replicate the Electoral College in other democracies to be emblematic of hatred. This is incorrect; this is simply disinterest. The Electoral College was an American invention in order to balance the needs of the smaller states in electing the US President, forcing the President to pay more attention to the smaller states than he otherwise would (since smaller states get proportionally more votes in the Electoral College system). Most other countries prefer to make each person's vote count equally rather than trying to reallocate voting power between different densely-settled and rural regions.

Answer 4

I have not seen nor heard any of the expressions of hate to which you referred, so I can only assume it is because the U.S. President is not directly elected by the U.S. citizens.