[EM] does Election-methode require e-voting?

[David GLAUDE]

Hello,

I am strongly opposed to e-voting and lightly interested in the various 
way a leader can be elected using "alternative counting/preference method".

The main reason for my non-interest in those method is that in Belgium 
we never have to elect a single man durring an election (no president, 
no single man directly elected an any level).

The main reason for my opposition to e-voting (any device between me and 
my vote) is that we have that in Belgium and that citizen are not in 
control of the election, only expert.

Recent news on slashdot.org:
* 
http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/11/03/182226&mode=thread&tid=126&tid=172

Made me look at the Australian [e-]voting system:
* http://www.softimp.com.au/evacs.html
* http://www.elections.act.gov.au/Elecvote.html

And the interesting "Hare-Clark Electoral System":
* http://www.elections.act.gov.au/Hare.html

Vendor of e-voting system care more about making money than democracy. 
And I fear that they could promote alternative election methods in order 
to push e-voting hardware and software.

So my main question is about the pratical/mathematical complexity of 
each of the alternative election methods you discuss here.
How hard is it to manually "count the vote" for those method to be applyed?
How hard is it to hand compute the result (once the vote are properly 
hand counted)?
Do you need "computer counting and voter intend recording" for those or 
some of those methode to be practicaly applyed?

I believe all those thing you talk about are practicaly possible to do 
by hand... but one of the argument from Australian election official to 
introduce e-voting is the complexity and error-prone result of hand 
counted "Hare-Clark Electoral System" (especially when result are close).

Thanks for your comment.

David GLAUDE from Belgium
Web master of http://www.poureva.be/