[EM] approval strategy

[Dave Ketchum]

Below I will talk of "Ranked" rather then IRV, for it would be rare, if 
ever, that strategists could plan on voting fitting one of the 
distributions for which Condorcet (IRR) awards a different winner than IRV.

Quoting 'Approval *is* considerably simpler than IRV' from below, I have 
to choke.  While ranking and Approval each permit me to approve of more 
than one candidate, placing those not rejected in order for ranking is 
simpler (and uses information I need for either method) than deciding the 
Approval boundary between approving as if equally liked and rejecting as 
if completely unliked.

Too often we write of "lesser of two evils" as if the topic is a constant 
pair of parties.  Even NYS election law is smarter, defining the major 
parties by attributes, and not needing amending if new parties take their 
turn.

Also, look back 150 years and see that the Whigs nominated a couple US 
Presidents.  Then the Republicans came out of the woodwork and have been 
major since then.  It is proper for new parties to replace old - so I 
claim it is voting methods business to tolerate change, but to 
neither hurry nor impede it.

On Tue, 18 Jan 2005 22:35:26 -0800 Russ Paielli wrote:

> Russ Paielli 6049awj02-at-sneakemail.com |EMlist| wrote:
> 
>> Voter strategy in Approval will be simple at first, but it could 
>> become very difficult later. Simple formulas are nice, but they cannot 
>> resolve the dilemma that voters could eventually face.
>>
>> Let's say that Approval has just been adopted. Well, Greens will vote 
>> for their Green candidate plus the Democrat and everyone else they 
>> prefer to the Democrat. That's the easy part.
>>
>> But now let's say that Approval has been in use for several election 
>> cycles, and the Green is starting to catch up to the Democrat. Well, 
>> the Green Party will certainly urge their supporters to drop their 
>> vote for that pesky Democrat. But if they take the advice, they risk 
>> handing the election over to the Republicans, of course.
> 
> 
> I'm replying to myself because I would like to expand on the point I was 
> making.
> 
> A couple of proposals were made to alleviate the voting dilemma I 
> pointed out above. I did not reply to them because I honestly don't know 
> if they will work or not. I do know, however, that they compromise the 
> ultra-simplicity of Approval, which will make them harder to get 
> adopted. That certainly does not mean they are not worth discussing, 
> just that I'd like to focus on Approval and IRV for now.
> 
> At ElectionMethods.org I wrote an article on IRV that attempts to 
> explain its deficiencies. It says that IRV works fine until a third 
> party becomes truly competitive, at which point it more or less breaks 
> down. The voters will sense that and will not let the situation get to 
> that point. Many minor-party supporters will insincerely vote the 
> "lesser of two evils" as their top pick, and we will be more or less in 
> the same situation as with plurality, except that the effect of 
> small-percentage spoilers (e.g., Nader 2000) will be removed.

As I write above, minor parties can, and should be allowed to, grow when 
they deserve this.
> 
> Well, call me slow, but I am starting to realize that Approval has the 
> very same problem. As soon as a third party starts truly competing, 
> supporters of that party must decide when to drop their vote for the 
> "lesser of two evils." It's basically the same decision they must 
> ultimately make in IRV as to when to finally take the plunge and put 
> their real party at the top of the list.

This is less of a headache with ranking than with Approval.  Greens can 
happily rank Democrats second without considering current competition status.
> 
> So is Approval really any better than IRV? Well, Approval *is* 
> considerably simpler than IRV, which a major factor for public 
> acceptability. And it *is* monotonic, which obviously desirable. And it 
> is "summable," which greatly simplifies implementation and reduces 
> security risks. Approval clearly has a lot going for it over IRV. But 
> when push comes to shove, how effective will it really be at giving 
> "minor" parties a chance to actually get elected?

Counting votes is more complex with ranking than with Approval - but 
experts get paid to deal with the complexity - voters only deal with 
filling out ballots.

If I understand "summable", IRR qualifies - here first counting step is 
to restate the vote in each ballot as an array, with all the arrays added 
to get total vote.

Ranking can help minor parties, for voters risk less penalties for simply 
voting their desires.  IRR's arrays help understand competitive liking, 
which can lead to smarter responses.
> 
> If Approval is ever adopted, prepare for some irate voters who pull back 
> too early on their vote for the "lesser of two evils" and have it 
> backfire on them. After they get burned on that one, many of them will 
> go back to their old ways and the duopoly could be back as strong as 
> ever. Or so it seems to me. Am I wrong?

Agreed - which is why I push for going directly to IRR.
> 
> --Russ

-- 
  davek at clarityconnect.com    people.clarityconnect.com/webpages3/davek
  Dave Ketchum   108 Halstead Ave, Owego, NY  13827-1708   607-687-5026
            Do to no one what you would not want done to you.
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