Generalized Majority Rule (was Re: Bruce, Condorcet & Copeland)

[Mike Ossipoff]

Steve Eppley writes:
> 
> Mike Ossipoff wrote:
> [snip]
> >One way that I've worded this has been my "Generalized Majority Standard":
> >
> >A group of voters consisting of a full majority of all the voters
> 
> When is a majority not a "full" majority?

My wording was just double-emphasis, probably unnecessary, as you
point out.

> Could those 13 words be replaced by:  A majority of the voters

Sure, but I sometimes over-word things to be on the safe side.


> 
> >should be able to get any result that they all want (electing
> >someone or preventing the election of 1 or more candidates),
> >without having to rank a less-liked alternative equal to or over 
> >a more-liked one. 
> >
> >And, under as broad a range of conditions as possible, we'd like
> >the members of that majority to be able to get what they all want
> >without any kind of defensive strategy at all, including
> >truncation. 
> [snip]
> 
> Would this be another way to express this standard?:
>   Each voter should be able to *both* vote for some candidates and
>   against others.  S/he shouldn't have to express only one of these 
>   two goals.

Yes, one thing that I sometimes point out is that Condorcet is
nearly the only method where it's never necessary for voters to
not rank their favorites alone in 1st place.

The wording you suggest is a way of putting the lesser-of-2-evils
standard.

> 
> I think the generalization of majority rule to "voting against" is
> implicit using this wording.  This also generalizes even further, to
> all voters and not just the majority, so no group appears privileged
> and there's less complexity.  Comments?

Yes, though it's important to mention that majority-rule property,
I've been getting away from reference to a majority in my initial
explanation because, as you say, the property is more general than
that. ...when I say that your vote against your last choice is counted
because you rank a compromise over him, even though you don't rank
the compromise 1st (& are therefore free to rank your real favorite
1st).

I should add that, for one of the standards that I proposed, I
meant not just the right to _express_ your preferences, but
the right to have them _counted_.

Someone might say that Copeland counts your preferences. Oh yeah?
It counts them initially, to find out who beats whom, and then
it ignores them. With bad-news results sometimes, for the voter
whose preference has been ignored.
 
> --Steve
> .-
> 


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