Talk:2020 national electoral calendar

New Caledonia

As for New Caledonia, isn't it a Dependent_territory#France? Wykx (talk)

Independence referendums are included in the national electoral calendar if the vote succeeds in creating an independent country; independence referendums are listed in the local electoral calendar if the vote does not succeed in creating an independent country. – Jwkozak91 (talk) 07:41, 14 November 2019 (UTC)

Icelandic referendum

Is there any source for a referendum taking place this year in Iceland, as claimed on the featured map?--Aréat (talk) 21:15, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

POSTPONED ELECTIONS

Should we move Bolivia and Sri Lanka to Unknown date ? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.239.144.129 (talk) 10:11, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

Parliament vs legislature

There has been some contention on this page over these terms and I'm a bit puzzled as to why "parliament" is being treated as a generic term? It's not generic and there are both sovereign states and depencies where that term is never used for the legislature and to use it here would be inaccurate. I honestly would be in favor of just using whatever the term used locally in each country would be, but if we need to use one generic term for all legislative bodies surely "legislature"/"legsilative" is the one to use. --Jfruh (talk) 23:48, 27 September 2020 (UTC)

@Jfruh: Sorry I only saw your question now. "Parliament" is a generic term, probably the most common one in English across different times and places. However, any use of generic terms is going to be somewhat awkward, because none are uniformly favored everywhere and at all times. Despite this, I do think it makes this list more accessible to use such generic terms instead of the specific names/translations of all the various world parliaments. We did recently switch to always using the specific names for the separate chambers of bicameral systems. Sladnick (talk) 23:16, 13 December 2020 (UTC)

I agree with Sladnick here. A parliament is the generic term. Using the specific one used in each country would make the list less clear, while using a single generic term allow the reader to browse through without having to check it up to know what the election is about exactly.--Aréat (talk) 23:26, 13 December 2020 (UTC)

Speaking as an American, I don't think "Parliament" is a generic term. No American English speaker would ever us "parliament" to refer to any of the legislatures of the US states or territories, and I challenge you to find a reliable source that does so, even one published in the Commonwealth. I really don't know why you don't think "legislature" (small l) is generic. Would you consider it incorrect to say the UK Parliament is a legislature? The lede of its wikipedia article calls it a "legislative body." --Jfruh (talk) 01:59, 14 December 2020 (UTC)

That's the point. We should use generic terms, not the specific ones of every specific countries.--Aréat (talk) 13:50, 14 December 2020 (UTC)

I think we're talking at cross-purposes. What I'm saying is that "legislature" and "legislative" are more generic terms than "parliament" and "parliamentary," and that's why we should use "legislature" as a generic, not because (to use the example that prompted my initial comment) Guam's legislature happens to be called "Legislature" as a proper name. There are legislatures whose proper names are "Parliament", but it still would be correct to call them legislatures; conversely, there are legislatures whose proper names are "Legislature" that nobody anywhere would call a "parliament." --Jfruh (talk) 17:41, 15 December 2020 (UTC)

FWIW, scanning the list now, it looks like just about every legislative election has a link that uses the proper noun of the body being elected, so the point is moot at the moment. --Jfruh (talk) 17:43, 15 December 2020 (UTC)

The U.S. is the oldest republic, and therefore has its own unique traditions and terminology. But not a single other country today bases its system of government on the U.S. model. In addition, because the U.S. is bicameral, and because the local electoral calendars are looser with the terms used (generic only for particularly obscure proper names), it isn't affected whatsoever by this convention of using "parliament". I'd be open to changing it if there was an argument for doing so based on some country actually affected. Sladnick (talk) 05:42, 16 December 2020 (UTC)

I think the Latin American nations, none of which use "parliament" as a generic term for their legislature, would probably disagree with you on several points here. --Jfruh (talk) 03:30, 17 December 2020 (UTC)

Just considering the 2020 calendar, the only Latin American nation whose election is listed as "Parliament" on it is Peru, and in Peru 'parlamento' and 'parlamentario/a' are frequently used as generic terms. Sladnick (talk) 16:57, 17 December 2020 (UTC)