[Election-Methods] Fwd: FYI - FairVote MN Responds to Lawsuit Against IRV

[Juho Laatu]

> I have to say that I like the Condorcet method better than IRV because
> it does seem to treat the ballots equally - as long as voters vote for
> the same number of candidates - but I still don't like it as much as a
> system that weights a voter's first choice more than a voter's second
> choice, and so forth.

Condocet methods do not put any additional weight on first position  
on the ballot. Vote Gore>Bush>Paul>Nader is considered to be equally  
strong in saying "Gore is better than Bush" than e.g. vote  
Nader>Paul>Gore>Bush.

With votes
25: A>E>B=C=D
25: B>E>A=C=D
25: C>E>A=B=D
25: D>E>A=B=C
Condorcet methods elect E (since E would win any of the others 75-25  
in a pairwise comparison). E didn't have a single first place  
supporter but many obviously considered E to be a good compromise. Is  
this ok to you?

Condorcet methods simply collect the pairwise preferences from the  
ballots and base the decision on that data (without any potentially  
unfair elimination rounds). Putting more weight on the first  
preferences is not used, mainly since it would then be more  
problematic to keep the method sufficiently strategy free (=voters  
can now quite safely mark their sincere preferences on the ballot).

Juho