[EM] sortition/random legislature Was: Re: language/framing quibble

[Raph Frank]

On Thu, Sep 11, 2008 at 8:10 PM, Aaron Armitage
<eutychus_slept at yahoo.com> wrote:
> What about
>> one of the
>>  the proposed random ballot rules, where if there is
>> consensus, a
>>  specific candidate wins.  However, if that doesn't
>> work, the winner is
>>  random.
>>
>
> I'm not sure I understand. If everyone votes for the same person, any
> random ballot will be a vote for him. What point is there in having a
> special consensus rule when that the usual rule will always give the same
> result as the special one?

Sorry, I meant some of the proposals by forest simmons.

They often have the form that if more than say 70% of the people agree
on a compromise candidate, then that candidate gets elected with near
certainty.  Otherwise, it is a random ballot.

> As far as I'm aware, the only community that uses random ballot elections
> are the Amish, who use it for choosing bishops. The whole point is prevent
> themselves from being actors in governing themselves, because they
> consider that God's role.

Interesting.  However, I am sure that they mean that by using
randomness, God, in effect, picks his bishops.

>
> If this is so there would no longer be a public opinion, which would mean
> that the assembly could not accurately reflect public opinion.
>

It reflects the opinion the public would have if they actually sat
down and thought about the issues.


>> A random
>>  legislature would not have to do any convincing.
>>
>
> Why would it need to?
>

It wouldn't, as I said.

The point is that a normal legislature does.  We agree on this point I think :).

However, the random legislature might still need to do some
convincing, especially, if it wants the next legislature to continue
the policy.

Also, they might fare better as they would be seen as 'one of us' by
more of the public.

> I would imagine a legislator who chose to make a career of it would be in
> office almost permanently once he passed his first re-election. You can't
> beat something with nothing. Under sortition, party politics becomes
> meaningless, so a legislator running for re-election would have no
> opposition party.

True, there would be nobody to lead the opposition.

However, the vote is just yes/no vote, but maybe voters would feel
better the devil you know.

OTOH, if normally the random choices turn out well, then maybe they
would roll the dice.

> At most there would be a local ad hoc opposition. Even
> with a national party on the other side incumbents have a 90% re-election
> rate; a major part of that is the fact that a candidate has to be a good
> fit for the district to get elected in the first place, and he's likely to
> remain a good fit. But after the first re-election a legislator chosen by
> sortition is probably also a good fit, and after the first test I would
> expect re-election rates to be even higher.
>
> My point here is that sortition has little or no advantage over elections
> in terms of preventing corruption. I'm not saying it actually has a
> disadvantage, just no advantage.

The advantage is that the person is less likely to be one who is power
seeking.  Ofc, the ones that remain would be 'power keeping', or
perhaps just publicly spirited.