[EM] Proportional Representation Systems I'd Support

[Raph Frank]

On Fri, Mar 26, 2010 at 6:41 PM, Abd ul-Rahman Lomax
<abd at lomaxdesign.com> wrote:
> You can't hold a "runoff election," and here is why: Some voters already got
> their candidate. A runoff under these conditions has no way of knowing who
> "won" and who didn't.

The multi-seat equivalent of top-2 runoff could be something like

Round 1:

Run the election using the PR-STV rules, but only transfer surpluses

If N candidates reach the Droop quota, then those are the winners

If not, the top N+1 candidates proceed to the runoff

Note: anyone who has surplus transferred is guaranteed to be one of the top N+1

Round 2: Run off

Elect N of the N+1 candidates using PR-STV

Since there are only N+1 candidates, only the surplus transfers would be needed

It would have be called top-N+1 runoff or something.

A possible problem would be that a candidate elected in round 1 might
end up being the one eliminated in round 2.  However, that just means
that the voters changed their minds when the debate focussed on the
front runners.

Another option would be to drop the surplus transfers, so

Round 1:

Vote for 1 candidate

The top N+1 candidates make it to the runoff

Round 2:  Runoff

Vote for 1 candidate

All except the weakest candidate get a seat.


This is less complex, but not as fair as transferring the surpluses.