[EM] Is strategic voting a bad thing, really?

[Paul Kislanko]

Bill Clark wrote:
Recently I've come to question the accepted wisdom that strategic voting
is a bad thing that should be minimized.

It looks to me like the English Language is failing us again. "Strategic
Voting" is the only kind there is from the electorate's standpoint, so
it can't be "bad".

>From the standpoint of a *method*, which strategies are applicable to
the method are characteristics of the method, not value judgments.

Examples that show that different methods select different winners from
an identical set of ballots can be used to classify the methods and
identify strategies used by the voters, but cannot show that one is
"better" than another without resorting to something outside of the
method or strategy.
One must add a value judgment to say "this was the right winner" to do
that, and guess what - that's Arrow's Dictator Criterion.