Mike offers serious thinking about Approval. I step up to Condorcet
as being better and nearly as simple for the voter.
Voter can vote as in:
. FPTP, ranking the single candidate liked best, and treating all
others as equally liked less or disliked.
. Approval, ranking those equally liked best, and treating all
others as equally liked less or disliked.
. IRV, giving each voted for a different rank, with higher ranks
for those liked best, and realizing that IRV vote counters would read
only as many of the higher rankings as needed to make their decisions.
. Condorcet, ranking the one or more liked, using higher ranks for
those liked best, and ranking equally when more than one are liked
equally.
Condorcet is little, if any, more difficult for voters than FPTP and
Approval.
. For many elections, voting as with them is good and as easy.
.. When a voter likes A and B but prefers A - Approval cannot say
this, but it is trivial to vote with Condorcet's ranking.
In Condorcet the counters consider each pair of candidates as
competing with each other. Usually one candidate, being best liked,
proves this by winning in every one of its pairs. Unlike IRV (which
requires going back to the ballots as part of the counting), counting
here can be done in multiple batches of votes, and the data from the
batches summed into one summary batch for analysis.
There can be cycles in Condorcet, such as A>B, B>C, and C>A, with
these winning against all others. This requires a closer look to
decide on the true winner, normally one of the cycle members.
. Here the counters see the cycle, rather than a CW - and how to
pick a winner from a cycle is a reason for the dispute as to what is
best.
Range/score ratings have their own way of showing more/less desire.
Truly more power than Condorcet ranking - AND more difficult to decide
on rating values to best interact with what other voters may do.
Write-ins? Some would do away with such. I say they should be
allowed for the cases in which something needs doing too late to
attend to with normal nominations. True that voters may do some write-
ins when there is no real need - and I have no sympathy for such
voters - this needs thought.
Dave Ketchum
On Jan 28, 2012, at 3:13 PM, MIKE OSSIPOFF wrote
Re: [EM] Propose plain Approval first. Option enhancements can be
later proposals.:
The enhancement consisting of voting options in an Approval election
should only be mentioned when there’s plenty of time to talk, and
when talking
to someone who is patient or interested enough to hear that much.
And the
enhancements should only be mentioned as possibilities, when
speaking to
someone to whom the whole notion of voting-system reform is new.
Maybe that goes for SODA as well. Don’t propose too much
change, when talking to someone new to the subject.
So the method to propose first is ordinary Approval.
If, in some particular community, there is a committee of
people interested in working on a voting-system reform proposal,
then, though
the enhancements might be mentioned to that committee, the
suggestion to
include them in a public proposal should come only from other
members of the
committee, people new to voting systems. That’s a measure of their
enactment-feasibility in that community.
For AOC, MTAOC, etc., I’ve spoken of two kinds of
conditionality :conditionality by mutuality, and conditionality by
top-count.
In an Approval election in which the conditional methods are offered
as
optional ways of voting, any particular voter could choose which of
those two kinds
of conditionality s/he intends to use for any particular conditional
vote for
any particular candidate. There’s no reason why a voter couldn’t
specify
different kinds of conditionality for conditional votes for different
candidates.
In the count, the conditionality by top-count should be done
first, and then, when those conditional votes are established, the
calculation
for conditionality by mutuality, as described in the MTAOC
pseudocode, should
be done.
Of course, if SODA’s delegation is also an option in the
same election, then after the entire count is completed (including
AERLO’s 2nd
count if AERLO is offered), then the work of the delegates would
begin, just as
it would if SODA’s delegation were the only option enhancement in
the election.
Of course, for SODA to work as needed, mutual approval
agreements among candidate-delegates, whether made before or after the
pre-delegate-work count(s), should be public, officially-recorded,
and binding.
Of course, one would expect that there would be no need for
delegates to make
agreements before the pre-delegate-work count(s).
Since the current poll’s voting period doesn’t end till zero
hours, one minute, on February 1st (Wednesday), GMT (UT), or, in
other-words, at a minute after midnight, Tuesday night, GMT (UT),
which is 4:01 p.m. Tuesday, Pacific Standard Time in the U.S., and
7:01 p.m.
Tuesday, Eastern Standard Time—then I’ll mention that of course the
above-described variety of conditionality options should be
available in a mock
election too, including the current one.
Yes, I’ve noticed that no one’s participating in the
poll. I was glad to provide you the
opportunity to try out the methods that you advocate.
On a related subject: The other thing lacking at EM, in
addition to mock elections, is support for claims that a criterion is
important. We hear, “I consider this criterion to be very
important”. But such
assertions need to be supported by explanation of _why_ you consider
that
criterion important. Why should others
consider it important? What practical problems are present in non-
complying
methods but not in complying methods? What would it be like to vote
in a
non-complying method?
That kind of criterion-discussion would make EM a useful
resource for people comparing the merits of voting systems.
As I said, I’ll be putting some definitions of methods,
voting-options, and criteria on the electowiki, and will continue to
check EM
and reply when appropriate during that time.
Mike Ossipoff
----
Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
