[EM] Cheering for simplicity

[Forest Simmons]

On Mon, 1 Sep 2003, Alex Small wrote:

> Dave Ketchum said:
> > If I really wanted to broaden the field, I might get into ways for the
> > people being represented to control who got to be officials, and
> > when officials got replaced, WITHOUT doing elections.
>
> Here's a simple scheme along those lines.  Surely it can be improved, and
> as set forth it's only for legislatures, but it's a way to proceed.
>
> Each eligible voter has one vote.  At any time he can give it to any
> representative or would-be representative that he wishes to.  As long as a
> representative has a certain threshold of support he retains his seat in
> the legislature.
>
> Proportionality is achieved because as soon as a group gets enough people
> on board to elect one representative, it will start recruiting voters for
> another.  Groups will add representatives until they've maxed-out.
>
> Recall is simple:  If enough voters withdraw support from one
> representative and transfer it to another the representative loses his
> office.  Maybe there could be a grace period, so that he has a certain
> interval of time to regain support before losing office.  But that's a
> detail.
>

How about this: in any given week you can transfer one third of your vote
from one representative to another, so it would take three weeks to make a
complete transfer.

Forest