[EM] To Blake, re: strategy

[Anthony Simmons]

>> From: Forest Simmons <fsimmons at pcc.edu>
>> Subject: Re: [EM] To Blake, re: strategy

>> On Mon, 11 Feb 2002, Bart Ingles wrote:

>> > I had the chance to speak to an Australian visitor at a recent local
>> > Libertarian convention.  Her stated reason for liking IRV was that she
>> > was able to rank a sure-to-lose fringe candidate above her favorite, in
>> > order to keep the favorite from taking her vote for granted.
>> >
>> > Not exactly a utilitarian strategy, is it?

>> Bart certainly has a knack for interesting twists on
>> strategy.

Rob Lanphier made a distinction between two types of
strategy:

>> I think the strategy issue manifests itself in a couple of ways:
>> 1.  Tendency of voters to engage in tactical/insincere voting
>> 2.  Tendency of candidates/parties to position their candidate in the
>> strategically best position of the political spectrum based on voting
>> system.

These two can combine to create a third:  Tendency of voters
to engage in tactical voting (1) in order to manipulate the
tendency of parties to position candidates (2), or,
presumably, to choose differently.

One might suppose there are voters who vote for third party
candidates in order to convince their favorite party to
change strategy.  For example, there may have been Democrats
who voted for Nader in order to convince the Democratic Party
to shift to the left.  Or there might have been Republicans
who voted for Nader in order to convince the Democratic Party
to shift to the left.

One of the valuable functions of third parties is to
eliminate the automatic advantage of hugging the center.