Dear James, James Gilmour wrote :
> I prefer candidate-based voting systems over party-based voting systems because I do > not want to see the power of the parties increased at the expense of the voters. I do not want "to see the power of the parties increased at the expense of the voters" either. But I think it is not the fact of using party labels within the electoral system that increase their power at the expense of the voters. I think it is because voters decide to follow party directives instead of judging the candidates running in their electoral district. Party closed list systems enforce this on voters and I fully agree with you against accepting that parties build their candidates ranks. You may be right for other party list PR systems, but with SPPA party labels help to give some sort or representation to losing voters. So I hope you realize there can be system using party labels to increase the power of voters (losers in this case) at the expense of party voting guidelines. It is another proof that SPPA is an open list system, as well as STV. It compares more candidates of the same party, with less accuracy but with less work for the voters. Sincerely, Stéphane Rouillon ---- Election-methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
