Mackerras article

[Steve Eppley]

Marcus G wrote:
-snip-
>It could be argued that while the existence of the threshold is a
>arguable point, if it does exist it should not be open to such
>blatant manipulation.  Of course if NZ voters were able to indicate
>preferences with their party vote (eg 1 Act, 2 National) this
>problem would be lessened. 

Yes.  Even if the threshold is 0% an argument can be made to allow 
the voters to rank the parties: to give the parties and the nation 
valuable feedback about how broad each party's support really is.

* *

Also, directly electing the executive (using a good single-winner
voting method if it's a vote for the CEO, or using a good prop rep
method if the executive is a small council) instead of letting the
largest party in the legislature cobble together a working majority
would help lessen the manipulation too.  

And this would remove a "lesser of evils" dilemma -- Vote for one's
favorite party?  Or vote for one of the two largest parties to
prevent the worst of the two largest from picking the gov't? --
from the voting, so the two largest parties have their votes, 
and their mandates, falsely inflated.

---Steve     (Steve Eppley    seppley at alumni.caltech.edu)