On Aug 17, 2008, at 19:44 , Raph Frank wrote:
On Sun, Aug 17, 2008 at 6:06 AM, Juho <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
(Continuous elections could also increase the level of
participation in
decision making in the sense that old votes could be valid for a
long time
even if the voter wouldn't bother to change the vote often. Well,
on the
other hand the votes must have some time/event limits after which
they
become invalid. Otherwise the system would e.g. make any changes
in the
party structure very "unprofitable".)
There is also the security issue. Continuous voting requires some
way for
a person to cancel their vote. That is hard to achieve in a way that
maintains the secret ballot.
Yes, not an easy task since votes can not be anonymous as they
"normally" are after voting.
It is possible to develop methods where the election officials would
not know the identity of each voter (only the voter would have that
information) but this may get quite complex.
One (at least theoretically) simple approach would be to arrange
elections say every Saturday and assume that each voter has a
computer (or corresponding device) that is on-line and votes on
behalf of the voter every Sunday. If the voter has not updated the
data then the application just uses the old data. This method would
not require keeping a record on how each voter voted.
(P.S. I used Saturdays above instead of Sundays sine that way the
politicians have one day time to pack their belongings before the
next working week and new representatives to move in. In real life we
would however probably need some hysteresis here. Maybe that could be
in time. Maybe we could also use different voting weights for the
representatives. This would allow longer times to allow new
representatives in and kick the old ones out. Also a system where the
representatives could "work at home" instead of "at the capital" is
possible.)
One option would be to allow a voter decide in advance how long their
vote will stay active, when they cast it. A voter could pick 3
months,
6 months, 1 year, 2 years, 4 years for their vote.
In order to allow a party to be split in two, or popular
representatives to retire, then the time should be short enough not
to penalize this party too much. If all votes will be outdates say in
one year then a one year delay between announcement of the event and
its final implementation would be sufficient (since then there would
be no lost votes, assuming that the voters can vote in the new way
right after the announcement). Also faster changes would be possible
since most votes would probably be changed sooner.
Each ballot would be marked with the length of time it will remain
valid
for. The results would then be announced broken down by length of
time they remain active for.
If you pick 4 years, then you will not be permitted to cast another
vote
for at least 4 years (for that office). OTOH, if you pick 3
months, then
you will have to vote again 3 months later.
I'm not sure if this is still a "continuous election" in the sense
that the voter could change opinion at any time.
This would be reasonably simple for methods that don't have rounds.
However, it would be complex for things like IRV.
Wouldn't IRV be at least easier than a two round runoff? (=> instant
runoff vs. sequential runoff)
If the ballot lists are a matter of public record, then voters who
vote
every 3 months and reliably vote could end up being targeted by the
parties as they have the ability to withdraw support much more
rapidly. (kinda like how politicians currently spend much more time
with their supporters near election time).
When thinking about the problems of continuous elections and direct
democracy maybe the first problem in my mind is the possibility of
too fast
reactions. Populism might be a problem here. Let's say that the
economy of a
country is in bad shape and some party proposes to raise taxes to
fix the
problem. That could cause this party to quickly lose lots of support.
Actually, one option would be to allow each voter vote once every 4
years,
but stagger when each person gets to vote. For example, their
might be
an election every 6 months electing one eights of the legislature.
This gives continuous feedback, but still requires time to change the
composition of the legislature. A swing in the votes would only have
1/8 the effect on the legislature.
Yes, gradual impact could help in stabilizing the system.
These
rather direct forms of democracy could be said to require the
voters to be
more "mature" than in some more indirect methods in the sense that
the
voters should understand the full picture and not only individual
decisions
that may sometimes even hurt them. In an indirect democracy painful
decisions are typically not made just before the elections. This
is not an
ideal situation either. But all in all, the more direct forms of
democracy
seem attractive if the voters are mature enough.
I think it probably depends on how it works. Initially, people
might switch
their vote at the drop of a hat, but as time passes, people are
less likely to
bother.
That would be positive. People would in a way "mature" in the process.
Also, under a PR/coalition based government system, it would encourage
any coalition formed to have more than a simple majority. If the
coalition
has 60% of the legislature, it is less likely to be massively
swayed by
short term popularity changes.
This kinda happens already. In Ireland, coalitions tends to aim for
the high 80's (of 166) so that they can lose a few to byelections
without
causing the coalition to fall.
Possible interest to have stable governments that live from one
(traditional) election to the next may be seen as a factor that talks
against continuous elections. On the other hand also governments
could be flexible. They could include new parties in the government
if the support of the old government parties gets too small.
Juho
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