[Election-Methods] rcv ala tournament

[Juho]

On Dec 29, 2007, at 10:53 , CLAY SHENTRUP wrote:

>> Seems like Rob Brown gave us a start on moving ahead.
>
> the best way to move ahead is to dump ordinal voting methods for
> cardinal ones.  approval voting is vastly simpler than all ranked
> methods.
>
> i don't know why we're still talking about ranked methods in this  
> day and age.

Simply since many if not most experts seem to feel that they are good  
if not best (for typical political single-winner elections).

This mail stream is about joining forces in defending all the good  
methods. I have no problem in forming also a joint team for  
supporting both rating and ranking based methods. But in this case  
I'd like to make it clear for what purpose and environment each  
method is good for.

In order to reach consensus on what Range is good for one could also  
approach it from two different angles. We could define it as two  
different methods.

Range(ratings) is a method where (most) voters are expected to give  
their sincere rankings. This wonderful method is at its best in non- 
competitive environments.

Range(ratings) could in theory also work in utopias where the current  
political arenas are replaced with some new softer ones. In real life  
some areas in life might also lose their competitive nature e.g. as a  
result of people becoming richer (no need to fight on some basic  
cheap stuff any more, just interest in picking the best candidate  
left), but these cases may be quite marginal.

Range(approval) is a method where voters are expected to vote as in  
Approval. Additionally voters are allowed to cast weak votes. This  
wonderful method works quite well also in competitive environments.

In (competitive) Range(approval) I would not recommend voters to cast  
weak votes unless they know what they are doing. It is not good if  
voters with less strong feelings cast weaker votes than voters that  
feel that they are always right and want to drive their opinions  
strongly. It is not good if "altruistic and cooperative" voters have  
less weight than the selfish ones. As a general rule I'd recommend  
all voters to use votes of same strength (one man one vote is a good  
basic rule in competitive democratic decision making).

Making a clear difference between Range(ratings) and Range(approval)  
is important when discussing the benefits of each. Too often I have  
seen approaches where people pick e.g. only the best parts of both  
approaches (and forget the non-working cases) and assume that they  
all are valid simultaneously.

Juho




	
	
		
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