[EM] Consensus?: IRV vs. Primary w/Runoff

[Forest Simmons]

On Tue, 5 Feb 2002, Markus Schulze wrote in part:

> 
> My argument is that in so far as IRV meets majority for solid coalitions
> and independence from clones, IRV can hardly be called "erratic" compared
> to primary with runoff. You didn't address my argument. Check the
> paragraph of mine that I copied above, and which you'd quoted before
> your "reply".
> 
> Markus Schulze
> 

Your remark about Top Two Runoff being more erratic than IRV was prompted
(as near as I can tell) by two separate threads. (1) my use of the word
"erratic" referring to the behaviour of IRV described by Adam Tarr in a
three way race (hence equally applicable to TTR). (2) another thread
claiming that IRV is essentially no better than TTR in any important way.

It might be enlightening to see how the two criteria (solid coalitions and
independence from clones, presumably satisfied in Adam Tarr's three
candidate IRV example) mitigate the erratic quandry described by Adam,
since that was the context of the word "erratic."

On another note, before I got sucked into this TTR versus IRV (train wreck
versus plane wreck, according to Demorep) business I gave my reasons for
why I think IRV is inferior to the "exhaustive ballot procedure" in which
the alternatives with the least votes are eliminated one at a time in a
series of elections, i.e. the method of which IRV is the "instant"
simulation, except in the inconvenience of many trips to the ballot.

In other words, the simulation versus the real thing was the more
interesting comparison to me. In the case of TTR, there is no appreciable
difference (besides the potential second trip to the polls in the real
version) between the simulation and the real thing, but in the case of IRV
there is a definite strategic difference when the number of candidates
exceeds four.

In your way of thinking does this strategic difference reflect more
favorably on IRV, or on the exhaustive ballot procedure?

Forest