STV for party candidate lists?

[DEMOREP1 at aol.com]

Mr. Baum is suggesting the use of a mixture of instant runoff and STV
surpluses to elect a variable N persons.   

The use of IRO is technically defective in a multi-member p.r. election in the
same manner that it is defective in a single winner election.   For N seats to
be filled each set of N candidates should technically be matched against each
other candidate (with the other remaining candidates being deemed test losers)
(i.e. Condorcet also works for p.r. elections).   Due to the possibility of
multiple ties with a large number of candidates, IRO might be used as a
tiebreaker only if the election system does not have a computer to do the
large amount of Condorcet math.

Example--
N = 20, 100 candidates
Each set of 20 would be compared against 1 (with the other 79 candidates being
deemed test losers) to see if the 1 gets a quota (3000/20) before each of the
20 gets a quota (or the highest number of votes--- noting again that many
voters might not make enough choices- i.e. many of the voters in the 79 group
might only vote for each other's candidates).

Another change in the law would be to permit each general election voter to
vote for any candidate(s) by the use of a write in number(s) of the
candidate(s) using a list of all partisan and independent candidates (as in
Finland) who have some minimum support (via a nominating petition having total
votes in last election/total seats/400 signatures).

Example--
             Cand. No.       Rank
John Doe  254             3
Mary Doe  256             2
Herman Baun  956       1
etc.
That is, no primary election is needed.

For larger legislative bodies there might be thousands of candidates -- U.S.
House of Representatives has 435 members, the U.K. House of Commons has 659
members, etc.).

Mr. Baum's Questions

1: Does this method meet the objective, i.e. does it solve the
problem _in the way specified_?
2: Any experiences with this system or a similar one?
3: How do other democratic parties forced to operate within a
closed-list national election system (s)elect their candidates? 

D- Answers
1. Yes but the Condorcet math should be done if possible.
2.  No.
3.  Most (if not all) have party elites choosing the candidates who get on the
party's list (which causes many of the problems in parliamentary type minority
coalition governments).