[EM] Proportional election method needed for the Czech Green party - Council elections

[Peter Zbornik]

On Thu, Apr 29, 2010 at 2:45 AM, Juho <juho4880 at yahoo.co.uk> wrote:

>   On Apr 28, 2010, at 9:19 PM, Peter Zbornik wrote:
>
>  Hello,
>
> I have some catching up to do here.
> I need to think more about some of the different methods and the proposals
> I have gotten.
> Some of the methods are new to me.
> As I am a layman it takes time to understand them.
>
> Condorcet methods have not been used in politics yet, I think.
> Are there by any chance other methods to elect centrist presidents?
>
>
> The most common single-winner methods (plurality, top-two runoff, IRV) are
> known not to be "centrist oriented". For example in the quite common set-up
> where we have two extremists and one centrist with slightly less support
> they all elect one of the "extremists".
>
> Approval and Condorcet are more centrist oriented. They are both also old
> and well tested methods although they have not been widely used in public
> political elections.
>
> One problem with Approval (that was not mentioned yet) is the limited
> expressive power of the Approval vote and resulting problems in choosing the
> right strategy, e.g. when there are three leading candidates and one should
> approve either one or two of them. That is problematic e.g when left wing
> has 2 candidates and is is bigger than right wing that has 1 candidate. (In
> Approval voters are generally assumed to vote strategically and not just
> sincerely list candidates that they consider "approvable".)
>
>  If I have understood the discussion correctly, you are still in draft
> phase.
>
>
> Many of the presented drafts can be quickly made into concrete and exact
> proposals. Some of the used components are more mature / well tested than
> others. There are some details left to decide, e.g. which STV variant (/
> which proportional method) or which Condorcet variant (/ which single-winner
> method) to use.
>
>  When some of you feel you have a good proposal at hand in this
> discussion, feel free to summarize and put forward a draft.
>
>
> I'm trying t listen to you to understand which one of the proposals would
> be the best for your needs :-). Now my understanding is that you still want
> all the listed requirements to be met and you want to use as "well tested"
> (and simple/explainable) methods as possible.
>
Yes, the requirements are set.
People have to understand what they are voting about, if they are to support
the method.
The people who like the majoritarian system can be expected to spread FUD
(fear uncertainty doubt).
It has at least to be a method in use in some organizations.
Maybe I shouldn't have excluded Schulze STV right away, since it is in use
at some places.


>  Are you btw ok with the idea of limiting the choice of P+VPs to the
> (already elected of simultaneously elected) council members?
>
Yes as one variant

>
>
> Using the same ballots with different vote counting techniques seems like
> quite an elegant and interesting solution.
> I never thought of that possibility.
> If more than one ballot is to be used, then I prefer to having the P and
> VP elected before the councilmembers.
>
>
> There is a small problem here. If one elects the P and VPs first, then the
> voters may not give the already elected P+VPs any votes in the second
> (council) round for strategic reasons (or maybe they are not even candidates
> there any more but considered "already elected"), and as a result
> the groupings of P and VPs would be over-represented in the council. This is
> not ok if you want the council (that includes P+VPs) to be proportional.
> (For this reason my first draft used the same ballots for all elections and
> the second draft elected the council first and P+VPs among the council
> members only after that.)
>
>
> Just to avoid misunderstandings:
> The president is the party leader as in most political parties around the
> world.
> He is the main guy simply, the person appearing on television etc., the one
> people know best in the streets.
> The president also chairs the meetings of the national council (sometimes I
> have used the term "board", the meaning is the same in this context).
> Think Gordon Brown or Angela Merkel, small scale :o)
> We have discussed splitting the external and internal funcions of the
> president, but it is not politically feasible to do.
>
>
> Two separate jobs then, and someone might be competent for one job and
> someone else for the other. This would make the election process more
> complex. The simplest approach would be to elect these two persons among the
> council members in two separate elections and forget proportionality with
> respect to these two jobs. VPs could still be elected proportionally (but
> they could be close to the two Ps => the set of Ps+VPs is not fully
> proportional).
>
>  It is neither feasible to change the role of the president to be a
> stricly internal guy or to have him elected by the council.
> The president has to be elected by the delegates as is the case today, if
> the proposal should have a chance to pass.
>
>
> This should be ok. (No limitations on who can vote although in some
> scenarios the set of candidates must be limited to the already elected (or
> simultaneously elected) council members.)
>
>
> There was some discussion on if it is ok to elect a variable number of VPs
> (exact number not known beforehand) or if it is more acceptable to modify
> the traditional methods a bit (an "innovative" addition).
>
Well normally, the VPs are variable and are not regulated by the party
stautes, thus not regulated by any method which should be specified in the
statutes.


>  The option of allowing some deviation from full proportionality in the
> Ps+VPs set (while the council would still be fully proportional) is one more
> alternative to consider (this would keep the methods bit
>
  more traditional / less "innovative").
>
>The rule of electing a compromise president may in some cases distort the
proportionality a bit anyway ->(in all scenarios), but the most common case
(if we allow extra deviation) would probably be one where >one of the VPs
would be close to the P, giving that section double-representation in the
P+VPs set (but >not in the council). You may have to pick one of these
problems :-), a varying number of VPs, some >innovativeness in one of the
methods, some (more) distortion in the P+VPs set proportionality, or maybe
>some other new (slightly problematic) solution.

It is indeed appropriate, that at least the first VP is from the "opposite
side".
This gives the party peace and quiet in the party and appropriate
"balance/division of powers".
Maybe one might argue, that an election method without this "balance of
power" is not truly proportional, since not all council members are equal.
I would personally prefer complete proportionality, but I am not sure how it
would be greeted.

On the other hand, a representative council would be a vast improvement even
with non-proportionality in the P an VP.

Just to comment on the competitiveness in the party. I would say it is
pretty high. That is why we have the infighting going on. I am not able to
quantify hovever :o)

So I guess we would have two-three proposals in play:
1. optimal with proportionally elected P and VPs after council elections,
2. "traditional" (without proportionality in the P. and VPs. set) elected
after council elections.
3. (optional) "conservative" (preserving the order of election today)
- elect the P. and the VPs (either one-by one or together or first P and VPs
together), Then elect the rest of the council members - using a method which
is not overly complicated, while possibly sacrificing proportionality

I think it is good to have several variants, in order to check them with
some other members before proposing one specific model.

>This might already get too complex, so maybe your proposal to propose some
complete solutions to >the problem (and list their benefits and problems)
after this discussion (that hopefully clarifies the >requirements) could be
the simplest way forward.
I aggree, lets not make it overly complex and let us round up the discussion
with some specific proposals.
A brand new method, however promising, would first need to be tested and
evaluated using some real-life ballots, so I couldn't propose it to be sent
right into the statutes.
I guess that is standard when introducing any new "technology", to
have alpha and beta tests.
Those of you, who have sent me recommendations of methods only in private,
please send your specific proposals publicly.

I don't know if there is a "standard public database" of real ranked-order
or range ballots on which the different methods could be tested.
Such a database exists in the data-mining field:
http://www.kdnuggets.com/datasets/
Maybe that could be something to consider for benchmark purposes.

Maybe we could test some of the more "innovative" methods in the party on
real ballots.
This would allow us to evaluate.
Such a test would need to be consulted with the party first and it would
take some time.

A motivation why PR systems are better to use in organizations than majority
systems, might be of help.

I am overwhelmed of the interest in this request.
I quite didn't expect such response, so thanks.
Please do not have too high hopes on me, it might as well end up that in the
end, it will be decided to leave things as they are.


>
> Juho
>
>
>
>  The vice president's are ordered first and second and third. The number
> of VP chan vary. The VP are the ones who stand in for the president or party
> leader (in that order).
> The president and the vice presidents are all member of the board, which
> currently has seven members.
>
> Best regards
> Peter Zborník
>
> On 4/28/10, Jonathan Lundell <jlundell at pobox.com> wrote:
>>
>> On Apr 28, 2010, at 7:34 AM, Raph Frank wrote:
>>
>> > On Wed, Apr 28, 2010 at 4:47 AM, Juho <juho4880 at yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
>> >> You assume that there is only one VP.
>> >
>> > Well, if more than 1 VP is possible, then the election could be
>> >
>> > - Elect council with PR-STV
>> > - The condorcet winner (only including the councillors) is President
>> > - Elect 2 of the councilors as VPs using PR-STV
>> >
>> > However, there is still the question of what exactly the VPs and
>> > President is supposed to do.
>> >
>> > If they are to chair council meetings, then it is better to just elect
>> them.
>> >
>> >> We could have also two and keep track
>> >> of which members are elected first, second and third.
>> >
>> > I still disagree with using order of election in a PR-STV election.
>> > It provides an additional incentive for dishonest rankings.
>>
>> It also encourages strategic nominations. The whole idea of using
>> order-of-election in STV for *anything* should be drowned in a bathtub ASAP.
>>
>> >
>> > It would have most of the same problems that plurality has where you
>> > need to vote for one of the top-2.
>>
>>
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