[EM] IRV variant

MIKE OSSIPOFF nkklrp at hotmail.com
Mon Nov 7 11:24:49 PST 2011



Robert:

I'd said:

> I've watched someone vote in a rank-balloting presidential mock 
> election. Though she
> prefers Nader's policies to those of the Democrats, she ranked all of 
> the Democrats
> over Nader.

You replied:

it depends on how the ranked ballots are tabulated. 

[endquote]

Quite. 

Some rank-counts meet FBC and some don't. Among the full-rankings methods, 
MDDA, ABucklin and MDD, ABucklin meet FBC. No Condorcet's Criterion complying
method can meet FBC.

You continued:

i don't see much 
advantage to burying (let alone betraying) your favorite candidate in an 
election using ranked-choice ballot if the method is Condorcet and 
anything approximating non-pathological and non-bizarre circumstances 
exist.  

[endquote]

Most here wouldn't. But I'm more concerned about what the usual lesser-of-2-evils voter
will feel need to do. People are used to lesser-of-2-evils voting as a fact of life. To 
assure someone that they needn't bury their favorite to help a lesser-evil, it's necessary
to tell them that it's quite impossible for a lesser-evil to be helped in that way. 
Hence the need for FBC complying methods in the U.S.

With any Condorcet's Criterion complying method, a voter can help a needed compromise win by
burying hir favorite, thereby avoiding the election of a greater-evil.

Yes, it's a rare exceptional scenario. It never bothered voters in our EM presidential mock
elections. But, for many LO2E voters, our timid electorate, it's necessary to give absolute
assurance that favorite burial is _never_ needed and never helpful in electing a lesser-evil.

You wrote:

so Nader loses and her second choice counts.

[endquote]

But maybe some Democrat can be saved (and the election of Palin averted) by making hir the CW,
by helping hir to beat Nader, by ranking hir over Nader. Maybe the number of voters trying to help
hir against Nader are few enough that mere equal ranking won't do it, and it's necessary to vote 
Democrat over Nader.

That can happen in any Condorcet's Criterion complying method.


 >
> FBC is essential for public elections.

You replied:

all that is saying is that we would like to get rid of the burden of the 
most common (in my opinion) voting tactic (i think they call it 
"compromising").

[endquote]

That word is an understatement. I call it "favorite-burial". Yes, it's necessary to get
rid of any possible need for that.

You continued:

that was the whole point in adopting IRV here in 
Burlington VT

[endquote]


IRV doesn't accomplish that. IRV has great need for favorite-burial, to help a compromise,
to keep a greater-evil from winning.


>
> My current favorite is MDD, ER-Bucklin (whole)   (where 
> ER-Bucklin(whole) is defined
> as in the electowicki).

You replied:

why?  any method that fails to elect the CW when one exists is electing 
to office a candidate whom a majority of voters have explicitly marked 
on their ballots that they prefer a different specific candidate for 
office.  how is it democratic to elect Joe Schmoe to office when more of 
us have expressed in the election that we prefer this other guy instead?

[endquote]

As i was saying, all CC complying methods fail FBC. 

Don't think that CC equals majority rule. There are many other valuable
majority rule criteria that are compatible with FBC.

SFC, 1CM, SDSC, MMC, 3P, UP, to name a few.

CC guarantees the election of a sincere CW (SCW) only under sincere voting.

Our electorate is antagonistic. WE can't guarantee sincere voting. Truncation is
likely, if not offensive order-reversal. 

SFC, unlike CC, doesn't require all to vote sincerely. It requires only that 
no one order-reverse.

1CM, SDSC, MMC, 3P and UP don't make demands on all the voters, only the ones
receiving the majority-rule protection.

>
> It's the Cadillac of FBC methods.
>

You reply:

naw!  Bucklin is a contrived value system.

[endquote]

??? What is a contrived value system?

You continued:

 and a dinosaur.

[endquote]

What is a "dinosaur", in the voting systems context?

A method that isn't new? ABucklin is relatively new. Of course I wasn't
the initial proponent, but the method is a lot newer than ordinary Bucklin,
if that helps you to like it.

Approval was used in a few Renaisance elections, I've heard. But I still like it :-)

You continued:

 and the 

"One Person, One Vote" people (who meaninglessly chanted that slogan as 
their main opposition to IRV) will *really* cut Bucklin down as "one 
person, two (or more) votes" and then say (again falsely) that someone 
was "disenfranchised" by Bucklin.  those arguments are crap of course

[endquote]

Yes. And it's easy to show people that, as in the case of Approval. Bucklin
is stepwise Approval. Approval is the 0-1 points system. Why not let people
rate each candidate? One person one vote, regarding each candidate's rating.
Approval is set voting--You can vote a set of candidate over another. You choose
which sets. Why shouldn't you give to your favorite what you give to a lesser-evil?
Rating all the candidates makes a lot more sense than just being allowed to rate one
candidate acceptable.



You continlued:

 (despite what perhaps Ms. Dopp might say), but the bottom line is that 
Bucklin is not Condorcet compliant and the fundamental problem with any 
non-Condorcet method is, simply, that it does not elect the CW when one 
exists which means a contradiction to Majority Rule (along with the 
*real* meaning of one-person-one-vote).

[endquote]

Wrong. Non CC methods don't violate 1 person 1 vote. They violate CC.

You continued:
 i think, under anything approximating normal circumstances, when a CW 
exists, electing that CW is just fine regarding FBC.  

[endquote]

That isn't good enough. It's necessary to give absolute assurance that
there can be absolutely no need or reason to bury favorite to help compromise.


> Is there an FBC-complying method meets UP and SDSC and that does 
> better by other criteria?
>
> Is there an FBC-complying method that doesn't fail in the Approval 
> bad-example?
>
> ...and maybe that also meets at least 1CM and 3P.
>

too much alphabet soup going on here.

[endquote]


We typically abbreviate the names of criteria, using the initial letters of
some of the words of their names.


Mike Ossipoff

 		 	   		  
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