[EM] Why LTPs/Am forms of PR matter for "more local" democracy...

[David L Wetzell]

I wanted to add personally that increasing the import of "more local"
elections is critical for transferring more decision-making to "more local"
gov't and giving folks more say-so in their gov't.  But most "more local"
single-winner elections are rarely competitive due to de facto segregation
and our two-party dominated system.  However, with 3 seat LR Hare the third
seat would be competitive most of the time*, and so folks would get more
interested in "more local" elections and issues which would then have a
trickle-up effect on "less local" elections by evening the power structure
between the two major parties at the state level and thereby helping small
LTPs be potential swing-voters who also help to increase voter turnout and
the circulation of issues in the public square.

dlw
* LR Hare has one vote per voter and one candidate per party and one or two
vice-candidates on the party-list who win the extra seats if a party's
candidate wins multiple seats.  But the top candidate would have to beat
the third place candidate by more than one-third of the vote to win two
seats and (s)he'd have to beat the 2nd place candidate by more than
two-thirds of the vote to win all three seats.  So if the vote %s were
40:30:20:10 then there'd be 3 winners.  If they were 50:35:10:5 then the
top candidate would win two seats and her/his vice-candidate would hold the
second seat.  If they were 80:10:5:5 then the top candidate would win all
three seats and get to choose two vice-candidates (or have her/his list
specified before the election) but that outcome is not likely outside of
Russia or other DINO areas.

dlw

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: <election-methods-request at lists.electorama.com>
Date: Thu, May 30, 2013 at 2:02 PM
Subject: Election-Methods Digest, Vol 107, Issue 21
To: election-methods at lists.electorama.com


Send Election-Methods mailing list submissions to
        election-methods at lists.electorama.com

To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit

http://lists.electorama.com/listinfo.cgi/election-methods-electorama.com

or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to
        election-methods-request at lists.electorama.com

You can reach the person managing the list at
        election-methods-owner at lists.electorama.com

When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific
than "Re: Contents of Election-Methods digest..."


Today's Topics:

   1. wrt Fobes (David L Wetzell)
   2. Re: wrt Fobes (Richard Fobes)


----------------------------------------------------------------------

Message: 1
Date: Wed, 29 May 2013 17:24:05 -0500
From: David L Wetzell <wetzelld at gmail.com>
To: EM <election-methods at lists.electorama.com>
Subject: [EM] wrt Fobes
Message-ID:
        <CAMyHmncpUn4xdi_DEGLrJYhj_BxxUOe=JE4mfDEzocRcDrmFFw at mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"

It may not be fair but in the status quo US system there are networking
effects in activism and voter education about electoral reform.  Given the
need to deal w. rational ignorance about politics, and even moreso
electoral rules, there is a need for marketing short-cuts.  FairVote does
that well in simplifying the message for low-info voters ignorant about
electoral rule analytics.

So reform in a system where economies of scale are exacerbated by the
status quo is not fair and there's scope for a 2nd best approach based on
networking externalities and marketing advantages that include
over-simplifications or statements of tendencies as absolutes.

I agree w. your focus on primary systems where the no. of candidates on
average wd tend to be higher.

My agenda is to defend iRV for single-winner gener'l elections and redirect
energy to complenting such with American forms of Proportional
Represetnation that similarly won't so much challenge the US's 2-party
dominated system but keep it from tilting to one-party domination and make
it work a lot better, as I belive would be inevitable if the proliferation
of LTPs were incentivized by the use of Am forms of PR that make it easy
for a small, local third party to win represetnation.

dlw

------------------------------

Message: 5
Date: Wed, 29 May 2013 14:48:45 -0700
From: Richard Fobes <ElectionMethods at VoteFair.org>
To: election-methods at electorama.com
Subject: Re: [EM] Re2: Fobes wrt IRV w. relatively few competitive
        candidates.
Message-ID: <51A677BD.4070303 at VoteFair.org>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed

A clarification would be helpful in this discussion (below).

David seems to be talking about the number of candidates in _general_
elections.

I am more focused on the number of candidates in _primary_ elections.
This is where the greatest unfairnesses now occur.  This is where there
should be more candidates.

Specifically, in a congressional election where the district boundaries
do not ensure victory for the incumbent's party, the other party should
have about four to seven credible candidates in their primary election.

IRV cannot handle that many credible candidates.

Richard Fobes
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <
http://lists.electorama.com/pipermail/election-methods-electorama.com/attachments/20130529/6c9a9390/attachment.html
>

------------------------------

Message: 2
Date: Wed, 29 May 2013 23:43:28 -0700
From: Richard Fobes <ElectionMethods at VoteFair.org>
To: election-methods at electorama.com
Subject: Re: [EM] wrt Fobes
Message-ID: <51A6F510.2050003 at VoteFair.org>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed

On 5/29/2013 3:24 PM, David L Wetzell wrote:
 > My agenda is to defend iRV for single-winner gener'l elections and
 > redirect energy to complenting such with American forms of Proportional
 > Represetnation that similarly won't so much challenge the US's 2-party
 > dominated system but keep it from tilting to one-party domination and
 > make it work a lot better, as I belive would be inevitable if the
 > proliferation of LTPs were incentivized by the use of Am forms of PR
 > that make it easy for a small, local third party to win represetnation.

Interesting.  You/David seem to be focused on the balance of power
between left versus right, whereas I'm focused on the balance of power
between voters ("up") versus special interests ("down").

In my book I promote ways for U.S. elections to produce more
proportional results, but I'm sure the approach is unlike whatever you
have in mind, which I presume is STV.

If your perspective is shared by the Green party, that could explain why
the Green party says they promote the use of IRV, yet they do not use it
for their own primary elections.

I think that one of the best ways to promote election reform (of any/all
types) is for a third party to adopt any method -- even IRV -- for their
primary elections because that would force state election organizations
to accommodate it on the ballot.  Or if a state's election rules do not
allow it, then that party would do well to offer a candidate for
Secretary of State (or whichever office handles election issues) and
highlight the issue in the voter's pamphlet.

More realistically I expect election-method reform to come to the United
States after it has occurred in other nations, which is the same pattern
that occurred for women getting the right to vote.

Richard Fobes

On 5/29/2013 3:24 PM, David L Wetzell wrote:
> It may not be fair but in the status quo US system there are networking
> effects in activism and voter education about electoral reform.  Given
> the need to deal w. rational ignorance about politics, and even moreso
> electoral rules, there is a need for marketing short-cuts.  FairVote
> does that well in simplifying the message for low-info voters ignorant
> about electoral rule analytics.
>
> So reform in a system where economies of scale are exacerbated by the
> status quo is not fair and there's scope for a 2nd best approach based
> on networking externalities and marketing advantages that include
> over-simplifications or statements of tendencies as absolutes.
>
> I agree w. your focus on primary systems where the no. of candidates on
> average wd tend to be higher.
>
> My agenda is to defend iRV for single-winner gener'l elections and
> redirect energy to complenting such with American forms of Proportional
> Represetnation that similarly won't so much challenge the US's 2-party
> dominated system but keep it from tilting to one-party domination and
> make it work a lot better, as I belive would be inevitable if the
> proliferation of LTPs were incentivized by the use of Am forms of PR
> that make it easy for a small, local third party to win represetnation.
>
> dlw



------------------------------

_______________________________________________
Election-Methods mailing list
Election-Methods at lists.electorama.com
http://lists.electorama.com/listinfo.cgi/election-methods-electorama.com


End of Election-Methods Digest, Vol 107, Issue 21
*************************************************
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.electorama.com/pipermail/election-methods-electorama.com/attachments/20130530/759926a2/attachment-0003.htm>