[EM] Student government - what voting system to recommend?

[Tim Hull]

Regarding the constituencies, the 19-seat one is elected 10 seats one
semester, 9 seats the other.  The other multi-seat constituencies are
similarly divided.  I would say that none of these can be combined for a
simple reason - they do represent a clear group (each individual
school/college within the University) as opposed to being a territorial
district.  Additionally, each such group has its OWN student government -
which makes them somewhat resemble "states".  Thus, combining the
single-seat districts would make about as much sense as combining several of
the one seat at-large Congressional districts for small U.S. states for STV
purposes.  Likewise, there is no logical subdivision for the 19-seat
grouping - any such division would be an arbitrary new construction.  One
might be able to split based on class status or on off-campus/on-campus
residency, but such designations tend to change much more than
school/college, leaving some students who run for the seat they are eligible
for becoming ineligible to hold it the next semester.  Regarding major party
domination of such districts - often these seats are not even contested by
the "parties", and half of them are won with a few votes by independent
write-ins.

This does present a somewhat weird situation as far as PR and elections,
though it seems as if the best solution would be to leave the division of
representatives alone.  However, the division between two elections is
something to consider.  According to what people think in here, it seems
that this may be good for the 19-seat constituency.  However, it seems like
it may not be for the others (especially the 2 and 3-seat constituencies,
but also the 6 and 7 seat).  The problem, though, with doing this (combining
some multi-seat elections and dividing others) is that each election is
contested by only half the campus (whereas now, each election is contested
by 90% of students - everyone minus the 1-seaters not up for election).
Thus, advertising and getting turnout becomes more of a problem.

Any comments on this?  As far as single-winner goes, I see IRV as being the
likely choice with STV used in multi-winner due to the fact that it would
reduce the amount of explaining (as opposed to doing something like
Condorcet).  As far as approval, I really don't see that working very well -
only voters who think their favorite has NO CHANCE to win would vote for
more than one.  In this case, it seems like IRV is better.

Tim

P.S. Under my "pro wrestler" example, I was assuming that the voter would,
under a range system, give the pro wrestler a 3 or a 2 out of 10, except for
those who prefer them first.  In this case, both IRV and Range would not
elect this candidate.
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