[EM] language/framing quibble

[rob brown]

On Mon, Sep 1, 2008 at 11:42 AM, Kristofer Munsterhjelm <
km-elmet at broadpark.no> wrote:

> One example I would use to argue that Plurality can swing in the direction
> of a minority is the 1987 South Korean election. The two democratic groups
> split the vote, giving the election to the general who supported an earlier
> coup.
>

Well, Plurality certainly *can* do a lot of things....it can elect a
completely illogical candidate, so it's not unexpected that there are
examples where it achieves any particular thing.  :)

But I would say that the voting blocks that are most consistantly favored
under plurality are those neither in the center nor on the extremes, but
those in the center of either of the two main opposing sides (especially in
an established system where parties have had time to form).  For instance in
the US, someone who is your "average republican" or your "average democrat"
is most favored, while the centrists as well as the extremists are
disfavored.

Condorcet methods are the closest, in my opinion, to giving everyone's vote
equal weight.  This does not mean "equal chance of electing one's first
choice candidate" though.  While the centrist voters get the honor of having
it most likely that their first choice is elected, those on the extremes
have the ability to move where the center is....so their vote counts just as
much as everyone else's.

(again, I use the example of "voting for a number" and selecting the median
as the model of perfect fairness --- with Condorcet methods coming the
closest to matching this level of fairness for single winner elections with
a finite number of discrete candidates)
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