Counting votes: simple, absolute and qualified majorities explained

"Carried by a majority" sounds like a fact. It is really the output of three separate decisions that somebody has to make before the vote opens: how big a share is required, a share of what, and what happens to the members who abstained. Most disputes about a vote are disputes about one of those three, and almost all of them could have been avoided by saying the answer out loud beforehand.

The three thresholds

Simple, or relative, majority. More votes for than against. Abstentions are set aside, and the proposal wins even if the votes for are fewer than half of everyone in the room. In an election with several candidates the same idea appears as a plurality: the candidate with most votes wins, without needing half.

Absolute majority. More than half. The trap is what it is half of. In everyday use it usually means more than half of the votes cast; in many sets of bylaws and in some legal traditions it means more than half of all the votes that exist in the association, whether cast or not. Both readings are current, so the phrase on its own is not enough.

Qualified majority, also called a supermajority: a fixed fraction above half, typically two thirds or three quarters, reserved for bylaw amendments, dissolution, the sale of property and the removal of board members. Company law uses the same device: a special resolution under the UK Companies Act 2006 requires not less than 75% of the votes cast. That is a company-law figure and tells you nothing about your bylaws, which may set two thirds, three quarters or something else again.

Note that "simple majority" itself is used in two senses: more for than against, and more than half of the votes cast. Where the bylaws use it without defining it, the chair should state which reading is being applied before the vote, rather than after.

The denominator

Three denominators are in common use, and they shrink in this order: all eligible votes in the association, the votes represented at the meeting, and the votes actually cast on that item. A requirement counted on all eligible votes is far harder to meet than the same fraction counted on votes cast, because every member who stayed at home counts against you.

Read the clause literally. "Two thirds of the votes cast", "two thirds of the members present", "two thirds of the members" and "two thirds of the total votes" are four different rules. The last two are the ones that quietly defeat proposals, and they are common precisely for bylaw amendments; see the guide on voting on bylaw amendments.

Abstentions

An abstention is a member exercising the right not to take a position, and where it lands depends entirely on the denominator. In a majority of the votes cast, an abstention is normally excluded from the count, so it has no effect on the threshold. In a majority of the members present, or of all eligible votes, an abstention is inside the denominator and therefore works exactly like a vote against. A blank or spoiled ballot is usually treated as an abstention, and a member who simply does not vote is not an abstention at all unless the rules say so.

State the treatment before opening the item. It is the single most useful sentence a chair says all evening.

Worked example: one ballot, three answers

An association has 200 members entitled to vote. 80 of them attend. On a motion the result is 38 for, 30 against and 12 abstaining.

• Simple majority, more for than against: 38 beats 30. Carried.
• More than half of the votes cast, abstentions excluded: 68 votes cast, so more than 34, that is 35, are needed. Carried on 38.
• More than half of the members present: 80 present, so 41 are needed. Not carried, on 38.
• More than half of all members: 200 members, so 101 are needed. Not carried, and it never had a chance with 80 in the room.

The same 38 votes carry the motion under two rules and lose it under two others. This is why the rule belongs in the agenda, not in the discussion afterwards.

Worked example: a qualified majority

A meeting of an association with 312 eligible members has 137 votes represented. A bylaw amendment requiring two thirds gets 92 for, 41 against, 4 abstaining.

• Two thirds of the votes cast, abstentions excluded: 133 votes cast, two thirds of which is 88.67, so 89 votes are needed. Carried on 92.
• Two thirds of the votes represented: 137 represented, two thirds of which is 91.33, so 92 are needed. Carried, exactly on the line.
• Two thirds of all eligible members: 312 divides by three, so two thirds is exactly 208. Not carried on 92.

Two points of arithmetic. Fractions do not divide into whole votes, so the requirement is met by the smallest whole number that reaches the fraction: with 133 votes cast you need 89, not 88. And where the fraction does come out whole, as it does on the 312 members above, "at least two thirds" and "more than two thirds" differ by exactly one vote, 208 against 209. That case is rare, and when it arises it decides the item, so read which of the two your bylaws use.

Weighted votes

Where votes follow units or shares, the arithmetic is the same but the numbers are not headcounts. An owners' association has 10,000 shares; 6,400 are represented. A motion gets 3,050 shares for, 2,600 against and 750 abstaining.

• Majority of the shares cast: 5,650 shares cast, so 2,826 are needed. Carried on 3,050.
• Majority of the shares represented: 6,400 represented, so 3,201 are needed. Not carried, on 3,050.
• Majority of all shares: 10,000 in issue, so 5,001 are needed. Not carried.

Some decisions require a double majority, counted both by share and by head, and the motion then has to clear both thresholds. The guide on weighted voting in housing associations covers those rules and how the two tallies are kept.

Ties

A tie is not a majority, so on the default rule the proposal falls: the status quo stands. Many bylaws give the chair a casting vote. It exists only where the bylaws say so, and some bylaws give it to the chair of the association rather than to the chair of the meeting. In elections a tie is usually resolved by a second ballot between the tied candidates and, if that ties again, by lot, which sounds undignified and is better than an argument; see online board elections. Whatever the mechanism, it must exist before the tie, not be invented after it.

What the system must show

• The item as it was put, and the majority rule set for it: threshold, denominator and treatment of abstentions.
• Eligible voters and the total votes they represent, and the votes represented at the meeting.
• Votes for, against and abstaining, in votes and, where weighted, in shares and heads.
• The threshold expressed as an absolute number, so the chair can compare rather than calculate.
• Carried or not carried, with the rule that produced it.
• Times for opening and closing, and any votes entered manually or under a proxy.

A system that shows only a bar chart has done the easy half. The half that matters is the sentence "92 of 133 votes cast, threshold 89, carried", because that is what goes into the minutes and what a member who doubts the outcome has to be shown. Set the rules when you build the agenda, together with the attendance question covered in quorum at general meetings, and the counting takes care of itself.