[EM] What's wrong with the party list system?

[robert bristow-johnson]

On Jul 4, 2011, at 12:28 PM, Jameson Quinn wrote:

>
>
> 2011/7/4 James Gilmour <jgilmour at globalnet.co.uk>
> Jameson Quinn > Sent: Monday, July 04, 2011 5:03 PM
> > As I said in my last message, asset-like systems can let you
> > have your cake and eat it, if you trust your favorite
> > candidate to agree with you in ranking other candidates. This
> > is fundamentally different from trusting your party, because
> > your "favorite candidate" in asset-like systems could, in
> > principle, be arbitrarily close to you - even BE you, if
> > you're willing to give up vote anonymity, and if the system
> > allows this extreme. Most systems will put some limits on
> > this, but still, they are far closer to this extreme than any
> > party list system. Also, there is no need to stay within the
> > arbitrary bounds of any party; a candidate can have
> > affinities based on ideology, so candidates at the fringes of
> > their party (including the centrist fringes) have full freedom.
>
> I am a campaigner for practical reform of voting systems and I do  
> not think an asset system or asset-like system will be acceptable
> for partisan public elections  -  certainly not here in the UK.  And  
> I see nothing in US or Canadian politics to make me think such
> a system might be any more acceptable there.
>
> I disagree, if the asset-like transfers were pre-announced and  
> optional to the voter. That is, no "smoke-filled room" after the  
> election; everything is there on the ballot. This still leaves a  
> broad array of possible ballot formats/complexities and transfer/ 
> assignment rules.


being that we, in the US, are still struggling with institutions like  
the "Electoral College" (a term not found in the code that instituted  
it), plurality (a.k.a. "simple majority"), and the occasional delayed  
runoff, even if i saw asset voting as a reform, i cannot see it  
getting anywhere in the US.  only a handful of jurisdictions have a  
ranked ballot (and these elections are all decided by IRV rules, no  
government yet uses Condorcet for any public election) and,  
unfortunately from my POV, the ranked ballot is declining in use.  we  
can't even get simple reforms enacted in law, how could we get  
something as completely different as asset voting.

i believe that asset voting will never catch on, first because it's at  
least as complex as IRV which is oft rejected because of complexity,  
and second, at least with IRV (as well as in delayed runoffs), the  
voter directly controls their contingency vote, whereas in asset, they  
do not have independent control of it.

--

r b-j                  rbj at audioimagination.com

"Imagination is more important than knowledge."