[Election-Methods] Improved Approval Runoff

[Abd ul-Rahman Lomax]

At 12:30 PM 8/20/2007, Chris Benham wrote:
>And method which allows equal ranking and truncation is "Condorcet/Approval."
>
>Abd,
>Is  "And.." suppose to read  'Any...', or is there some missing 
>word?   As written, to the extent that it makes
>sense it is false.

Yes. Any.

>>The term "Approval" is somewhat misleading for the method, because 
>>a  vote does not necessarily represent any absolute "Approval" of 
>>the candidates, and some people have a reaction to the method based 
>>on an idea that it does.
>That is purely a secondary marketing issue. Perhaps you would like 
>to unilaterally change Approval's name?

We already have. Approval is now being marketed as "Count All the Votes."

You may think it secondary if you are only concerned about the 
theoretical properties of methods, but some of us are only interested 
in election methods from the point of view of improving politics and 
the process of government, as well as other practical uses of election methods.

Much argument about Approval hinges on some expectation that voters 
will "approve" of those they "approve." And not those that they do 
not. But a supporter of a third party candidate, here, with no hope 
of his favorite winning, may well choose to vote for the preferred 
major candidate in addition to his favorite. Does this mean that this 
voter "approves" of this candidate? You could argue that it does, but 
only by assuming, quite simply, that "approval" is an action, in this 
case, of choosing, which is not really the ordinary meaning. And,, 
since the ordinary meaning of approval, i.e., to hold a favorable 
opinion of, to consider that the actions of the one "approved" are 
beneficial, could mean that the voter does *not* approve of this 
candidate in any absolute sense, but only in comparison with the 
other frontrunner, and this preference might be relatively small. Do 
I prefer a quick poison or a slow one? If I make a choice, does this 
mean that I "approve" of it?

Absolutely, I have seen Approval as a voting method used in the real 
world where the vote meant to "accept." But this was not a 
competitive context, it was one where a group had a number of 
possible choices and needed to choose one only. An Approval polls was 
taken, the question was "which of these are acceptable to you?" And, 
indeed, the first preference of the majority (probably a 2/3 
majority}, was passed over. But not by the poll. The poll was not 
binding, it was not the act of decision. When it was apparent from 
the poll that there was a choice that all but one "accepted," the 
motion was made to make that nearly universal choice. And that motion 
passed unanimously. Apparently the single holdout in the Approval 
poll either abstained or changed her mind.

(This was a poll made in person, by show of hands. Under that 
situation, sequence matters. Everyone knows how everyone voted for 
the prior choices. It is entirely possible that the holdout revised 
her opinion based on a subsequent vote.... It is an error to suppose 
that people have some kind of fixed internal preference, our actual 
preferences do shift in response to the preferences of others. We are 
social animals.)

>>It's a vote, pure and simple. "Approval" is a method which allows
>>overvoting, or equal rating.
>It is, but is that supposed to be its definition? Maybe you are on 
>your way to changing Approval's definition.

The method is the method; that is, properly, an election method 
should not depend on what it is called, or the precise manner in 
which the process is described. You can describe Approval as it was 
originally described, that is, with a ballot instruction. However, 
ballot instructions which include something like "Vote for those you 
approve," are not neutral, they could shift the election results, and 
then we get all this stuff about how "strategic voters" are taking 
advantage of the poor "sincere voters." But that only occurs if the 
"sincere voters" are simply following instructions regarding "Approval."

If they understand that they are simply voting, that they are marking 
a ballot such that a vote is added to the total of a candidate, and 
that the candidate with the most votes wins, and that they may do 
what the ballot itself would allow them to do, which is to vote for 
more than one (I do not recall seeing a ballot instruction that 
informs voters that their vote will be discarded if they vote for 
more than one, and my suspicion is that some level of overvoting is 
from voters who think that the votes will be counted, even though 
what I *do* see on ballots is "Vote for One.")

The word "Approve" should not appear on the ballot unless some very 
specific purpose justifies it. Simply Approval does not have an 
"Approval cutoff." If the ballot is a ranked or range ballot, and 
approval cutoff has a meaning with the method, then I'd think it 
acceptable. With ordinary Count All the Votes, standard, basic 
Approval, the term is misleading, there is no Approval cutoff used by 
the method.

(The meaning I would assign to an approval cutoff is that by rating 
or ranking a candidate at or above the approval cutoff, the voter is 
indicating that the voter would ratify that result in a ratification 
vote. I've elsewhere argued that pure democracy is not satisfied 
unless an election result is ratified or "accepted." And, in this 
context, "approved" is an equivalent. But I dislike offering this 
choice, in fact. Ratifications should be explicit, single questions, 
Shall A be elected? I would make, to the extent practical, election 
process follow standard deliberative process, as used in direct 
democracies, where the report of the clerk as to election results is 
not, by itself, adequate to determine the outcome. In public 
elections here, it takes a formal declaration by the responsible 
election official to make a result binding, but in direct democracy, 
the assembly itself makes that determination.)