Jameson Quinn wrote: > 2011/7/23 Andy Jennings <electi...@jenningsstory.com> > >> On Sat, Jul 23, 2011 at 7:45 AM, Jameson Quinn >> <jameson.qu...@gmail.com>wrote: >> >>> And so I'd like to suggest that we should be looking for a PR system >>> which satisfies the following criteria: >>> >>> c1. Truly proportional (of course). I would be willing to support a >>> not-truly-proportional system, but I'm not everyone. Egregious compromises >>> on this issue will simply reduce the activist base, to no benefit. >>> c2. Includes a geographical aspect. People are attached to the "local >>> representation" feature of FPTP, whether that's rational or not. >>> c3. No "closed list". A party should not be able to completely shield any >>> member from the voters. In general, voter power is preferable to party >>> power, insofar as it's compatible with the next criterion. >>> c4. Simple ballots. A reasonably-thorough voter should not have to mark >>> more than, say, 5 candidates or options, and an average ballot should not >>> list more than 20 candidates or options. Those are extreme limits; simpler >>> is better, all the way down to around 7 options (of which only around half >>> will be salient and/or viable). >>> c5. Ideally, the smoothest transition possible. If existing single-winner >>> districts can be used unchanged, all the better. >>> c6. Insofar as it's compatible with the criteria above, greater freedom >>> in voting is better. For instance, if ballots are printed with only >>> in-district candidates, a system which allows out-of-district write-ins is >>> better than one which doesn't, all other things being equal. >>> >> >> I'm interested both in systems which satisfy 2 and those that don't. If >> we could identify a good, truly proportional, at-large system, then a state >> with a bicameral legislature (like Arizona) could leave one house as >> geographical and change one to be at-large proportional. >> > > I agree that if you were designing a democracy from scratch, > non-geographical systems deserve attention. My purpose here is to support a > system or systems that have some chance of passage in the US or UK. In my > experience, that means that activists should unify behind a system which > represents a minimal change. Whatever reform you propose will have > opposition, both from people who are honestly and naturally skeptical of > anything new, and from whichever major party currently benefits from the > distortions of the current system. It's better to push a smaller reform > which gives such people fewer arguments to use against you, than a > more-complete one which can never pass. That's why I included criteria 2 and > 5, and I stand behind them. > > This same argument applies to Kathy Dopp's suggestion that states like AZ > could have their bicameral legislatures function using one PR body and one > geographical body. It's a great idea, and I'd happily and enthusiastically > support it; but it's a more-radical reform, so I think something which meets > my criteria would be more attainable. At least, I'd like to settle on > something which meets my criteria, so that if I'm right, we still have a > chance. >
Agree on both counts, but I live in AZ so the bicameral option doesn't seem so radical. :) > >> >> My proposal for SODA-PR satisfies and surpasses all 5 criteria. Other >>> systems which do reasonably well: >>> -I've seen a proposal for single-member districts and open party lists. >>> This is similar to my SODA-PR system, except that it requires that all >>> candidates in a party approve the same party set. As such, it is strictly >>> worse on criterion 3, without being notably better on any of the other >>> criteria. It is more conventional, though. >>> -Multimember districts, with some system inside each district. >>> -Mixed member systems. >>> >> >> We should add Fair Majority Voting, by Balinski. ( >> http://mathaware.org/mam/08/EliminateGerrymandering.pdf) Here's the >> summary: Parties run one candidate in each district and voters vote for one >> candidate in the race in their district. The votes are totaled nationwide >> by party and an apportionment method is used to decide how many seats each >> party deserves. Each party is assigned a "multiplier" and the winner in >> each district is the one whose (vote total times party multiplier) is >> highest. The multipliers can be chosen so that the final total seats won by >> each party matches the number of seats assigned by the apportionment >> method. >> > >> It definitely satisfies your criteria 1,2,4, and 5. I'd say it mostly >> satisfies 3. Don't know how to evaluate 6. The main thing I don't like >> about it is that it conflates voting for a candidate with voting for his >> party. What if I like the candidate but not the party, or vice versa? But >> since so many things in the legislature happen on a party basis, I've >> decided that this is not as bad as it first seems. >> >> FMV is equivalent to the "single-member districts and open party lists" > system I was talking about, although I remember seeing it under some > different name (some two-letter acronym with a "U", I seem to recall). In > the end, FMV can be considered a limited special case of SODA-PR. Thus, > using the more-general terminology of SODA-PR to discuss them both, the > differences are: > > d1. FMV requires all candidates to approve all other nominated candidates > from their own party, and no others. In SODA-PR, this would probably be the > most-common result, and perhaps parties would develop means of effectively > forcing their candidates to do this, but the system itself allows greater > freedom. > d2. FMV as stated does not allow cross-district write-ins, although > actually there is no technical reason this couldn't be allowed. Without this > feature, it is clearly worse on my (quasi-)criterion 6. > d3. FMV does not allow an approval-style vote. Like difference d1 above, > this ends up giving less power to the voters, and more power to the party > nomination process. Again, worse on c6. > d4. FMV's counting process nominally involves "vote multipliers", whereas > SODA-PR nominally involves (optional) delegation and vote transfers. > Although the two processes have the potential to be fully equivalent, I have > a real concern that (for silly reasons) FMV would not pass constitutional > muster in the US. SODA-PR, where the voter has the ultimate say, and each > vote is eventually counted for exactly one candididate with exactly the same > weight as all other votes, seems to me clearly constitutional. > d5. FMV was proposed by "some French PhD" (Balinski; and, as I said, I've > seen an equivalent proposal before under a different name), and SODA-PR was > proposed by "some American on the internet" (that is, me). This is an > advantage for FMV, though not a huge one, especially in US red states where > France is viewed with suspicion, or if SODA-PR could get good endorsements. > d6. FMV is precinct-summable, while SODA-PR is not (although SODA-PR is > still significantly easier to recount and/or audit-through-sampling than > generic STV is). > > Consider the following scenario, which shows the advantages of SODA-PR from > d1, d2, and d3: what happens when a major party candidate in a "safe" > district for that party has a corruption scandal after being nominated. > Let's call the corrupt candidate Caligula and their party Countrymen. Under > FMV, the majority voters in that district cannot support the Countrymen > without supporting Caligula. If the district naturally skews 70/30 for one > party, Caligula can lose over 20% of the vote and still be elected. ("Over" > 20% because such a safe district implies that the gerrymandering favors the > other party, so the multiplier will favor this party to compensate.) > Effectively, this candidate has a guaranteed seat; it's as bad as > closed-party-list in that regard. > > In SODA-PR, three things can happen: > d1. Other Countrymen candidates can make a principled decision not to > approve Caligula. Without vote transfers from these others, Caligula will > have a harder time winning. > d2. Voters in Caligula's district can vote for Countrymen candidates from > other districts who represent the party they like, and who (by d1) didn't > approve Caligula. > d3. Countrymen voters in other districts, whose candidates *did* approve > Caligula (ie, did not opt for d1), can choose to vote approval-style for > some set of Countrymen candidates, whether or not those candidates approve > Caligula. This is extra work for voters, so it won't be too common, but it > is an important principal that voters can always ensure that their vote will > not support a candidate they despise, if they want to spend the effort. > > All of these three things will end up reducing Caligula's votes. Thus, in > SODA-PR, unlike in FMV, no candidate can be given a safe seat through > gerrymandering. > > The upshot is that SODA-PR has 4 advantages over FMV, and two > disadvantages. Disadvantage d5 could be fully overcome with the right > endorsements, and disadvantage d6 could be removed along with advantage d3 > and a small part of advantage d4, by moving to SDA-PR (ie, not allowing > approval-style votes). > I totally agree with all this, but three points: - The SODA-PR ballot design features (bolding candidates in the district, having to write in people if you want to vote for someone outside a neighboring district) are a little radical and may be hard to explain to voters. For this reason, I think FMV is slightly better on criteria c4 and c5. - In a two party system, gerrymandering can create safe seats, but if you have more than two parties, these safe seats become very fragile. - FMV only works if there are political parties. SODA-PR can work with or without them, which I like. But the legislature runs on party lines, so maybe we'll never get rid of them. Andy
---- Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info