[Election-Methods] Local representation

[Juho]

On Jul 18, 2008, at 1:34 , James Gilmour wrote:


> Juho  > Sent: Thursday, July 17, 2008 9:18 PM
>> I think already the basic open list provides a quite strong link
>> between candidates and voters.
>
> Yes, it is certainly much stronger than with closed-list.  But see  
> next proviso.
>
>
>> Voters will decide which candidates
>> will be elected, not the party (this is an important detail).
>
> This will be true only when there is no facility to cast a "party  
> vote" rather than a vote for a named candidate.  Some (many?
> most?) open-list systems allow the "party vote" option, when such  
> votes are allocated to candidates in the order the party ranked
> the list.  Experience shows that where this option is provided it  
> is used by large numbers of voters and so negates the purpose of
> the open list..

I'm used to one where I can't vote for parties (and there is no party  
preference order of the candidates). I don't know how common that is.

I know there are some methods that are more or less closed party  
lists but where voters can also deviate from the given order and vote  
for a candidate. The method may even require certain threshold amount  
of votes to override the party list order.

It would be also possible to allow votes to a party but to determine  
the winners using the open list style, i.e. without a party given  
preference order.

>
>
>> (Extensions are needed to provide proportionality between different
>> subgroups of the party.)
>
> Now you have made open-list party-list MUCH more complicated.  The  
> most effective way of doing this is to allow transfers of votes
> among candidates within each party's list.  But then you are so  
> close to proper STV-PR that you might as well go all the way and
> allow the voter full freedom to mark the preferences in any order  
> he or she wishes, not just within one party list.  (But NO option
> for "above-the-line" voting.)

The simplest tree based open method would be really simple. Just vote  
for one of the candidates; the vote will be inherited by a small  
group, by a bigger group, by a party, and by a party alliance. Voters  
need not even know that the new system is somehow different from the  
old one. The sub-groups and parties may be shown as nested in the  
public posters that list all the candidates.

Combining the tree style open list and STV-PR voting styles may be  
helpful to the voters since it allows a default inheritance order to  
be used also for short votes (=> easy voting for maybe most voters).  
Another benefit is that one need not list all the members of the  
groups and the party (naming one's favourite candidate is enough).

(Actually in STV it is sufficient to list one's favourite candidates  
starting from the best ones and continuing until one is certain that  
some of them will be elected, and then a bit further to guarantee  
that also the possible fractions of the vote will not be lost.)

One problem (based on your comment on party votes) is that if groups  
and parties can be named (in order to determine some exceptional  
order of inheritance), then the voters either can also vote for  
parties without voting for a single candidate or else we need to ban  
votes that vote for groups/parties only. Maybe votes to parties would  
however be ok (based on the discussion above) as long as there is not  
party given preference order of the candidates that would be followed.

Juho


>
> James
>
> No virus found in this outgoing message.
> Checked by AVG.
> Version: 7.5.526 / Virus Database: 270.5.0/1557 - Release Date:  
> 17/07/2008 05:36
>
>
> ----
> Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for  
> list info


		
___________________________________________________________ 
Try the all-new Yahoo! Mail. "The New Version is radically easier to use" – The Wall Street Journal 
http://uk.docs.yahoo.com/nowyoucan.html