[EM] Markus & Manipulability

[Blake Cretney]

  Joe Weinstein wrote:

>
> As a citizen and voter, I don't want the election method to give 
> gratuitous incentive to CAMPAIGN strategies which aim to confuse and 
> entrap voters, e.g. thru introduction of incontestable fallacious poll 
> data or of extra clones (pro or maybe con a given position).
>
> But I do have a VOTING strategy.  My strategy has me vote (or abstain) 
> so as to maximize my expected overall satisfaction - call it 
> 'utility'.  Ingredients which enter into this utility include:  how, 
> apparently, my vote would most likely (or thereafter profitably) make 
> a difference in picking the winner (instrumental effect);  how my vote 
> would most likely (or profitably) bear weight as an expression of 
> sentiment;  my costs in time and money to go and cast the vote; my 
> regret and losses in self- or others' respect from not voting or from 
> voting 'insincerely'; etc.
>
> I not only have a VOTING strategy:  I am in fact ENTITLED to conceive 
> and have and use such a strategy.  Indeed I DEMAND that the election 
> method give me scope for effective strategy.  (A decent respect for 
> democracy requires me to concede the same rights to other voters too.)

The more a voting system allows effective strategy, the more it allows 
those who understand the system to get more power than those who do not. 
 This may be a necessary evil, but it surprises me that you seem to feel 
this is actually desirable.

>
> As Mike pointed out, most of us - including me - have been energized 
> into election reform because we resent being often forced to trade off 
> two quite reasonable strategic goals: defensive - to defeat the worst 
> alternative; and affirmative - to support our favorite.  We know that 
> this tragic trade-off is largely avoidable, through use of another 
> method such as Approval in place of the prevalent Lone-Mark.
>
> It's bad enough being hobbled in the kind of strategy I can use.  
> What's worse, though, is to be berated for - or prevented from - 
> effectively strategizing at all.
>
> A totally non-'manipulable' (by me as voter) election - e.g., one 
> where my choice has minimal effect (whether on account of someone 
> else's prior choices, or gratuitous randomization, or a combination) - 
> is of course of no civic interest or benefit to me.

Obviously being manipulable (as you define it) is a good thing, and 
strategy is a form of manipulation.  But that isn't really an argument 
for why strategy is a good thing.  In the same way, I could argue that 
donuts are food, and that food is good for you, therefore donuts are 
good for you.

>
> I must heartily second what Forest wrote so eloquently earlier today:
>
> '... Nurmi and Bartholdi are worried about voters "manipulating" the 
> system to increase their expected utilities, i.e. to vote in their own 
> best interest, as though voters' utilities had nothing to do with 
> social utility.
>
> 'It is the prerogative of the voter to maximize their own utilities,
> whether anybody else thinks they have social value or not. That's
> democracy. We don't try to use voting methods to protect the public
> against the public will. We use voting methods to ascertain the public
> will.

We clearly use voting systems to protect the public against the will of 
individuals.  As far as I can see, this is just a continuation of the 
same error I mention above.

>
> 'A more realistic worry is pollsters and pundits manipulating the 
> voters by fooling them into voting against their own best interest. 
> The more complicated the strategy and the more sensitive good strategy 
> is to
> information ...the easier the "experts" can manipulate the vote of the
> gullible voter.'
>
Most voters seem to view IRV as impossible to manipulate (by strategy as 
opposed to sincere votes).  So they don't try.  But it's obvious how 
approval can be manipulated by expert opinion.  People will want to 
approve of at least one option they think has a chance.  In run-off, 
voters will try to avoid wasting their votes in the first round.  So, it 
seems to me that by this standard IRV is superior.

---
Blake Cretney