[EM] Instant Runoff/Approval

[MIKE OSSIPOFF]

>Instant Runoff/Approval.  Number ONLY those candidates which you approve 
>of,
>starting at 1, and continuing using successive numbers.
>
>Count up all the candidate's approval totals (every ballot which numbers
>candidate A is worth one).  Eliminate all candidates except the two with 
>the
>most (approval) votes.  Conduct a head to head count based on the
>preferences of all the ballots that number either candidate.

It's a sure thing that the method you
propose would be a big improvement over IRV. I hope that you
will propose it and it would be great if you could succeed in
replacing IRV with it.

It meets WDSC. IRV doesn't even meet that basic minimum requirement
for an adequate method. Your proposal doesn't have IRV's
idiosyncratic instability. It would be a great improvement over
IRV.


For the U.S.:
That's essentially Approval with a top-2 runoff, except that
the rankings allow a pairwise-count between the top 2 to replace
the runoff. Its advantage over Runoff Approval is that it
doesn't require a 2nd election. But in places where a Runoff is
already in place, it's better to leave it than replace it with
something that's essentially the same, and requires a completely
new balloting system, and a replacement with the runoff with
something new. If we're going to essentially keep the runoff,
then we don't want to complicate the proposal by changing the
form of it. The less change that a proposal asks for, the better.
Approval is better without a runoff, and so I'd propose it without
one, for replacing Plurality. For replacing Runoff, there's a case
for keeping the top-2 runoff, so as to propose as little change as
possible. But not only is Approval better without the runoff, but
we save money by not holding the runoff. I tend to agree with Bart
that it's better to propose pure Approval, no runoff. But the
super cautious proposer might leave the runoff in, for a
minimal-change proposal.

>It is the kind of thing that people might actually go for here

I hope so. Propose it.

, but it might
>be a waste of time - I generally support a straight push to proportional
>representation (probably STV, as we already have it in use)

Ok, but if you don't succeed in replacing IRV with STV then
try IRV/Approval.




, which is more
>achievable than in the US.  What's more, aside from the election of the
>lower house, there are no single winner contests of any kind (save some
>mayoral elections - but a lot of councils don't have directly elected 
>mayors
>anyway).

The lower house isn't something to ignore, right?

Mike Ossipoff

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