[EM] Condocet with many candidates - two round elections considered

Peter Zbornik pzbornik at gmail.com
Wed Jun 16 06:34:42 PDT 2010


Dear all, dear Markus Schulze,

after having presented Condorcet elections to some people in the Czech green
party, the following question came up.
Condorcet elections might work with three candidates, but what about if
there are twenty of them, will the system work and elect the best candidate?

Q1: What would you answer for Condorcet elections in general and
Schulze-method elections in particular?
Q2: Specifically, would you recommend a two-round construct, i.e. the three
best candidates (or x best?) meet in the second round.
Q3: Would such a two-round system help to deal with the case of the "dark
horse" winning with long beat-paths and people being dissatisfied with the
election?
Q4: If yes, how many candidates should be in the second round and how should
they be selected (Schulze ranking?)?

One such mis-election with dissatisfied voters would be enough to discredit
Condorcet elections in our party and two-round elections might give an
additional sense of security for some voters in the face of a novel and
fairly complex election system. In the Czech republic we currently use
two-round elections.
However, if two round Condorcet elections bring no additional value, then
there is no need to complicate an elegant election system.

Thanks for your advice.

Best regards
Peter Zborník
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