[EM] Re: majority rule criteria--alternative nomenclature

[James Green-Armytage]

I basically agree with Paul's post. Different voting methods are
appropriate in different situations. In my January 9 post "majority rule
criteria", my purpose wasn't to say that approval voting is bad (although
my choice of a category name might have carried that implication). My
purpose was to point out that approval shouldn't be understood as a
majority rule method. 

In some voting situations, majority rule is not necessarily the goal, and
so approval can potentially be the most appropriate method. In other
voting situations (such as elections for government executives), majority
rule is very important, and so approval voting can be problematic, and is
generally less useful than pairwise methods. Perhaps it is also less
appropriate for this purpose than IRV methods that allow equal rankings,
although this may be an interesting topic to debate. However, I believe
that approval is more useful for executive elections than plurality (which
also shouldn't be understood as a majority rule method), and so if it's
just a question of approval vs. plurality, I'll surely choose approval.

Sincerely,
James

>This is what I've suggested before - there is a "right" method for the
>right
>context. A board meeting is like us saying at the end of a happy hour
>"well,
>where should we meet next week?" Joe suggests Applebee's, because it is
>close to home for Joe. If no one disagrees, it's an "approval vote". If
>someone says "How about Friday's instead", now there are two options, and
>in
>any case the venue for the next drinking bout is subject to an "approval"
>style election. 
>
>But there's an important context in the board-meeting and happy-hour
>scheduling problem. Each member has veto power. The board can't "approve"
>a
>meeting date/time that one required member can't attend because of a
>conflict, and the happy-hour crowd will ask for another alternative if a
>popular member of the group says "well, my ex-wife is the barmaid at that
>Applebees so I won't go there even if you do."
>
>Approval works in that kind of interactive environment, when iterated to
>achieve maximum approval. In fact, in the board-meeting case, what is
>desired is unanimity, not majority approval.
>
>