[EM] IRV Failures

[Dave Ketchum]

On Tue, 08 Mar 2005 14:14:41 -0500 Eric Gorr wrote:
> Daniel Bishop wrote:
> 
>> Eric Gorr wrote:
>>
>>> In a recent conversation with an IRV supporter I asked the question:
>>>
>>>  What cases would you accept as failure of IRV?
>>>
>>> They answered:
>>>
>>>  Where the general public (or a significant fraction of it) failed to
>>>  accept the results as legitimate, or at least beyond question.  The
>>>  2000 and 2004 Presidential elections are examples of failed elections.
>>>  San Franciso's election was heralded as a success.
>>>
>>> They also believe that IRV has never failed to produce a fully 
>>> satisfactory result. Can anyone provide evidence to the contrary?
>>
>>
>>
>> It's going to be hard to find an example.
> 
> 
> I think you have misunderstood the kind of example I am looking for.
> 
> Take a real case where IRV was used in an election. By the above 
> definition of a failure, one may see many newsreports of a widespread 
> belief that the winner was a poor one.
> 
> If such a case exists, it would be easy to spot.
> 
> The only thing that makes this hard is that I am not sure anyone has 
> taken a close look at every election in which IRV was used.

IRV CANNOT AFFORD to do the complete vote counts that would permit 
comparison.  Ballots sometimes are kept around for recounts - if these 
were counted by Condorcet rules we would have ammunition.  Even here it 
would take a lot of recounting for, usually, Condorcet and IRV are going 
to agree.

I constructed an example that could happen - my voters could know 
expectable results.  Usually voters do not know what to expect close 
enough to complain with certainty.

-- 
  davek at clarityconnect.com    people.clarityconnect.com/webpages3/davek
  Dave Ketchum   108 Halstead Ave, Owego, NY  13827-1708   607-687-5026
            Do to no one what you would not want done to you.
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