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

[Jameson Quinn]

2011/7/4 robert bristow-johnson <rbj at audioimagination.com>

>
> 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.
>

Have you seen the discussion of SODA? I think that, aside from momentum and
empirical data, it is at least as conceivable a real-world reform as IRV,
and a much better one from the point of view of results and incentives. The
basic aspects:
1. Ballot is very simple. In SODA, it's an approval ballot with only one
extra line (for a second write-in who can be the invalid candidate "do not
delegate"). For a PR system, I think that a 4-rating ballot ("delegate to",
"approve", "delegate on", "disapprove"; that is, a DYN ballot) would be
acceptable.
2. Delegation order is pre-announced, so you can be sure your ballot won't
go to someone you despise.
3. Delegation is entirely optional, though it is mighty convenient. For
those who do not delegate, they have some ability to give multiple votes,
though of course only one vote total per voter can count to a droop quota.

I understand that IRV will dominate SODA on the national agenda for at least
several years more, but as far as I can see, SODA is an excellent system
which doesn't have the stumbling blocks that a lot of other (better) systems
have. Specifically, it is like IRV in terms of being a less-radical change
from the point of view of an existing two-party plurality winner.

JQ
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