[EM] Re: Ranked Approval Voting (RAV)

[Ted Stern]

On 13 Mar 2005 at 15:08 PST, Russ Paielli wrote:


> Since we're discussing names for election methods, I'd like to propose 
> one: Ranked Approval Voting (RAV).
>
> RAV works as follows:
>
> The voter ranks the approved candidates only. The CW wins if one exists, 
> otherwise the least approved candidate is eliminated until a CW is found.
>
> Equal rankings are not allowed in basic RAV. A variation could be to 
> allow equal ranking, in which case the name could be RAVE (RAV Equal) or 
> RAVERA (RAV with Equal Ranking Allowed).
>
> I believe RAV is an excellent method and has a better chance than any 
> other ranking method of beating IRV for public acceptance.
>
> Another variation of RAV could be to allow the voter to rank all the 
> candidates and also specify an Approval cutoff. I like that method, but 
> I think the requirement for specifying an Approval cutoff separate from 
> the rankings themselves will only confuse voters and make the method a 
> harder sell -- with little if any added benefit. The rankings of the 
> unapproved candidates are likely to be strategic anyway: most voters 
> will probably "bury" the unapproved candidate with the best chance of 
> winning, regardless of their true ranking of that candidate.
>

I disagree, Russ.  Consider this easy-to-describe method that is equivalent to
Ranked Pairs with defeats sorted by the minimum approval of either candidate.
Previously I have called this Total Approval Ranked Pairs, but it could
equally well be called Approval Seeded Bubble Sort (Forest's earlier name).

   "Rank candidate 'seeds' in descending order of approval.  For a candidate
    to move up in rank, it has to defeat all higher seeded candidates in
    succession, and only after each of those has itself moved up in rank as
    much as possible."

In this method, if a voter senses that none of his approved candidates will
win, he may want to express a "disapproved" ranking among the other candidates
with better support.

We actually want to encourage this.  It is what will tend to draw more support
for the moderate wing of each block.

Ted
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	ted stern at u dot washington dot edu

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