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

[Juho]

On Apr 25, 2007, at 16:36 , Howard Swerdfeger wrote:

>>> 4) The ultimate form of democracy is one that
>>>  * maximizes voter knowledge of issues
>>>  * seeks to Involve the voters at every stage of decision making
>>> process   (direction, Discussion/deliberation, Vote)
>>
>> Agreed. These are some very key principles that make a democratic
>> system work well.
>>
>>>  * generates a laws and directions for society that is
>>> representative of the beliefs of all well knowledgeable voters.
>>
>> Yes, assuming that we try to make all voters "knowledgeable" (as in
>> the first bullet) and don't deny the less knowledgeable ones the
>> right and recommendation to vote as well.
>
> Yes and no....:)
> A purely theoretical question now....
> You are now an omnipotent, omniscient, and altruistic ruler of a group
> of people. When making a decision on a course of action. Do you do  
> what
> is "best" for the people, or what the people prefer you to do?

I'd lean on the "best for the people" side. If I can not convince  
them what I think would be best for them, maybe then in some cases I  
have to conclude that they would suffer if I decide what I think is  
best for them, and therefore it would maybe be best for them to  
follow their own wishes (or to wait for a while and/or continue  
discussions if that is possible).

For me one key concept here is representative democracy. The indirect  
decision making softens the issue of voters not being experts on all  
topics. The representatives are expected to be more knowledgeable and  
able to provide good explanations to the voters so that also they  
will understand what is "best" for them.

In the light of my discussion above one could also start from doing  
exactly what people would prefer one to do but continuously keep  
educating them so that they would move in the direction that the  
ruler thinks is best (also the ruler might learn more and change his/ 
her opinion (and no stubbornly push his/her own ideas through)).

> This is not always an easy question and needs to take into account the
> "delta in result" between "best" and preferred action, as well as the
> size of the preference expressed by the people.
>
> Ultimately I believe the best answer is to educate the entire  
> population
> well in advance of the decision that needs to be made. So that
> correlation between "best" and preferred action approaches 1.

Yes, the two options you presented should ideally gradually converge  
for each question.

I think this is a process where all participants should ideally learn  
in time.

>>> Many people in the last election who voted Conservative did not
>>> really want the conservative in power. They mainly wanted the
>>> ruling Liberals out of Power. and the only party with enough
>>> support to do that was the Conservatives.
>>>
>>> Same goes for the one before that election. Many people "Plugged
>>> there nose" and voted Liberal because they were afraid of the
>>> "hidden agenda"  from the "Religious Right" in the Conservative  
>>> Party.
>>
>> This sounds like the "one dimensional" (binary) spectrum of
>> alternatives of a two-party system is not sufficient for the voters
>> in this case. Multiple parties and/or ability to provide opinions in
>> more than one dimension (traditionally often the left-right axis)
>> would probably reduce the "nose plugging effect".
>
> I agree with you. But, that was not the point I was trying to make. I
> was providing a counter example to your assertion that most  
> election are
>   competitive. By showing that in many elections a large percentage of
> the population has a very weak preference for the candidate they  
> vote for.

In this example he people maybe feel strongly but have no good  
candidates with reasonable chance of winning available. I thus see  
some competitiveness in the opinions/attitudes. The voting system  
however forced them to vote someone they really didn't strongly support.

>> P.S. One more comment on the older mails. The number of voters has an
>> effect in the sense that the higher the number of voters is the more
>> probable it is that one voter doesn't feel that he/she can trust all
>> the other voters to be his/her friends but will vote against him/her
>> (in a competitive way). This may increase the probability that this
>> voter decides to vote strategically (since probably others do so
>> too). In small groups people may thus trust that all members of it
>> know the needs to all others and will take them into account in a
>> fair way. In big groups others may be seen as "strangers that one
>> needs to defend against".
>
> This is probably true, and would most be a factor in small elections
> having more honest voters.
> But I think other factors might be :
> 1. A single voter in small election has more weight in the outcome and
> thus might be willing to vote more honestly rather then having to
> maximize voting power by voting approval.

This may depend on the personality of the voters. (Sometimes  
dictators become monsters when they get in power, sometimes they  
relax and become benign rulers. Often rich people want more money  
even though poor people think the rich ones already have more than  
enough of money.)

> 2. more random variation in results of a smaller election would create
> more chance that a voters perceives an positive effect with honest
> voting. (Kind of like a Superstition, but not really.)

Also here I can imagine some voters to take also the opposite direction.

Juho



	
	
		
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