Before the effects of "strategic" vs. "sincere" voting in elections using Approval Voting (AV) or Range Voting (RV) can be adequately assessed, there needs to be more clarity about what the best strategies really are or how they can be arrived at by voters wanting to maximize the impact of their votes according to their overall individual preferences. In some if not many or even most cases, strategic voting and sincere voting will be identical.
It seems to me that the only reasonable strategy for any voter who prefers one candidate more than any other or who has an equal regard for two or more candidates and prefers them over all other candidates is to give each such candidate the strongest possible vote, meaning either an approval vote if AV is used or the highest possible rating if RV is used. In fact, it seems to me that this is so incontestably true that it should be included in instructions to voters, as shown below. These instructions may be too complicated for some voters, but that's a separate and I think minor issue. Aside from written instructions, formal voter training could be offered to voters who need or want it. Such training could even be offered at polling places on election days. After a few elections, the number of people needing voter training would diminish greatly. One advantage of both instructions and voter training is that they would help enable voters to understand how to vote strategically and would greatly reduce any advantage that strategically sophisticated voters would otherwise have. ----------------------------------------------------------- VOTING INSTRUCTIONS Part 1 (for both AV and RV) Check any candidate you prefer over all the other candidates. If there is more than one candidate who you prefer equally well and who you prefer over all the other candidates, check all of them. You are not required to do so, but voting methods experts all agree that this is the only reasonable way for you to vote if you prefer one or several candidates more than all the others. * * * Part 2 (for AV only) You may (but aren't required to) check additional candidates as well. You may want to do so if you think there is a good chance your preferred candidate(s) won't win and you want to help a less preferred candidate who you think has a chance of winning. Another reason you may want to do so is to help defeat one or more candidates who you find particularly undesirable. If that is your goal, you may want to check all candidates except the one(s) you find most undesirable. Part 2 (for RV only): For each candidate you haven't checked as a most preferred candidate, check one of the numerical ratings. The higher the rating you choose for a particular candidate, the more you will help that candidate. The candidate(s) you have already checked as most preferred will automatically receive the highest rating. You may also want to give one or more additional candidates the highest rating, especially if you think the candidate(s) you have checked as most preferred have little or no chance of winning. You are not required to rate all or even any of the candidates, but keep in mind that those you don't rate will automatically receive a "0" rating. Also, keep in mind that whenever you give two candidates the same rating, you will be helping them equally much (or equally little). Therefore, if you want to help one candidate more than another, you should rate the candidate you prefer at least one rating number higher than the other one. If there is one candidate (or several) that you like less than all the others, you should give each such candidate a "0" rating and give all the others a "1" or higher rating. ----------------------------------------------------------- If anyone thinks these instructions don't make sense or wouldn't work, please explain why. I'm still trying to decide if I should support Range Voting as a promising alternative to other methods. -Ralph Suter ---- Election-methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info