[EM] Voting Systems Study of the League of Women Voters of Minnesota

[RLSuter at aol.com]

Will you please point out where in the study it says that "the
committee is in favor of IRV." I couldn't find any recommendations
at all. Futhermore, the summaries you quote are not summaries
of any committee's opinion. They are merely summaries of "the
most frequently cited pro and con statements made," and
some of the opinions cited in the summaries are debatable
or just plain wrong.

I suspect the comment about mathematicians in the summary re
Condorcet was derived from a statement from a book by Doug
Amy (one of the Center for Voting and Democracy's favorite
academic voting experts) that essentially dismissed Condorcet
as one of many mathematicians who have "dabbled" with
alternative voting systems. I found that comment, as well as Amy's
general discussion of both Condorcet and Approval voting, to
be astonishingly biased and condescending, coming from an
academic political science professor who claims to be an expert
and really ought to know much better. Condorcet was much more
than a mathematician. He was a pioneer political and judicial
theorist. He was also a serious politician who lost his life
in the French revolution because of the stands he took. In
addition to that, he was possibly the earliest enlightenment
period writer who strongly advocated political equality for
women. In any listing of history's most influential and
respected political philosophers, Condorcet would surely
rank in the top 50 if not much higher.

As for the comment that IRV "ensures majority rule," that
is just a patently absurd statement. It would ensure majority
rule so only if a majority were to agree prior to an election
to accept the IRV winner, but the same could be said of
any other voting system.

If you are an advocate of IRV, you are going to have to
support your position with better evidence than this.

-Ralph Suter



In a message dated 10/10/04 3:08:48 PM Eastern Daylight Time, 
election-methods-electorama.com-request at electorama.com writes:

<< Date: Sun, 10 Oct 2004 17:12:10 +0200
 From: Markus Schulze <markus.schulze at alumni.tu-berlin.de>
 Subject: [EM] Voting Systems Study of the League of Women Voters of
    Minnesota
 To: election-methods at electorama.com
 Message-ID: <4169514A.8688D2E8 at alumni.tu-berlin.de>
 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
 
 Hallo,
 
 I just read the Voting Systems Study of the League of
 Women Voters of Minnesota (2544 kB):
 http://www.lwvmn.org/LWVMNAlternativeVotingStudyReport.pdf
 
 The committee is in favor of IRV. In the summary, they
 write:
 
 > Condorcet Voting System (Voters rank candidates; winner
 > is the one who can top each of others in a series of
 > head-to-head contests)
 > * Allows voters to express preferences among candidates
 > * Considered by some mathematicians to best identify
 >   winner in three-way race
 > * May result in a tie that requires pre-election decision
 >   on how to break tie
 > * Is vulnerable to manipulation
 > * May be difficult for voters to understand
 >
 > Instant Runoff Voting System (Voters rank candidates;
 > votes for candidate with fewest firstchoice votes are
 > redistributed according to their second choices until
 > one candidate achieves a majority)
 > * Ensures majority rule
 > * Allows voters to express preferences among candidates
 > * Eliminates problems of spoiler candidates knocking off
 >   major candidates
 > * Eliminates need for run-off elections
 > * Does not meet mathematical requirement for monotonicity
 
 In short: IRV violates monotonicity, but it ensures majority
 rule and eliminates the need for run-off elections and it is
 spoiler-proof and immune to manipulation.
 
 Furthermore, in appendix 3 they argue that Condorcet requires
 a change of the constitution while IRV doesn't.
 
 Markus Schulze >>