[EM] Proxy-style hybrids with other voting methods

[Abd ul-Rahman Lomax]

At 08:53 PM 1/25/2010, Jameson Quinn wrote:

>I'd love to hear what others think of these proposals.

I think you are on the right track. Proxy systems introduce 
deliberative elements to amalgamation systems, which just has to make 
them more intelligent. They aren't terribly necessary when direct 
deliberation is possible, but with scale, direct processes become 
impossibly tedious, rapidly.

>  Personally, my favorite basis for a hybrid system is Bucklin with 
> equal-rankings and gaps allowed.

Which is almost what was used. Equal-rankings, in Duluth Bucklin, 
were allowed in third rank, and the tradition of preventing multiple 
"Favorites" was very strong. I wouldn't be horrified to see Bucklin 
implemented today with quite the same restriction, I just think it's 
stupid, it would do no harm, and some good.

>(Bucklin does poorly on criteria, but relatively well in practice. 
>Obviously, hybrid systems are never going to be the best on pure 
>criteria anyway.)

Right, because the criteria were designed to study single-ballot 
deterministic systems fed by pure preference data, equal ranking not 
allowed and not even considered of importance.

Thus the King of Criteria, the Condorcet Criterion, or its stronger 
relative, the Majority Criterion, are blatantly defective, as can be 
shown by real-world situations where, with completely sincere voting, 
they require a winner that every voter, once the votes are revealed, 
is very likely to consider a poor choice. Even though it is still 
their "personal favorite," it's a bad choice for the society, and 
they will know it, and would have to be pretty sick to insist on it. 
Quite simply, the vast majority of people wouldn't.

The Pizza election, three friends choosing a pizza. Two prefer 
Pepperoni, but will accept Mushroom, it's a decent choice for them. 
One is Jewish, can't eat Pepperoni, period, but prefers Mushroom. 
Mushroom must lose to Pepperoni, according to the Condorcet Criterion 
and the Majority Criterion. And it's a terrible choice for the group 
to make (assuming they must choose one pizza).

In a repeated ballot situation, ordinarily, the majority will accept 
the strong preference of a minority, as long as their own preference 
is weak. And this will show up -- shhh... big secret -- in 
differential turnout in a runoff election. It tests preference 
strength. The minority will have high motivation to turn out and 
vote, due to high preference strength, whereas the majority, by the 
terms of the problem, have low preference strength, they are actually 
going to be happy with either outcome.

Hence my prediction: as long as the votes weren't distorted in some 
way in the primary, a Range winner in a runoff with a Condorcet 
winner has a natural advantage, and will likely win. Absolutely, this 
would be invisible in the simulations that have been done, which 
think of a runoff as if it were simply a re-analysis of the ballots 
or underlying preferences. It's quite different, with different 
voters motivated to vote for different reasons in a different context.

But the runoff is important precisely because the Range results might 
be distorted, and the preference information better.

As a democratic principle, whenever the preference of a majority is 
being discarded, the majority should consent. Not necessarily the 
same majority, but a majority of the voters who choose to vote on the 
question. Those who care.