[EM] Asset Voting from EM archives

[Abd ul-Rahman Lomax]

I came across this:

http://lists.electorama.com/htdig.cgi/election-methods-electorama.com/2002-December/008919.html

>Date: Mon, 2 Dec 2002 14:28:47 -0800 (PST)
>From: Forest Simmons <<mailto:fsimmons at pcc.edu>fsimmons@[...]>
>
>Subject: Candidate Proxy Methods
>
>Dear [his correspondent, and he forwarded the mail to the EM list],
>
>I would like your feedback on the following minimal voting method reform
>proposal:
>
>The method is an example of a "Candidate Proxy" method.  If no candidate
>gets a full majority of the votes, then each candidate represents his/her
>supporters in an "Election Completion Convention" in which an "Election
>Completion Procedure" is carried out by the candidates.

Follows is a description of what is essentially single-winner Asset 
Voting, with only one vote allowed. Of course, it's a small step 
beyond that to interpret overvotes as assigning fractional votes to 
multiple candidates, though this complicates the counting (a little, 
not a lot) and is not essential in my view.

And it is likewise a relatively small step to use Asset for 
multiwinner elections to form a fully proportional assembly that 
could self-assemble with floating, overlapping "districts." (Why 
would there be districts at all? Well, precinct vote counts are 
available, and candidates could reassign votes in precinct blocks to 
create seats grouping proximate precincts, where there are enough 
votes. Yet there may also be some seats which would be state-wide.)

I also find much earlier in the EM archive, back in 1997, discussion 
of what was called Proxy STV. This was a form of delegable proxy, 
because the assembly members elected have variable voting power. I'm 
not sure -- I find it difficult to search that archive -- but it does 
not seem to have been realized that with a proxy assembly, it's 
possible to bypass most of the election method and proceed straight 
to voluntary assembly of votes, thus avoiding some of the hazards 
that caused much concern back in this days, the bete noir of some 
individual ending up with a majority of votes. It is highly unlikely 
that an electorate would assign a majority of votes to an individual; 
but it would be easy to set a cap well below the hazard level, and my 
guess is that a significant cap would never be approached in 
practice. Once people can freely choose representatives, they are 
hardly likely to all fall upon the same person as ideal!

(Indeed, that would, in a sense, represent the election of a king, 
not of a representative, because a representative is a communications 
link, not an officer, as such. The *duty* of the representative is to 
represent, which requires continuous communication, which requires 
that it take place at some level well below that of the entirety.)