[Election-Methods] RE : Re: peer-reviewed work that is critical ofIRV

[Abd ul-Rahman Lomax]

At 02:24 PM 9/28/2007, James Gilmour wrote:
>I found
>only one comment, on the Discussion page for "Plurality Criterion", 
>where "Voting matters" is described as "an on-line
>IRV advocacy publication".  That is a gross misrepresentation of 
>"Voting matters".  It is not an advocacy publication of
>any kind.  It is a technical journal only.  It is very unusual in 
>that it is dedicated to technical aspects of the STV
>voting system  -  as it makes very clear.

Let me explain this. There is clearly a strategy on the part of 
FairVote to cloak IRV with the mantle of STV. They do not want people 
to know that when you take STV and use it single-winner, the really 
nasty characteristics that are largely suppressed when it is 
multiwinner come to the surface. As long as it is a two-party system, 
not much of a problem. In that context, IRV keeps the third parties 
in their place and prevents them, mostly, from spoiling elections. 
Which is good for the major parties, but not for the third parties! 
If a third party can spoil an election, it might actually have more 
power (though it is a dangerous tool).

So this language, this definition of STV as being "IRV" is part of a 
coherent and possibly coordinated strategy to create desired 
impressions in the electorate. It's been working, because most of us 
have been asleep at the switch. The people who know about election 
methods are the ones that can recognize these little sleight of hand tricks.

Look, I thought myself that Robert's Rules recommended IRV. What made 
me think that? Well, I read the FairVote propaganda, looked at the 
source they provided conveniently, and, hey, it looked good. Did I 
notice the crucial difference? No, not until I got hard-nosed about 
the IRV article and started looking at everything with a jaundiced 
eye. The first thing I noticed was not the elephant in the living 
room, it was just the smell..... i.e., that RR was not actually 
recommending IRV, it was describing "preferential voting." And it 
wasn't a "recommendation" of some specific method, it was of a 
*class* of methods, and one example was given. And I still though the 
example was IRV. But then, looking over associated material, the 
matter of "majority came to my attention. And the spinners were being 
*very* careful to reverse my edits that were clarifying the language 
used in describing IRV to imply that it was a true majority decision 
being made. Then it all started to unravel.

RR was not recommending IRV, but something *like* IRV, but different 
in a crucial way. True to RR traditions, they were insisting on a 
*true* majority, not a fake one created by tossing out ballots with 
valid votes.

And, yes, there are clear sources that show that a vote is not 
invalidated because it is for a non-winner or a non-frontrunner. It 
stands, for the purpose of calculating the "majority," as long as it 
is not spoiled or does not contain a vote -- at least one, which 
might be required to be first rank or not -- for an eligible 
candidate. Other voters are considered to have abstained. They have 
*not* abstained if they cast a truncated ballot, even though this is 
exactly the argument that is being raised against what I've written. 
The rules are explicit about it.

So RR is not recommending what is explicitly described as IRV in the 
IRV article! It isn't exactly recommending at all, but what it 
describes is *better* than IRV in an important way.... and there is 
explicit discussion of the significance of this, plus explicit 
discussions of the problems with "preferential voting."

They want the "recommendation" of Roberts Rules, but they don't 
actually want people to read it. They just want the cachet. And they 
similarly want the tiara of STV, which, while it is not perfect, and 
we know of better methods, is actually quite good if the districts 
have more than a handful of members; it gets better with a larger 
number of members per district.