Re: [EM] language/framing quibble
Fred Gohlke wrote: Good Morning, Kristofer re: "I agree with your first point [that extending the rights of humans to non-human entities is a flawed concept], but the precedent seems to go all the way back to 1886." Precedent has a place in our lives but it ought not, and need not, be the noose by which we strangle ourselves. Is it not sufficiently evident that the laws and governing bodies that allowed, nay, encouraged, the excesses that led to our present financial debacle were enacted and supervised by the politicians selected and financed by those immense non-human entities that control our existence and decimate our environment? From whence came the notion that some corporations are too big to fail? In what way is their existence a benefit to the people? The 100-plus years that have elapsed since that precedent was set have given us time to understand the evils of not discriminating between human and non-human entities. But, have we the courage to change it? How can we do so as long as we let political parties serve as conduits for the corruption that ensures our laws are dictated by, and our government controlled by, the same non-human entities that owe their existence to that vile concept? We should never forget that morality is a top-down phenomenon. Our parents set our initial moral code. As we mature, we adapt our code to accommodate the will of those who control our existence. When unprincipled people achieve leadership positions and control our destiny, they infect society ... as has been so clearly demonstrated throughout history and, most recently, by the extraordinary breakdown of our economic system. If we want to improve society, the first step is to improve the quality of those who represent us in our government. I agree that the precedent shouldn't have been set (and it seems to have been set in a rather indirect manner); what I am saying is that in trying to change it, those who put value on precedent will use that precedent as an argument. That said, things are not hopeless. Some towns have taken the more direct route in countering the precedent by direct law - see http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2006/11/when_is_a_corporation_like _a_freed_slave.html . [The following continues our examination of corruption among elected officials.] re: "If what you're saying is correct, does that mean that the first phase of Practical Democracy has the same effect (or nearly so) in the long run limit case as does a very competitive traditional election method?" I'm sorry, but I don't know what a 'long run limit case' is, so I can't comment on that. However, the first (or, as you mentioned, selection) phase is incomparably more competitive than the most competitive traditional election method because the participants must persuade competitors for the same position that they are most deserving of selection. What I mean by "long run limit case" is the case in which a competitive traditional election method is left to run for as many elections as possible: as one approaches the "limit" of infinite time, the difference between the two systems vanish. The point is to say that if Practical Democracy can be divided into two parts, then one can treat the first part as if you had some magical election method that was, as you put it, more competitive than the most competitive traditional election methods, and that further, Practical Democracy really then has two parts - the selection phase and the continuation phase. It might be possible to improve one of the phases without having to improve the other, thus making the reform more continual (if the opposition is too great to do it all at once). re: "I'm wondering about that because you say that the problem of keeping the elected/selected candidates honest is one that applies to both Practical Democracy and more traditional solutions." The Practical Democracy method ensures (to the maximum extent it can be ensured) that the people we elect to public office are honest ... people of high principle. This differs from partisan electoral methods which elevate unscrupulous people by design. Those elected by the Practical Democracy method will have a pre-disposition toward integrity. However, once people have achieved public office ... by whatever means ... they are still humans; they will pursue their own interest. If we want them to maintain their integrity, we must provide an environment in which integrity can survive. Some part of this is connected to the first step of Practical Democracy, so I suppose I contradict myself now. Keeping record of the pyramid structure for later message passing, for instance, would be one such part. Yet other parts may be applicable to all types of representative democracy; for instance, staggered elections (such as having different election periods for different areas of the nation, so that the co
Re: [EM] Why I think IRV isn't a serious alternative 2
Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote:
At 04:44 AM 12/28/2008, Kristofer Munsterhjelm wrote:
Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote:
[it was written:] I am satisfied that there are perfectly adequate
"vote once"
systems available for all public elections, both single-office
elections and assembly elections.
If they are good for public elections, why are they *never* used for
smaller organizations where repeated ballot is easy? Wouldn't it save
time?
Yes, advanced methods *can* save time, *if* a majority is still
required. Otherwise the result can *easily* be one that a majority
would reject. How often? Depends on the method, I'm sure, but my
estimate is that it's about one in ten for IRV in nonpartisan
elections in the U.S. It's pretty easy to show.
Wouldn't that be because you can do RRO type iteration because of the
small size?
Of course. (i.e., nobody considers using advanced methods in such
organizations when, for example, face-to-face meetings are possible and
normal for election. There are exceptions, and, I'd say, they have been
warped by outside political considerations; there is a sense among some
student organizations, for example, that by implementing IRV, they are
advancing a general progressive cause. They've been had.)
Consider the extreme, where there's just you and a few friends. There
would seem to be little point in voting when you can just all discuss
the options and reach a conclusion.
Absolutely. However, this kind of direct process indicates the
foundations of democracy. There are problems of scale as the scale
increases, but the *substance* does not intrinsically change, until not
only the scale has become large, but the culture expects alienation and
division. When the scale is small, people will take the time to resolve
deep differences, ordinarily (if they care about the cooperation being
negotiated). That cannot be done, directly, on a large scale. *However,
it can be done through a system that creates networks of connection.*
These networks are what we actually need, and not only is it unnecessary
to change laws to get them, it actually would be a mistake to try to
legislate it. If it's subject to law, it is subject to control and
corruption. It would be like the State telling small groups how they
should come to agreement!
I would say that the problem is not just that culture expects
alienation, but that a full on "everybody discusses with everybody else"
scales very poorly (worst case quadratic) so that the common opinion
never converges, or converges very slowly. This is somewhat related to
Parkinson's coefficient of inefficiency - as the number of members in a
committe grows, subgroups form and there's no longer direct discussion.
The networks of connections would presumably make groups that readjust
and form in different configurations according to the political
positions of the people - like water, hence *Liquid* Democracy. I think
vote buying would be a problem with that concept, though, because if the
network of connections is public, then those who want to influence the
system can easily check whether the members are upholding their ends of
the "bargain" (votes for money).
Perhaps there would be if you just can't reach an agreement ("okay,
this has gone long enough, let's vote and get this over with").
Absolutely. And this happens all the time with direct democratic
process. And those who have participated in it much usually don't take
losing all that seriously, provided the rules have been followed. Under
Robert's Rules, it takes a two-thirds majority to close debate and vote.
Common respect usually allows all interested parties to speak before the
question is called.
However, it takes a majority to decide a question, period, any question,
not just an election. That's the bottom line for democracy. Taking less
may *usually* work well enough, but it's risky. It can tear an
organization apart, under some circumstances. That's why election by
plurality is strongly discouraged in Robert's Rules.
Given the above, maybe advanced methods would have their place as
figurative tiebreakers when one can't reach a majority by other means.
Say that the discussion/meeting goes on for a long time, and a
supermajority decides it's been long enough. If there are multiple
proposals, one could then have an election among those (law, no law, law
with amendment, law without rider, whatever). If there is no method
that's good enough to provide the majority certification you seek, there
could be a runoff afterwards - but I'll note that a runoff doesn't
magically produce majority support, since if one of the runoff
candidates/options is bad, most would obviously align themselves with
the other. The Le Pen situation would be a good example of that. Just
because Chirac got 82%, that doesn't mean that Chirac is best, just that
he's best in that one-on-one comparison.
In short, you'd have something like: for very small groups, the
Re: [EM] Why I think IRV isn't a serious alternative 2
Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote: At 05:03 AM 12/28/2008, Kristofer Munsterhjelm wrote: Say that Approval distorts towards Plurality. What does Condorcet distort towards -- Borda? "Let's bury the suckers"? If people are strategic and do a lot of such distortion, wouldn't a runoff between Condorcet (or CWP, if you like cardinal ballots) and something resistant to Burial (like one of the methods by Benham, or some future method), be better than the TTR which would be the result of Approval-to-Plurality distortion? If people stop burying, the first winner (of the "handle sincere votes well" method) will become more relevant; if they don't, the latter (strategy resistant Condorcet) will still be better than Plurality, I think. I'm certainly open to other suggestions. However, practical suggestions at this point should be relatively simple methods, which is why I'm suggesting Bucklin. Bucklin distorts toward Plurality. But the protection of the favorite is substantial enough that many voters *will* add votes; and historically, in municipal elections, many did. Plenty enough to impact results. (FairVote points to a long primary election series in Alabama with only 11% of ballots using the additional ranks, but that seems to be very low compared with the municipal elections, it's not clear what the cause was. And my guess is that IRV would have shown quite the same phenomenon.) The great majority of Condorcet methods use the Condorcet matrix to determine the outcome. I say great majority because non-summable Condorcet methods exist. Anyhow, the use of a matrix may seem complex, but I think that to sum Bucklin votes, you'd also need a matrix. The matrix would be n (number of candidates) times k (number of rounds). The first row is the count of approval for each candidate for first preference. The second row is the count of approval for each candidate for second preference, and so on. To determine the winner, you check for a majority in the first row, then you check for a majority in the sum of the first and second row, then the sum of the first three rows, etc. Thus, in order to have a summable count, you'd have to use matrices both for Bucklin and Condorcet. The matrices are different matrices (a Condorcet matrix for Condorcet, and what one may call a weighted positional matrix for Bucklin), but doing Condorcet analysis shouldn't make things more complex than either alone. Now, that's probably a very complex system: first you have to define both the sincere-good and the strategy-resistant method, then you have to set it up to handle the runoff too. But it's not obvious how to be selfish in CWP (except burying), whereas it's rather easy in Range (->Approval, or to semi-Plurality based on whatever possibly inaccurate polls tell you). This, in itself, may produce an incentive to optimize. "I can get off with it, and I know how to maximize my vote, so why shouldn't I?"; and then you get the worsening that's shown in Warren's BR charts (where all methods do better with sincere votes than strategic ones). In the worst case, the result might be SNTV-like widespread vote management. Let's keep it simple to start! Bucklin has some interesting possible variations: Condorcet analysis could be done on the ballots, and one runoff trigger could be conflict between the Bucklin winner and a Condorcet winner. Bucklin is a very simple method to canvass, just count and add the votes. You can look at a summary of all the votes in each position and use it. Preferential analysis is different, and requires the matrix, but at least that can be summed! Bucklin/Condorcet/Majority required runoff would still be simpler to canvass than IRV. As long as the Condorcet method is a good one, I wouldn't have much of a problem with this. If the Condorcet method is good, the Condorcet completion winner would usually win the runoff, so nothing lost (except the inconvenience of the second round). In that sense, having a runoff is itself a sort of compromise option - a hedge against the methods electing bad (undeserving) winners. The most common "voting strategy" would be truncation, which simply expresses something that is probably sincere! (I.e., I prefer this candidate strongly to all others, so strongly that I don't even want to allow competition two ranks down!) The method can't know whether voters are honestly truncating or are truncating out of some game theoretical sense. You may say that because it can't tell the two apart, there is no difference, but by imagining sincere preferences and then considering adversary voter groups, we may see situations where people could strategize just to get their candidate to win whereas that would not otherwise be the case. Burial in Condorcet is one such situation, but truncation, too, can be gamed. For the sake of the argument, let's consider three groups. The first group knows the votes of the other groups. This is not necessa
Re: [EM] Why I think IRV isn't a serious alternative 2
Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote:
At 05:48 AM 12/28/2008, Kristofer Munsterhjelm wrote:
Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote:
The error was in imagining that a single ballot could accomplish what
takes two or more ballots. Even two ballots is a compromise, though,
under the right conditions -- better primary methods -- not much of one.
I think I understand your position now. Tell me if this is wrong: you
consider the iterative process of an assembly the gold standard, as it
were, so you say that all methods must involve some sort of feedback
within the method, because that is required to converge towards a good
choice.
It's not clear how close a method like Range can get to the idea in a
single round. If any method could do it, it would be Range. It may
depend on the sophistication of the electorate and its desire to have an
overall satisfactory result. In what I consider mature societies, most
people value consensus, they would rather see some result that is
broadly accepted than one that is simply their primary favorite. What
goes around comes around: they know that supporting this results in
better results, averaged over many elections, *for them* as well as for
others.
That feedback may be from one round to another, as with TTR, or
through external channels like polls, as with the "mutual
optimization" of Range.
Is that right?
Yes. Polls or just general voter impressions from conversations, etc.,
"simulate* a first round, so voters may *tend* to vote with compromise
already in mind. And that's important! That's called "strategic voting,"
and is treated as if it were a bad thing.
That makes the entire cycle, including polls and feedback, into one
election system. Method is too narrow, because the system isn't just
"input, then function, then output"; it doesn't just translate
individual preferences into social preferences.
Thats all nice, but with the versatility of that wider definition, you
get the chance of problems that accompany systems that include feedback
within the system itself. Such can include cycling, and too much of
either stability (reaches a "compromise" that wasn't really a good
compromise) or instability (doesn't settle, as with cycling, or reaches
a near-random result depending on the initial state of the system).
In short, there's a wider range of possible outcomes because the system
permits many more configurations than a simple one-shot election method.
This is good when it leads to a better result from voters optimizing
their votes in a way that reaches the true compromise, but it's bad when
factions use that increased range to try to game the system. If Range
voters (for instance) need to consult polls or the prevailing atmosphere
to gain knowledge of how to express their votes, then that too is
something the strategists can manipulate.
When one uses strategy to construct a wider mechanism on top of a single
election method by adding a feedback system (such as one may say is done
by Range if it's used honestly), then that's good; but if one uses
strategy to pull the method on which the system is based in a direction
that benefits one's own preferences at the expense of others, giving
oneself additional power, then that is bad. Even worse is if many
factions do so and the system degrades further because it can't
stabilize or because the noise swamps it; or if the combined
strategizing leads to a result that's worse for all (chicken-race dynamics).
I think that what we have to distinguish here is Range as part of the
wider system that involves adaptation, and Range as an isolated method.
If you consider Range as an isolated method like other methods, which
gathers information from voters, churn it through some function, and
outputs an aggregate ballot ("society's ballot"), be it ordinal,
cardinal or some other format, then Range is susceptible to strategy -
the kind of strategy that leads to bad outcomes. However, if it's just
one component of a wider system - the feedback method - then it becomes
a sort of manual DSV that polls the intent of the voters (if they don't
lie or drive it into oscillation etc), and that "greater method" may be
a good one. I don't know.
From a convenience point of view, some voters may want not to have to
care about other voters' positions. "I just want to give my preference",
says a (hypothetical) Nader voter who, although a third party supporter,
thinks Bush is so bad that among two-party mediocrity, Gore would be
preferrable to Bush. Of course, if your point that people naturally vote
VNM utilities (or somewhere in between those and sincere utilities) is
true, then it would be an inconvenience to ask sincere cardinal opinions
of voters, rather than the other way around. In any case, ranked methods
handle this issue, but note that the ranked methods are once-through
methods, not part of a "manual DSV" system.
But, we know, systems that only consider preference are flat-out whack
Re: [EM] Why I think IRV isn't a serious alternative 2
Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote: At 10:36 AM 12/28/2008, James Gilmour wrote: Kristofer Munsterhjelm > Sent: Sunday, December 28, 2008 9:45 AM > The UK is also parliamentary, so I suppose there would be few places > where you could actually have a runoff. Given that all members of the UK Parliament are elected from single-member districts (UK "constituencies") and that all districts were contested by at least three candidates (max 15 in 2005), it would be theoretically possible to have run-off elections in all 645 districts. In the 2005 general election, 425 of the districts were "won" with a plurality of the votes not a majority, so that could have been 425 run-offs. Quite a thought! Sure. Consider the implications. Most of those who voted, in those districts, did not support the winner. Odd, don't you think, that you imagine an outcry over a "weak Condorcet winner," when what is described is, quite possibly, an ongoing outrage. Is it actually an outrage? It's hard to tell. It's quite possible that the majority was willing to accept the winner; that is normally the case, in fact. Bucklin would have found some majorities there. IRV probably -- in spite of the theories of some -- probably a bit fewer. In nonpartisan elections, IRV almost never finds a majority when one is not found in the first round, but those were, I presume, partisan elections, where finding a majority is more common.) However, consider this: the Plurality voting system (FPTP) encourages compromise already. There would have been more sincere first preference votes. My guess, though, is that the use of, say, Bucklin, would have resulted in *at least* half of those pluralities becoming a majority, possibly more. However, this is the real effect of the system described: In maybe one election out of 10, were it top two runoff, the result would shift, which, I contend, is clearly a more democratic result. There might be a slightly increased improvement if the primary method weren't top two Plurality, majority win, but a method which would find a Condorcet winner or at least include that winner in a runoff. How much is it worth to improve the result -- it could be a very significant improvement -- in 10% of elections? I'd say it's worth a lot! I'd also say that even if you had a magic "best utility" single-winner method, it wouldn't be the right method to use in a parliamentary context. If a majority of the voters agree with some position (and we discard gerrymander-type effects, intentional or not), then the parliament will agree with that position, unanimously. Hence... PR is needed. Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
[EM] Does IRV elect "majority winners?"
I take offense at Abd repeatedly suggesting I am a liar or am engaging in deception. We have a legitimate difference of opinion about the appropriate use of the term "majority" and interpretation of RRONR. At the outset, we might all agree that no system can really assure a _true_ "majority winner" in an ultimate sense, since there may be a tie, or there may simply be no candidate running who a majority of voters can abide. The core of my argument is that if the winner of a traditional two-round runoff system (without write-ins) is appropriately called a "majority winner," so can the winner of an instant runoff election. The term "majority" simply means more than half, and it is regularly applied to different denominators...a "majority" of the entire membership, "majority" of those present and voting, "majority" in the second round of a runoff system, etc. In governmental elections we generally use the short-hand "majority" without specifying all of the exclusions from the denominator. Abd is insisting that uniquely for IRV elections, we should list the exclusions (i.e.. "a majority of unexhausted ballots," or "a majority of those who expressed a preference between the final two candidates", etc.). It is acceptable to make this detailed explanation, but not necessary in normal speech. In a typical U.S. governmental runoff election we do not list the exclusions from the denominator when naming a majority winner...We do not say "Jane Smith won with a majority, excluding those who were eligible but did not register to vote, or registered but did not cast a ballot, or cast a ballot but skipped the race, or that ballot was blank, or spoiled, or illegal, or contained identifying marks, and excluding those who may have participated in the first round of voting but not the second." We just say she was the "majority winner." Abd accepts that the winner of a top-two runoff (TTR) system (without write-ins) is appropriately called a "majority winner," but not necessarily the winner of an instant runoff. He treats the "majority winner" of a two-round runoff as somehow better, or more valid. Ironically, it is typical for the winner of an IRV runoff to have won more total votes within a given jurisdiction and have a larger majority threshold to reach, than a "majority winner" of a two-round runoff, simply due to higher voter participation resulting from a single trip to the polls (yes, I know this is not an absolute as separate runoffs do on rare occasions have higher turnout). One essential difference between these two "majority winners" is simply the duration of time between the beginning and ending of he candidate marking process, in that the IRV ballot allows the voter to complete the task in a single visit to the polls. (Yes, I know voters also get to have a "second-look," etc. but that is irrelevant to the "majority" issue here). A top two runoff system, JUST LIKE IRV, finds a "majority winner" by excluding from the denominator any voters who expressed a preference in the first round of counting, but whose preferred candidate gets eliminated and who express no preference between the two final candidates for the final round of counting. Let me set out some thought experiments (these are silly, perhaps, but are presented to illustrate an underlying point.)... 1. First, I still think my interpretation of RRONR's use of the word "abstention" is sound (that not indicating any preference between finalists can reasonably be deemed an abstention that RRONR says should NOT be counted in the denominator). Note that on page 394 in the section on the "Right of Abstention" RRONR points out that in an at-large election a voter may "partially abstain" by marking fewer candidates than allowed. In other words, the voter has participated in the election with some marks for some candidates, but may still be said to "abstain" from some aspect of that contest. Thus Abd's insistence that under RRONR a ballot with some candidates marked cannot also be an abstention is incorrect. Abd agrees that RRONR says to treat "each segment of a ballot" separately in considering blanks and abstentions. I have argued that each possible pairwise final runoff combination is functionally the same as a separate segment of the ballot. To explain...imagine if the IRV ballots were inefficiently, but logically, divided into a series of questions or segments as follows: Section A. Rank the candidates in the order you would prefer they be included as finalists in a runoff count. Jane1 2 3 4 Mary 1 2 3 4 Stan1 2 3 4 Dave 1 2 3 4 Section B. In each possible final runoff pairing below mark an "x" for the one candidate you would prefer. (1) Jane __ vs. Mary__ (2) Jane __ vs. Stan __ (3) Jane __ vs. Dave__ (4) Mary__ vs. Stan __ (5) Mary__ vs. Dave__ (6) Stan __ vs. Dave__ Now suppose a voter completely marks the ballot except in segment B. (4) of this unusual, but function
Re: [EM] Why I think IRV isn't a serious alternative 2
At 09:28 AM 12/30/2008, Kristofer Munsterhjelm wrote: The great majority of Condorcet methods use the Condorcet matrix to determine the outcome. I say great majority because non-summable Condorcet methods exist. Anyhow, the use of a matrix may seem complex, but I think that to sum Bucklin votes, you'd also need a matrix. The matrix would be n (number of candidates) times k (number of rounds). The first row is the count of approval for each candidate for first preference. The second row is the count of approval for each candidate for second preference, and so on. To determine the winner, you check for a majority in the first row, then you check for a majority in the sum of the first and second row, then the sum of the first three rows, etc. Yes. Bucklin results were reported with such a matrix. Rows: candidates. Columns: Totals for each rank. Because these are simply totals of votes in voting positions, they are easy to totalize, would work with lever machines and any system that handles multiwinner elections already. You just assign 3 positions to each candidate. (it would work with just two, probably, but some voters will appreciate the flexibility, and if leaving a rank blank is allowed without spoiling the next one, it gives voters who want it some additional "LNH" protection. *The need for this would depend on preference strength.*) Thus, in order to have a summable count, you'd have to use matrices both for Bucklin and Condorcet. The matrices are different matrices (a Condorcet matrix for Condorcet, and what one may call a weighted positional matrix for Bucklin), but doing Condorcet analysis shouldn't make things more complex than either alone. Well, it depends. I don't think the Condorcet matrix can be generated by simply summing votes from positions. Each ballot generates its own unique votes in pairs. To get the votes from position totals, one would need to actually have the voter vote the matrix. Too complicated, I'd say. So Condorcet, while it is precinct summable, isn't as simple to implement and probably couldn't, practically, use existing equipment and software. Bucklin clearly could. As long as the Condorcet method is a good one, I wouldn't have much of a problem with this. If the Condorcet method is good, the Condorcet completion winner would usually win the runoff, so nothing lost (except the inconvenience of the second round). In that sense, having a runoff is itself a sort of compromise option - a hedge against the methods electing bad (undeserving) winners. No, there is a common error here. A Condorcet winner is rigidly defined from the pairwise elections, and does not -- except sometimes with cycle resolution -- consider preference strengths. The Condorcet winner, I'd predict, would generally *lose* to a Range winner, with the same ballots in the primary used for both Range and Condorcet analysis. I've explained why many times. Supporters of the Condorcet winner are less likely to turn out in a runoff than those who support the Range winner, if we assume sincere votes. Further, with weak preferences, they are more likely to change their minds, particularly once they are aware of the issues between the two candidates. *The Range winner* -- if the votes have not been badly distorted by bullet voting or the like -- is indeed the best winner, overall. Some Range advocates think we should just go with the Range winner. That is actually better than simply going with the Condorcet winner, *but* there are exceptions. A runoff will test for them! The most common "voting strategy" would be truncation, which simply expresses something that is probably sincere! (I.e., I prefer this candidate strongly to all others, so strongly that I don't even want to allow competition two ranks down!) The method can't know whether voters are honestly truncating or are truncating out of some game theoretical sense. That's right. However, the division between "honesty" and "game theoretical truncation" is very poorly defined. You don't make a game theory move unless you have sufficient preference strength behind it! You may say that because it can't tell the two apart, there is no difference, but by imagining sincere preferences and then considering adversary voter groups, we may see situations where people could strategize just to get their candidate to win whereas that would not otherwise be the case. Yes, but there are severe limits on what they could do in a hybrid Range/Condorcet method. Voting insincerely in Range, truly insincerely, would be *very* risky, and generally useless. Maximal strategy simply shoves votes to the extremes; with very good knowledge of the context, this can be safe. With poor knowledge, it can be disastrous. The sincere vote, reasonably considered, is probably the *personally* safest vote. It doesn't aim for quite so much benefit as an exaggerated vote, perhaps, but it does not risk the worst o
Re: [EM] Why I think IRV isn't a serious alternative 2
At 08:56 AM 12/30/2008, Kristofer Munsterhjelm wrote: I would say that the problem is not just that culture expects alienation, but that a full on "everybody discusses with everybody else" scales very poorly (worst case quadratic) so that the common opinion never converges, or converges very slowly. Yes, *of course!* This is precisely the problem of scale in democracy. It is not a voting problem, per se, but a *deliberation* problem. And if voters don't deliberate, how can they intelligently vote? What I hit upon was a finesse: they vote for what they understand or at least believe that they understand. They entrust the rest to representatives. Who decides if the voter is competent to vote on a topic? *The voter.* Democracy is properly rooted, not in popular decision, as such, but in popular *consent* to the decision process. This is somewhat related to Parkinson's coefficient of inefficiency - as the number of members in a committe grows, subgroups form and there's no longer direct discussion. Yes; however, there is a classical response: when the group size reaches some point, subgroups form *and independently deliberate within themselves, then deliberate collectively through representatives; often the representation is totally informal, often proxy voting isn't allowed, *but when organizations seek consensus,* as many do, voting is not so important though when the group size increases beyond a few, polling remains useful to sense and detect the degree of consensus that has been found. I've seen Approval be very useful in this situation, I've never seen Range used, but it should be even more useful (but very small groups still may find it more cumbersome than is appropriate). In the FA/DP model, proxies and their clients and subclients form what we've called "natural caucuses." The clients of a proxy may be connected through devices such as mailing lists or other tools, or even meet face-to-face when an organization is local, and may deliberate under the "supervision" of the proxy. The purpose of that deliberation is to advise the proxy, as well as for the proxy to communicate to his or her clients the reasoning behind positions, questions to be addressed, etc. However, this takes us quite far from out topic. The relevance here was an approach to the study of voting systems to understand how they simulate -- or do not simulate -- direct democratic process. Where the positions of the electorate are considered to be fixed -- a drastic assumption, actually -- then voting systems can probably do a pretty good job of predicting what a negotiation would produce as a maximally acceptable compromise, one which would be approved by the largest majority. (Multiple majorities are probably pretty rare once all the factors are broadly understood and the question reduced to a minimal one.) The networks of connections would presumably make groups that readjust and form in different configurations according to the political positions of the people - like water, hence *Liquid* Democracy. I think vote buying would be a problem with that concept, though, because if the network of connections is public, then those who want to influence the system can easily check whether the members are upholding their ends of the "bargain" (votes for money) The matter has been considered in some depth. The problem with vote buying under Liquid Democracy or Delegable Proxy, and especially in FA/DP, where actual power is not delegated, only representation in deliberation and an informal and rough measurement of broad consent, is that it would be extraordinarily expensive, for a transient benefit. So ... the bought proxy votes and advises corruptly. In public. However, this proxy, in a mature system, only directly represents a relatively small number of clients, whom the proxy also trusts. So the proxy *may* publicly advise, and privately hint or advise to his or her direct clients that they check it out. It is in the interest of the clients that the proxy get the payment! *Especially if they tell him about it.* So, is the payment conditional not only on the vote or advice of the proxy, but rather on ultimate success? If the former, the proxy gets to collect and the clients just decide to investigate for themselves, and they themselves have natural caucuses whom they advise, and so they say, "My proxy, whom I respect greatly, seems to have missed somethin on this issue, so I'm advising the contrary of his advice." If the latter, the decision by the clients will be made on a different basis. Further, since bribery would be illegal, I assume that would continue (I'm not sure what you call it when you corruptly influence someone's advisor, but if it isn't illegal, it should be), the agreement is unenforceable. Would you agree? Knowing that the person offering the bribe was unethical and could simply deny knowledge of the bribe when payment was demanded?
Re: [EM] Why I think IRV isn't a serious alternative 2
Just for clarity, can we agree that ">In Bucklin, after the first round, there is no majority." is a non-sequitor? There aren't "rounds" in Bucklin. All counts for all (#voters ranking alternative x >= rank n" are known simultaneously. Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
Re: [EM] Why I think IRV isn't a serious alternative 2
At 12:55 PM 12/30/2008, Kristofer Munsterhjelm wrote: Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote: However, consider this: the Plurality voting system (FPTP) encourages compromise already. There would have been more sincere first preference votes. My guess, though, is that the use of, say, Bucklin, would have resulted in *at least* half of those pluralities becoming a majority, possibly more. However, this is the real effect of the system described: In maybe one election out of 10, were it top two runoff, the result would shift, which, I contend, is clearly a more democratic result. There might be a slightly increased improvement if the primary method weren't top two Plurality, majority win, but a method which would find a Condorcet winner or at least include that winner in a runoff. How much is it worth to improve the result -- it could be a very significant improvement -- in 10% of elections? I'd say it's worth a lot! I'd also say that even if you had a magic "best utility" single-winner method, it wouldn't be the right method to use in a parliamentary context. If a majority of the voters agree with some position (and we discard gerrymander-type effects, intentional or not), then the parliament will agree with that position, unanimously. Hence... PR is needed. I was considering single-winner context. Yes. For representation, single-winner is, almost guaranteed, a nondemocratic proposition. If I have to contend with you to determine who represents the two of us, it can't be said that whoever wins actually represents us both. Only if I can choose my representative can I be truly said to be represented fairly. STV methods approach this, but Asset simply does it. I choose the "candidate" I most trust, there isn't any reason to vote for anyone else. I can, perhaps, even register as an elector-candidate and vote for myself, if I'm willing to go to the trouble of participating in further process. And then this person will either end up representing me in the assembly, or will, again, choose the person who does end up in the assembly. In an Asset system, it may not be necessary that the votes be "passed on," as in a delegable proxy system. Rather, the electors would negotiate, and when enough of them agree with each other on the identity of the seat, they register the required quota of votes and it is done. I've been recommending the Hare quota, not the Droop quota, because it is theoretically possible that all the votes would be used; the Droop quota assumes wasted votes. Further, because I'm looking to the possibility that electors might be able to vote directly in the Assembly, the voting power of the seats is equal to the summed voting power of the votes transferred by the supporting electors to the seat. Because it's very likely that *some* votes will be wasted, i.e., won't create a seat, for some reason or other, I'd rather aim for a number of seats but tolerate that normally, there would be a vacancy. There might be even more than one! If the electors can vote directly, they actually don't lose that much if they are unable to elect a seat. If they can vote by proxy, it's almost as good! -- but they wouldn't have deliberative rights, just voting rights. Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
Re: [EM] Why I think IRV isn't a serious alternative 2
At 12:46 PM 12/30/2008, Kristofer Munsterhjelm wrote: Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote: At 05:48 AM 12/28/2008, Kristofer Munsterhjelm wrote: Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote: That makes the entire cycle, including polls and feedback, into one election system. Method is too narrow, because the system isn't just "input, then function, then output"; it doesn't just translate individual preferences into social preferences. "Election systems" in the real world are extraordinarily complex. "Voting systems" are methods for taking a ballot and generating a result; sometimes this is a fixed and final result, sometimes it is feedback for subsequent process, which may include a complete repetition, repetition with some restrictions, or even a coin toss. Individual preferences do not exist in a vacuum, there is inherent and massive feedback in real societies. The idea that there are these isolated voters who don't talk to each other and don't influence each other by their positions is ... ivory tower, useful for examining certain theoretical characteristics of systems, but not for predicting the function of systems in the real world. It can be useful, sometimes, but we must remember the limits on that utility as well. Thats all nice, but with the versatility of that wider definition, you get the chance of problems that accompany systems that include feedback within the system itself. Such can include cycling, and too much of either stability (reaches a "compromise" that wasn't really a good compromise) or instability (doesn't settle, as with cycling, or reaches a near-random result depending on the initial state of the system). We are now considering as relevant "cycling" within the entire electorate, within the process by which a whole society comes to an election with the set of preferences and preference strengths that they have. Human societies have been dealing with this for a long, long time, and the best answers we have so far are incorporated in traditional deliberative process, which insures that every point of view of significance is heard, that possible compromises are explored, and that there is an overall agreement that it is time to make a decision, before the decision is actually made. And then the decision is generally made by or with the explicit consent of a majority of those voting, with the implicit consent of those not voting (but able to vote). In short, there's a wider range of possible outcomes because the system permits many more configurations than a simple one-shot election method. This is good when it leads to a better result from voters optimizing their votes in a way that reaches the true compromise, but it's bad when factions use that increased range to try to game the system. If Range voters (for instance) need to consult polls or the prevailing atmosphere to gain knowledge of how to express their votes, then that too is something the strategists can manipulate. Range voters don't need to consult polls! They can do quite well, approaching the most strategic possible vote, without them, voting purely based on their opinions of the candidates and some common sense. Those who strategize, who do something stronger than this, are taking risks. All the groups will include people who strategize When one uses strategy to construct a wider mechanism on top of a single election method by adding a feedback system (such as one may say is done by Range if it's used honestly), then that's good; but if one uses strategy to pull the method on which the system is based in a direction that benefits one's own preferences at the expense of others, giving oneself additional power, then that is bad. Even worse is if many factions do so and the system degrades further because it can't stabilize or because the noise swamps it; or if the combined strategizing leads to a result that's worse for all (chicken-race dynamics) The "pulling" of a group toward its preferred result is, however, what we ask voters to do! Tell us what you want, and indicate by your votes how strongly you want it! Want A or you are going to revolt? You can say that, perhaps, though we are only going to give you one full vote to do it with. Want to pretend that you will revolt? -- or merely your situation is such that A is so much better than the others that you don't want to dilute the vote for A against anyone by giving them your vote? Fine. That's your choice. It helps the system make its decision. Be aware that if the result is not going to be A, you have abstained from the result. If there is majority failure, you may still be able to choose between others. (IRV *enforces* this, you don't get to cast a further vote unless your candidate is eliminated.) *Truncation will be normal*. And, in fact, represents a reasonably sincere vote for most voters! (In most common elections under common conditions). Why are these "strategic voters" different. I realized t
Re: [EM] Does IRV elect "majority winners?"
At 06:59 PM 12/30/2008, Terry Bouricius wrote: I take offense at Abd repeatedly suggesting I am a liar or am engaging in deception. We have a legitimate difference of opinion about the appropriate use of the term "majority" and interpretation of RRONR. I have generally been very reluctant to use the term "liar." It implies deliberate deception. However, it is possible to "engage in deception" that is not deliberate. There is no clear dividing line between lying and reckless disregard of the truth. There is no legitimate difference of opinion here, as far as I can see. The term "majority" is well-defined as used by Robert's Rules of Order; the term can be used with finer specification, but using it that way, implying the general meaning, *without making the specification* is deceptive, and continuing to do it after having been reasonably notified of this is ... lying. How did you do at the target practice today? Well, the majority of my arrows hit the central half of the target. That's great! So it wasn't like last week, where you mostly missed the target entirely? No, actually, I did about the same as last week. How can that be? Well, arrows that miss the target are useless, so I didn't count them. So the majority of your arrows missed the target? No, I told you, the majority of my arrows hit the central half of the target. "The winner will still be required to get a majority of the votes" has a clear implication. The existing law required that. What "interpretation" of Roberts' Rules of Order is Bouricius claiming that we "legitimately" differ on? The meaning of "blanks and abstentions" is clear, and a ballot with a vote on it is neither. Bouricius has made up an entire line of approach, then claims it is merely an alternate "interpretation" of Robert's Rules. This isn't about whether or not we *should* elect the last round winner in IRV. The only question that has been the subject of contention here, and around which I'm coming to deeply suspect Bouricius' motives, is whether or not we can legitimately call that a "majority" without qualifying the term, where it is not only reasonably possible but actually likely that we will be misunderstood. Misunderstood in way that, if we advocate IRV as Bouricius does, will favor our cause. This is political spin of the worst kind, because it is directly deceptive. At the outset, we might all agree that no system can really assure a _true_ "majority winner" in an ultimate sense, since there may be a tie, or there may simply be no candidate running who a majority of voters can abide. Actually, there is a system which assures a true majority winner -- or there is no winner. Bouricius knows what it is, because it applies to all, I believe, legislative actions, and he was a legislator. You keep voting until you find a majority. Top two runoff is merely one step from plurality toward a majority-guaranteed system. You know what would happen in the legislature, electing the Speaker, if there were "no candidate running [whom] a majority of voters -- i.e., legislators -- can abide." There would be no election until they got it together to find a majority. So, sure, TTR can't truly assure a majority -- though when the candidates are restricted to two, then the only exception to a majority would be a tie. I agree, that restriction is a compromise, one which I actually think worse than the disease it purports to cure: majority failure. It would be better to allow, at least, write-in votes, and to then, tolerate the possibility of an election by plurality. If the preceding process has been good enough, that's not likely to be a bad outcome. The core of my argument is that if the winner of a traditional two-round runoff system (without write-ins) is appropriately called a "majority winner," so can the winner of an instant runoff election. Yes. That's your argument, and it is totally corrupt. There is no possibility of mistake in the meaning with TTR. With top-two runoff, the winner has actually received -- excepting a tie -- the "majority" of the votes cast in the election. The runoff is the election. When Mr. Bouricius was in the legislature, and some matter came up for vote, and it failed to pass, but then it was reconsidered, and passed, did the votes in the first consideration count? Indeed, under Robert's Rules of Order, if the desirable repeated balloting is carried out, are the votes in all the unsuccessful elections preceding the final one relevant to what is a majority in the last one? I agree, there is a problem with no write-ins, because the voters have been constrained, *but this has nothing to do with whether or not the winner gained a majority,* except that, of course, if there are only two candidates who are eligible to receive votes, then there is either a tie or one candidate gets a majority of the votes. We don't even say, with a two-candidate election, that a candidate mus
