[EM] Re: Approval vs Condorcet

[MIKE OSSIPOFF]

James Cooper wrote:

The most compelling argument against Approval voting from the Science
mag article is the idea that it will result in non-substantive
campaigns where candidates try to come across as totally inoffensive
in order to gain approval from as many voters as possible.


I reply:

Trying to be something for everyone is nothing new. Some dishonest 
candidates, like the ones who always want to be your lesser-evil,  try it in 
Plurality. They'd try it in IRV too, to get 2nd preferences. In any 
method--Pluality, ranked, or Approval--don't vote for a candidate whom you 
believe to be dishonestly trying to appeal to everyone.

Don't worry about candidate psychology. The candidates who are worth voting 
for don't falsify their opinions for popularity. There's a good candidate in 
the presidential campaign, and he couldn't care less about what's popular.

Worry instead about the falsification that the voting system forces on the 
voter. IRV gives strategic need to bury your favorite, if your favorite 
isn't a sure loser who will get eliminated first. Approval nevser gives any 
incentive to vote someone else over your favorite. For the first time, 
everyone could fully vote for their favorite.

What about Approval vs Copeland? Or Approval vs Margins Condorcet? Sure 
those inferior pairwise-count methods meet Condorcet's Criterion. But, when 
worded so that it works as we expect, CC assumes sincere voting. And how 
likely is sincere voting in a method that gives incentive for drastic 
falsilfication, as do Copeland and Margins Condorcet?

CC ignores strategy, assumes it doesn't exist. FBC & WDSC are about 
strategy, about the strategic needs that a method could create.  Approval 
meets those two more realistic criteria. IRV fails them.

Mike Ossipoff

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