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

[Peter Zbornik]

Dear all,

if the single-winner president or the proportionally elected VPs
sometimes are not a member of the set of proportionally elected
council members (which is likely), then I would also like to ask you
for a proposal on the last "conservative" method, thus it would not be
optional, as I wrote below.  Thus, in all I ask you for three
proposals.

Motivation:
I can imagine that there could be a method, which elected the rest of
the council members after the the president and some or all vice
presidents have been elected using proportional ranking (see the
proposal of Markus Schulze for an example).

Such an election method would sacrifice a proportionality in the
council in order to elect the president unambigously and to achieve
proportionality between the president and some of the vice presidents
(at least the 1st VP).

The election of the rest of the council members would be done to
maximize the proportionality of the elected council, maybe by using a
modified version of STV, where the pre-elected president and vice
presidents would be considered elected to the council at the start of
the STV election, using the same ballots as for the  proportional
ranking election. Less important VPs (like for instance a fourth VP),
would be elected from the council.

Thus, the rest of the council members would be elected in such a way,
that the council would be as much proportional as possible given the
pre-elected P and VPs.

The advantage of this method is, that there would be no ambiguity
relating to the legitimacy of the elected president and the most
important VPs.

What methods would you recommend for this scenario?

Would there be a software that could be able to handle this problem
(possibly after some slight modification)?

I think the scenario above (i.e.first proportional ordering of P and
some VPs, then balancing election of the rest of the council to
achieve proportionality in the council and finally possibly electing
some less important VPs from the elected council) is the variant which
would come closest to the way the elections are done in our party
today, while attaining proportionality.

Right now the scenario above seems to be the optimal solution, which I
would like propose to the party.

 It wasn't easy to arrive to the model above, but now I think the
problem is well-defined.

Best regards
Peter Zbornik

2010/4/29, Peter Zbornik <pzbornik at gmail.com>:
> 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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>>>
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