[EM] first-wave Condorcet versions for public election

[Russ Paielli]

James Green-Armytage jarmyta-at-antioch-college.edu |EMlist| wrote:
> Dear election methods fans,
> 
> 	In a recent message, I noted that there is no broad consensus among
> Condorcet supporters as to which completion methods would be most
> appropriate for a few key scenarios. I don't really expect to establish
> such a consensus, but I would at least like to address some of the issues
> involved, and hear where some of the other Condorcet supporters are coming
> from.
> 	There are at least three areas of possible divergence:
> 1. The base method: Minimax (candidate whose worst loss is least bad),
> sequential dropping (drop the weakest defeat that's in a cycle until a
> candidate is unbeaten) ranked pairs, river, beatpath, Condorcet completed
> by another method, approval hybrids, etc.

The method that I tentatively call "Ranked Approval Voting" (RAV) is not 
simply Condorcet "completed" with Approval. (Condorcet completed with 
Approval would simply choose the Approval winner from the Smith set or 
from the entire set of candidates.) RAV uses Approval as an integral 
part of the rules rather than as an afterthought. As I said before, the 
approval scores naturally fill in the diagonal elements of the pairwise 
matrix. To my way of thinking, RAV is how Condorcet should work (or is 
at least one good way it could work).

<cut>

> 	I know that Mike Ossipoff has said that we should all come together
> around a winning votes method without an additional anti-strategy measure.
> But I'd like to hear what some other people think. 

If the EM community adopts this approach, you will be no further ahead 
in 30 years than you are today. I guarantee it.

> 	I'm not even sure what I would recommend, if I was in a position to
> recommend something for public elections. I lean towards starting out with
> a winning votes version of sequential dropping (or any one of ranked
> pairs, beatpath, river, if there isn't an intense need for simplicity)
> with a CWO. But that's subject to change, with further discussion.

Your last sentence leaves some hope.

Regards,
Russ