Empathy List Archives

election-methods@mailman.electorama.com

Technical discussion of election methods

Fwd: The Global Fight For Electoral Justice: A Primer

Someone

Wed, Dec 28, 2016 5:23 AM

It
doesn't make sense to me to aim for pure centrism in assemblies,
Congress, etc. -- you lose the ability to directly represent
specific concerns, and instead aim for some kind of prototype
politician-bot who can serve all constituencies.

Congressional districts are currently single-winner, so they should still
elect a "centrist" candidate (where "centrist" = "candidate closest to the
centroid of popular opinion within that district"; "representative" is a
better description than "centrist".) All single-winner elections in a
representative democracy should elect the person who best represents the
entire population that votes for them (not half of the population).

This argument is valid for multi-winner districts/elections, though. For
instance, it could be argued that having all the winners be centrist clones
is "representative", but in this case I agree that a better system would
divide up the population into N groups and elect N candidates who are good
representatives of each group. I haven't found a resource that explains
which systems do this, and am trying to simulate different systems to find
out.

But it's unlikely the general populace will be very satisfied with it

in the long run, since many concerns and ideas will never be directly
represented in such a system. And I doubt that it produces the best
politics, because it lacks the tension/disruption that makes
innovation possible.

Multi-member districts and MMP would both help with this problem, without
trying to elect local representatives who aren't actually representative of
their entire district.

Note that none of the above includes reference to IRV or STV.

I know IRV is bad, but is STV bad, since it's only for multi-winner
elections? I can see that IRV is bad because it elects polarizing
candidates rather than centrists, but maybe that same mechanism makes STV
good at splitting up the population into N groups, as I said above?

> It > doesn't make sense to me to aim for pure centrism in assemblies, > Congress, etc. -- you lose the ability to _directly_ represent > specific concerns, and instead aim for some kind of prototype > politician-bot who can serve all constituencies. > Congressional districts are currently single-winner, so they should still elect a "centrist" candidate (where "centrist" = "candidate closest to the centroid of popular opinion within that district"; "representative" is a better description than "centrist".) All single-winner elections in a representative democracy should elect the person who best represents the entire population that votes for them (not half of the population). This argument is valid for multi-winner districts/elections, though. For instance, it could be argued that having all the winners be centrist clones is "representative", but in this case I agree that a better system would divide up the population into N groups and elect N candidates who are good representatives of each group. I haven't found a resource that explains which systems do this, and am trying to simulate different systems to find out. But it's unlikely the general populace will be very satisfied with it > in the long run, since many concerns and ideas will never be directly > represented in such a system. And I doubt that it produces the best > politics, because it lacks the tension/disruption that makes > innovation possible. > Multi-member districts and MMP would both help with this problem, without trying to elect local representatives who aren't actually representative of their entire district. Note that none of the above includes reference to IRV or STV. I know IRV is bad, but is STV bad, since it's only for multi-winner elections? I can see that IRV is bad because it elects polarizing candidates rather than centrists, but maybe that same mechanism makes STV good at splitting up the population into N groups, as I said above?

Erik Moeller via Election-Methods

Fri, Dec 30, 2016 11:36 AM

On Tue, Dec 27, 2016 at 9:23 PM, Someone fdpk69p6uq@snkmail.com wrot

I know IRV is bad, but is STV bad, since it's only for multi-winner
elections?

I don't think STV is a bad system, just a complicated one. I do worry,
as I mentioned in my original post, that this helps make it very
susceptible to repeal, since it's been repealed in all US cities that
have used it except one:

http://www.jacksantucci.com/docs/papers/repeal_dec2016.pdf
https://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/polit/damy/articles/Brief%20History%20of%20PR.htm
https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/001157823
http://archive.fairvote.org/library/history/true_experiences.htm

My sense is that US debate is dominated by the IRV->STV path, even
though single-vote MMP is a pretty straightforward upgrade path for
legislatures, and super-easy for voters. I've found the Canadian
reports from their many aborted electoral reform efforts the most
useful in my exploration of the subject. I recommend checking out this
report by Louis Massicotte that came out of the Quebec reform
discussions, one of the most rigorous examinations of compensatory
voting systems, which also concluded with a recommendation for
single-vote MMP:

https://www.institutions-democratiques.gouv.qc.ca/publications/mode_scrutin_rapport_en.pdf

Cheers,

Erik

On Tue, Dec 27, 2016 at 9:23 PM, Someone <fdpk69p6uq@snkmail.com> wrot > I know IRV is bad, but is STV bad, since it's only for multi-winner > elections? I don't think STV is a bad system, just a complicated one. I do worry, as I mentioned in my original post, that this helps make it very susceptible to repeal, since it's been repealed in all US cities that have used it except one: http://www.jacksantucci.com/docs/papers/repeal_dec2016.pdf https://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/polit/damy/articles/Brief%20History%20of%20PR.htm https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/001157823 http://archive.fairvote.org/library/history/true_experiences.htm My sense is that US debate is dominated by the IRV->STV path, even though single-vote MMP is a pretty straightforward upgrade path for legislatures, and super-easy for voters. I've found the Canadian reports from their many aborted electoral reform efforts the most useful in my exploration of the subject. I recommend checking out this report by Louis Massicotte that came out of the Quebec reform discussions, one of the most rigorous examinations of compensatory voting systems, which also concluded with a recommendation for single-vote MMP: https://www.institutions-democratiques.gouv.qc.ca/publications/mode_scrutin_rapport_en.pdf Cheers, Erik