[Election-Methods] Partisan Politics

[Juho]

On Mar 7, 2008, at 0:03 , Fred Gohlke wrote:

> Good Afternoon, Juho
>
> (I just noticed that I have another message from you, in another area.
> I will copy it and respond as quickly as I can, probably tomorrow.   
> I'm
> inexpert at navigating this site, but learning.  flg)
>
> In the message I'm responding to, you raise several important issues.
>
> IMPROVEMENT
> You mentioned several reasons why improving our political system is an
> uphill battle.  I would add the complexity of human nature as another.
> Overcoming them is difficult, but "A trek of a thousand miles begins
> with a single step."  In my view, the first step is to seek  
> understanding.

I tend to think that often the understanding is also the most crucial  
step. I mean that after such understanding and model is found that it  
covers all aspects and players and can be accepted by all, then  
people tend to think that actually it is obvious and it is natural to  
follow the model. The practical implementation of the model is then  
just straight forward work.

> The forces that guided our political development over the past 200  
> years
> are clear enough.  So far, we've tended to think of them as  
> inevitable.
>   We've failed to examine them analytically for the purpose of
> deflecting the worst of them.  (I had the privilege of sitting in on a
> political science course last year.  It described many of the  
> blemishes
> in our political process, historically and present, but did not  
> address
> them from the perspective of learning to correct them.  Neither, to my
> dismay, did it encourage such an intellectual approach.)
>
> We did not reach our present situation by accident.  If we are to
> improve, we must learn to anticipate and inhibit the forces that
> derailed The Noble Experiment.  It will be a long, hard road, not  
> to be
> completed in my lifetime, but that is no excuse for not making the  
> first
> "... small steps forward."
>
> LARGE GROUPS
> You make the excellent point that, under the method I outlined, large
> groups will succeed better than small groups.  Warren Smith made the
> same point to me, privately.  Where you suggest partisan dominance, he
> used advanced math to show that, based on purely racial attitudes,
> whites would dominate blacks.  The rationale supporting some of  
> Smith's
> mathematical terms were obscure, but I don't doubt the conclusion.  I
> have no doubt the attitudes of the largest group of voters will  
> prevail.
>
> However, the group that prevails will not be party and will not be  
> race.
>   It will be society (at least, insofar as society is reflected in the
> electorate) ... and the most common attitude in society is a desire  
> for
> tranquility.

Note that also the current two-party system of the USA has similar  
characteristics. The society will be run by the representatives of  
the largest faction. One could say that in a two-party system the  
opinions of the parties are not fixed but must move to follow the  
median opinion of the voters. If party X loses several elections in a  
row due to some particular opinion, it must change that opinion to  
better reflect the opinion of the voters to get the required 51% of  
the votes (in sufficient number of states).

One alternative to allowing the largest faction to take control is to  
elect the representatives proportionally (and possibly also to use  
coalition governments instead of single party governments).

> Society is us.  All of us; our friends, relatives, co-workers,  
> neighbors
> and acquaintances.  We have partisan feelings, we are influenced by  
> our
> family, our race, our education, our national heritage, our age, our
> health and our status, but none of these are greater than the fact  
> that
> we are, in toto, decent, law-abiding people.  Society could not  
> exist if
> we were not.

Yes. I believe the level to which the citizens feel that the society  
is their own and tend to live in line with the ideal model is very  
important. Well working societies have high values, and low vales  
mean a non-working society. It is a question if people want to  
respect the rules of the society and see them as a set of rules that  
have been jointly agreed.

> This is the large group that will prevail; these are the "whites" in
> Smith's equations; these are the people whose attitudes will  
> triumph ...
> if they are given a voice and a choice.

A healthy society behaves like this. One must however watch the  
politicians so that they will not start driving their own personal  
interests. I mean that one should encourage the kind of behaviour you  
describe but one can not trust that the imperfect society would  
always take that route. Especially in politics the risks of  
corruption are not very far.

There are also risks in allowing some single group to take strong  
control. => Maybe better to include also the minority opinions in the  
process some way.

> GROUP SIZE and PERSUASION
> You suggested larger groups and fewer layers.  I am not averse to  
> such a
> change, but would like to describe the rationale for using a group  
> size
> of three.
>
> At the initial level, when the entire electorate meets for the first
> time to select one member of a their group to represent the other two,
> there will be three kinds of participants:  (1) those who do not  
> want to
> be selected, (2) those willing to be selected, and (3) those seeking
> selection.  In any group where all three participants do not want  
> to be
> selected, the triad will not make a selection and all three  
> participants
> will be eliminated.
>
> Thus, among the groups that actually make a selection, the people who
> are selected will either be people who want to be selected or  
> people who
> are willing to be selected.  This is not to say that each person  
> must be
> of one type or the other, but rather that each person will be  
> somewhere
> on the continuum from those willing to be selected to those wishing to
> be selected.
>
> For simplicity, we will assume that the desire to be selected is
> equivalent to a desire for public office and that the people we  
> mention
> as examples are at one end of the wish-willingness continuum or the
> other.  The reality is infinitely more complex but the results will
> differ only in degree from what we learn by thinking about the kind of
> people who are at the hypothetical poles.
>
> We must also note that the attitudes we've mentioned may not be  
> static.
>   Although, generally, a person seeking public office is unlikely to
> become a person willing to serve, a person willing to serve might be
> transformed into a person seeking public office:
>
> [If person-willing-to-serve (A) feels person-seeking-office (B) is  
> not a
> good choice, (A) may seek to persuade the group that (A) or (C) is a
> better choice.  Such an effort moves (A) closer to being a
> person-seeking-office because, if A will not support B, the chance  
> that
> A will be chosen increases.]
>
> Based on this assessment, we can say that people who advance to the  
> next
> level either persuaded the other members of their triad to select them
> or they relied on the other members to select them.  The difference is
> the extent to which they used persuasion to achieve selection.
>
> In a pyramiding process of the type under discussion, it is reasonable
> to think that active seekers of public office will succeed more
> frequently than passive ones.  Thus, after several iterations of the
> process, we can anticipate that each member of a triad will be a  
> person
> seeking public office.  Under such circumstances, the art of  
> persuasion
> assumes mounting importance.  Those making the selection want  
> desirable
> qualities in the person they choose.  Those seeking selection will try
> to persuade their peers they possess the qualities sought.
>
> When persuasion occurs between two people, it takes place as a  
> dialogue
> with one person attempting to persuade the other.  In such events,  
> both
> parties are free to participate in the process.  The person to be
> persuaded can question the persuader as to specific points and present
> alternative points about the topic under discussion.  In such
> circumstances, it is possible that the persuader will become the  
> persuaded.
>
> When persuasion involves multiple people, it occurs more as a  
> monologue
> with one person attempting to persuade the others.  The transition  
> from
> dialogue to monologue accelerates as the number of people to be
> persuaded increases.  The larger the number of people, the less free
> they are to participate in the process.  As the number of people to be
> persuaded grows, the individuals among them are progressively less  
> able
> to participate in the process.  They can not question the persuader as
> to specific points or present alternative points about the topic under
> discussion.  In such circumstances, it is impossible for the persuader
> to become the persuaded.
>
> Viewed in this light, we can say that when selecting public  
> officials, a
> system that encourages dialogue is preferable to one which relies on a
> monologue.  Discussion can best be encouraged by having fewer  
> people in
> the "session of persuasion".  Because of the need for a definitive
> decision, I believe the best group size to encourage active  
> involvement
> by all participants is three.  In working toward a functional system,
> other aspects of the matter are sure to arise.  Group sizes of 5,  
> or 7,
> or 9 may be found to offer more advantages.

This was a quite good justification. Definitely small groups and  
close contacts make it easier for many people to express their opinion.

Small groups may also have problems like strong individuals simply  
running over the less aggressive and less confident ones. A bigger  
group can also provide safety against strong individuals. (This leads  
me to think if systems where similar minded people would be allowed  
and encouraged to jointly form groups that represent them and then  
together present their viewpoint.)

It is also possible to try to improve the behaviour of the  
(potentially larger) groups (to avoid monologues and other strong  
individual related problems) by setting some clear rules and  
procedures for them.

In short, the method with groups of three has some clear advantages  
but there are also problems. Search of optimal parameters should  
continue.

One general comment. It is typical that people of category 3  
("seeking selection") are overrepresented in a political system  
(representatives and civil servants). I tend to think that a  
political system that would favour more category 2 candidates  
("willing to be selected") would be a happier one.

> REGIONALITY
> You wondered whether the concept would have a regional bias.  I  
> intended
> that it should.  Presumably, we would develop software to randomly
> assign voters to groups while preferring geographic proximity.  This
> offers the advantages you outline and causes the least disruption for
> the electorate.  It also supports the idea that the first fruits of  
> the
> process are officials for the local community.
>
> PARTISANSHIP
> You raise a couple of questions of partisanship; whether "... it is
> possible that the party influence will infiltrate the system from top
> down ..." and "... if there are some groupings/parties at the top  
> level,
> the candidates at one level below could make their affiliations  
> clear ..."
>
> To take the second first, there is no top level until the level below
> has made its choice.  There are, indeed, previously elected people  
> with
> partisan attitudes.  Candidates in the process might indicate their
> approval and support for those people.  If they do, the others in  
> their
> triad will decide for themselves whether they agree, and will make  
> their
> selections accordingly.  That is the purpose of the system.

One interesting property of the proposed system is that current top  
level representatives, even if very popular, have a high risk of not  
being re-elected. At any level two (rather randomly selected) persons  
can decide to elect someone else instead of this this possibly well  
known and popular person. I guess it is your intention to have some  
this type of randomness in the process. This certainly diminishes the  
party power (since traditional parties can be characterized as being  
a collection of and led by a set of well established representatives).

The need to categorize the representatives is still there and some  
new kind of party structure may well be established. Maybe the act  
that there may be a strong circulation of the representatives can be  
considered to be a positive property (if the old system is seen as  
too stagnant).

> As to the first, the matter is more open to challenge.  For my part, I
> think it will be incomparably more difficult for existing parties to
> "infiltrate" (or corrupt) the Active Democracy process than what we
> presently endure.
>
> In the first place, there is no infrastructure.  There is no
> organization or "fund raiser" to act as an intermediary for  
> corruption.

You define fund raising as a form of corruption. I agree that money  
easily corrupts the process. There may be also other means to get rid  
of excessive power of money (not necessarily requiring this  
particular method to be used).

If all selections are done in small groups that efficiently  
eliminates some forms of marketing (and thereby reduces the power of  
money). There may however be lots of positive and negative  
campaigning at party level. Even though the election in the small  
groups is quite random the statistical effect of general marketing  
must despite of this be significant.

>   Those who would peddle corruption can not do so en bloc as they do
> now; they must do it individually and directly.  When those they  
> seek to
> suborn have been chosen by their peers (at least in part) for their
> perceived integrity, approaching them will not be easy.
>
> When candidates don't have to "sell their soul" to a political party,
> when they owe their advancement to nothing but their own intellect and
> ability, I believe most of them will reject, and probably denounce,
> influence peddlers.

There must be some tendency to go in this direction. But on the other  
hand the candidates may still get also benefits from being affiliated  
with a major party. And the parties may be ready to adopt any "semi- 
randomly" elected new representatives in their ranks.

>   I don't doubt that we'll occasionally have a
> deceitful public official, but he'll be operating in a goldfish bowl.
> It won't be as easy to keep it hidden as it is now.
>
> THE LONG CHAIN
> The possibility that "... the highest level decision makers do not
> listen to the lowest level voters ..." need not come to pass: "The
> process is inherently bi-directional.  Because each elected official
> sits atop a pyramid of known electors, questions on specific issues  
> can
> easily be transmitted directly to and from the electors for the  
> guidance
> or instruction of the official."  The extent to which this  
> capability is
> enabled depends on the way the process is implemented.

Is the system expected to allow any representative to be changed at  
any time?

Being a "pawn" at the bottom of the pyramid may not give the voter a  
very good position to change his/her candidate at the top. Of course  
also in more traditional systems one single vote doesn't mean much.

> In terms of the length of time from the beginning of an election cycle
> through the multiple levels, we can say with certainty that it will  
> not
> be as long as the present two-year travesty.
>
> Wow!  That turned out to be more than I expected to write.  I'm not
> certain I've given an adequate response to the issues you raised, some
> of which were quite subtle.  I hope we can continue to examine these
> questions and that others will bring their expertise to bear.

Yes. The proposed method is at least a very interesting extreme set- 
up that presents a clear alternative to current methods. Good  
viewpoint for analysing also other methods. It is also possible to  
try to seek similar impacts on the political system also by using  
some other alternative techniques.

One of the biggest impacts that I see this method having on the  
current typical models in the more random nature of the election. The  
leading party members may well not be re-elected.

One key property of the method is also that it is not proportional  
but tends to favour the strongest opinions (it s possible that 90% of  
the representatives would be from one party (if there would still be  
two parties, or other two clear groupings) instead of the now typical  
51%-49% situation in the USA).

Juho

> Fred
>
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