[EM] Monotonicity, but Participation too

[Blake Cretney]

On Sat, 15 Jul 2000, "MIKE OSSIPOFF" wrote:

> >Would you say that it is possible for one method to provide on
> >average better government or decisions than another?  If not, what
> do
> >you see as the purpose of electoral reform?
> 
> You know that we all believe that it's possible for one method
> to provide better choices than another, largely by letting
> everyone vote sincerely. I certainly didn't mean to imply
> otherwise. We all agree that that's the purpose of electoral
> reform.
> 
> >
> >For example, given the votes
> >70% A > B
> >30% B > A
> >
> >would you say that a method that elects A will on average provide
> >better decisions for these ballots than a method that picks B?  Or
> are
> >either choice equally likely to be the best choice?
> 
> Sure, I agree that choosing B in that example would be outright
> incorrect. Ok, I didn't mean to imply that there's no such thing
> as an incorrect choice. I just meant that, for something like
> Participation, it depends on what people expect. It would be
> difficult to deny that there's something wrong when my ballot,
> which ranks Gore over Bush, changes the winner from Gore to Bush.

I will take it as agreed, then, that it is possible for one answer
for a particular set of ballots to on average provide better
government than another.  If that is true, then we might call any
best-government answer "correct" and any other answer "incorrect". 
Any method that always picked correct answers would be "perfect", in
this limited sense.  Of course, it might not be ideal in the sense of
being simple or intuitive.  Certainly no method can be perfectly
intuitive, as people's intuition often contradicts reality, and
always contradicts the intuition of some other people.

Presumably we could judge criteria by whether a perfect method might
fail them.  Certainly, if two criteria are contradictory, that is no
method passes both, then we know that one of them fails a perfect
method.  This would give me reason to doubt the value of the
criterion.

Do you think a perfect method, as I have defined it, could fail
monotonicity?  How about participation?

On a related issue, you have in the past frequently spoken of the
need to use particular definitions of majority rule, ethics, and
fairness in order to judge election methods.  So an obvious question
is, can these concerns be derived from the goal of picking the
candidate that on average provides the best government?  If not,
might they come into conflict?  If they come into conflict, which
goal should prevail?  

For example, is majoritarianism more or less important than good
government.  Is it incapable of conflicting with good government? 
Why?

---
Blake Cretney