[EM] Posting #2: intro, a plea, LWV, organizing v. IRV, terms & taxonomy

[Forest Simmons]

Thanks to Bart for repeating a posting of Joe Weinstein.

I appreciate Joe's comments on terminology, especially that they should
somehow reflect both ballot type (whether rankings, ratings, pass/fail,
lone mark, multiple mark, etc.) and scoring method. 

People tend to assume that each ballot type has only one scoring method,
but the possible scoring methods (i.e. decision rules) are as diverse and
important as the ballot type. 

A good example of this is Borda Count and IRV versus the elegant Condorcet
Methods propounded on this EM list.  They all use the same ballot, but
the scoring method makes all the difference. 

Similarly, multiwinner AV and proportional AV use the same ballot as
multiwinner "plurality" , except different versions of the latter vary
from lone mark to the number of marks up to the number of seats to be
filled.  

Ironically, lone mark multiwinner tends to give more proportional
representation than normal multiwinner AV, where the "tyranny of the
majority" really kicks in;  51% of the voters decide who all the winners
are. 

Unfortunately, lone-mark multiwinner suffers badly from insincere
strategies.

How do we get the proportional representation without inducing insincere
strategies? That's where PAV comes in; it remedies the "Tyranny of the
Majority" problem of multiwinner AV without sacrificing the beautiful
sincere strategies. (I'm going with the less strict, more inclusive
criterion for sincerity that says as long as your ballot doesn't favor
someone over your true favorite, then you are sincere.)

This is another distinction of terminology that should be made more clear
to the public: strategic voting is not necessarily the same as insincere
voting.

Ever since I started delving into these matters I've been disturbed that
IRV pre-empted or co-opted the phrase Instant Runoff, since, as Joe
mentioned almost every method is amenable to some simple contingency that
resolves the "run off" without another voting episode.  Some, like AV,
require no runoff at all, not even instant, unless there is an absolute
tie. (This can happen in just about any method.)

I believe that Jim Hightower and the editor of "The Progressive" would be
prefer AV to IRV if they only knew that AV is the best chance for breaking
out of the two party system.  I think that they were sucked in by the
terminology; to the uninitiated "Instant Runoff Voting" sounds like "The
Unique Method that has a built in runoff policy."

As most of you know, IRV is the Trojan Horse of third parties.  It builds
you up for that big let down.  It resolves (to the satisfaction of some) 
the problem of someone winning by a mere plurality, as opposed to a
majority.  It resolves the spoiler problem as long as a non-threatening
third party is the potential spoiler.  But it does not resolve the spoiler
problem in the end game, when a third party is big enough to be a serious
contender.

What can we compare it to so the public will understand?  "You can go
window shopping all you want, but you cannot actually buy anything."

If you equate two party politics with "The American Way,"  then IRV is
what you want. It will keep the two parties entrenched, and it will give
the appearance of (1) majority approved winners and (2) room for third
parties. 

I wish every Green Party supporter could read Bart's paper on this topic.

As Tom Brockaw says, "I'll see you next week."

Forest