[EM] Tyranny of the Majority

[Rob LeGrand]

Forest wrote:
> When the only information available is simple preference, then majority
> rule would be the only democratic choice. But that's not the context of
> the posting to which Demorep replied below.
> 
> Suppose that you know strength of preferences:
> 
> 51 A > B >> C
> 49 B > C >> A
> 
> The majority choice is A.
> 
> The Approval choice is B with 100% approval.

. . .

> But arguably the Approval choice is more democratic than the Majority
> choice, especially if a democracy is supposed to be for the benefit of ALL
> the people, not just the magical 51%.
>
> That's why I changed my tune recently and started advocating the Approval
> winner unabashedly (for elections based on these kinds of ballots).

Just my opinion, but it seems to me that when the voted Condorcet winner is not
picked, you introduce more instability and potential strategy problems than you
should.  In the above example, if a voting system would choose B, the A voters
would be punished by their approval cutoff choice.  I think combining Condorcet
and Approval could certainly have merit, but surely it would be best to use
Approval to choose from the voted Smith set.  Nice and simple.

=====
Rob LeGrand
honky98 at aggies.org
http://www.aggies.org/honky98/

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