[EM] Electoral Experimentation

[David L Wetzell]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Richard Fobes <ElectionMethods at VoteFair.org>
To: election-methods at electorama.com
Cc:
Date: Thu, 15 Dec 2011 12:39:23 -0800
Subject: Re: [EM] Electoral Experimentation
On 12/15/2011 12:15 PM, David L Wetzell wrote:
> dlw: Within the third parties themselves, there'd need to be used
> single-winner elections to determine their candidates/leaders/positions.
>   In these regards, there'd be great scope for experimentation with
> single-winner election rules, especially since they'd have no commitment
> to a particular single-winner election rule.

Fobes: You said that experimentation opportunities would be
"a good reason to strategically support IRV".
Presumably IRV would be used for both internal voting
"to determine their candidates/leaders/positions"
and for choosing candidates for public elections.

dlw: There'd be no need for such.  The point is that if there were many
LTPs, local third parties, they'd have their own rules and could use IRV[or
another alternative to FPTP] to choose which rules they'd use for internal
voting and the determination of their candidates in elections.

Why would IRV-chosen party leaders be motivated to try
any other voting method (for either internal or
candidate-selection use)?

dlw: Because it'd be the American forms of PR, not IRV, that would give the
LTPs license to win representation and to have more voice.  I said
"strategically support IRV for single-winner", not because it's a god-send
but because bickering endlessly about the best single-winner election rule
takes away from pushing for the aforementioned reform that would then bring
about many venues for electoral experimentation.  There's no good reason to
presuppose that these smaller parties would be beholden to IRV so as not to
consider other options.  And that is why it's worthwhile to put aside the
infinite number of other election rules and focus on getting Am forms of PR
plus IRV as key parts of the renewal of the US's democracy.

dlw

Richard Fobes
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