I think it's all about nomenclature - that which we call an MMPR Parliament, would by any other name, be the same collection of politicians. NZ's system is basically this - 120 seats in Parliament about 60 electorate seats, the difference elected by PR - 5% threshhold for seats under PR, but if any party wins an electorate seat, it will get seats in the House proportionate to its total vote. Thus, the Greens, who got about 4.7% of the vote would have been excluded from Parliament but for the fact that they won an electorate sdeat, which meant that they got 5 seats in the house - much to the chagrin of the NZ Labour Party which would have been able to govern alone had The Greens not got those seats. It's incredibly complicated, but it is representational, unlike the US system, and our old FPP, where it is quite possible to win outright with a minority of the popular vote. This seems very likely to happen in the present US election - a president elected on a minority of the popular vote, and this happened many times in NZ under first-past-the-post. As an abstract, I think PR is fundamentally closer to pure democracy than FPP, but whether it results in better government, I am not qualified to say, especially as I choose not to vote.
