[EM] Voter strategising ability

[Michael Ossipoff]

On Sat, Jul 12, 2014 at 3:34 PM, Gervase Lam <gervase at madasafish.com> wrote:

> [...]
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>
> Alternatively, I think a candidate steering voters into the appropriate
> strategic voting (as suggested in the past on this list) can be risky.
>

No, it seems to work very well when the mass-media do it, in this country
(U.S.). It always achieves the desired result (perpetually-continued
election of Republocrats). I should add that the strategy I'm referring to
is intentionally mis-informed strategy.


> Other candidates and even the "neutral" media (e.g. editorial
> reporters/commentators)


We here don't have any neutral mass-media. Our mass-media have an agenda,
and promote one policy-position and voting-strategy.

I realize that you aren't referring spefifically to the U.S., and so your
statements might well be valid in other countries.


>
>
> Assuming that people are happy with strategic voting, then data would
> need to be provided for strategising.  I expect this would be in the
> form of polls/voter intention surveys being carried out market research
> companies.
>

Yes, data are provided, but there's no reason to suppose that they're
correct.

As for the questionaires, wouldn't it be better to just ask 1) "Which party
do you like best?", and 2) "How do you intend to vote?"

The first of those questions is conspicuously missinng in our political
polls.



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> Given the above, I really find it hard to see a good proportion of
> voters doing the correct strategic calculations.


Well, here, the voters' strategic calculations are correct, with the
incorrect data they've received from the media. But, as I mentioned, that
strategy is badly misinformed.


>
>
> I suppose to conclude all this, I'm just wondering if a voting method
> should handle the situation where voters carry out bad strategy!!?  I
> can't see any voting method being able to handle that!
>

Approval and Score minimize the effects of misinformed strategy. That's
because they meet FBC, the Favorite-Burial Criterion )also called the
Favorite-Betrayal Criterion). With Approval and Score, no voter ever has
any incentive or reason to not fully support hir favorite.   ...no
incentive to ever vote someone else over hir favorite.

With dishonest, disinformational mass-media, and gullible voters (I call
that "current conditions"), FBC is needed, and Approval and Score are among
thew few methods that qualify. ICT (Improved-Condorcet-Top, defined at
electowiki) meets CD, in additional to FBC, meaning that ICT has no chicken
dilemma. But ICT is a rank method, more difficult to enact (if we pretend
that it's even possible to enact a new voting-system under current
conditions).

As I always emphasize, I don't consider current conditions an important
area for voting system reform, because reform is impossible under current
conditions. That's whay I, instead, emphasize Green scenario conditions:
Honest agenda-free media, progressive govt already in office, and
non-gullible voters  Fantasy? Sure. But if anyone wants to pretend that
imrovement is possible here, the least impossible route to that improvement
here would start with the election of a better party to office, using
Plurality. (as I've discussed a lot here).




>
> A variation to the above question is, can there be a voting method that
> can handle voting where each faction carries out their own strategic
> voting AND can handle voting where within each faction voters carry out
> their own strategic voting.  The latter may significantly be due to the
> fact the voters are floating voters who don't tow the candidate/party
> line.  Therefore, they would have different opinions about the other
> candidates.
>

That needn't be a problem. There's no reason why voters should have
to follow party recommendations in their rankings, though, if they're
willing to, that could let them just designate a pre-published party
ranking, instead of filling out a ranking.


>
> In this current climate, I think most voters would vote sincerely with
> practically any 'reasonable' voting method.


That shows how drastically, dramatically, different the conditions are in
different countries! I the current conditions here, virtually no
progressive voters are willing to vote sincerely. They always say that it's
necessary to vote "pragmatically", for the least despised of two despised
candidates.  ...due, as I said, to disinformational media.



> But I don't know about the
> future.  I think the voting method should be solid for the future as it
> can be extremely difficult to change a voting method once one is
> instituted.
>

Yes, a hypothetical future in which a progressive party has already been
elected to office via good Plurality voting.

But if we were going to (somehow) get a new voting system under current
conditions, it should be Approval, Score, ICT, or Symmetrical ICT, because
of the need for FBC under current conditions.

For Green scenario conditions, IRV and, preferably, Benham or Woodall would
be better, becaue they meet the Mutual Majority Criterion and CD. Benham
and Woodall also meet Condorcet (in fact, they meet Smith).

>
> Ideally, I think voters should always be voting sincerely as
> strategising (both for good and badly executed strategies) makes things
> complicated.  But Gibbard-Satterthwaite shows this can't happen.
>

Yes, one can't count on everyone voting sincerely. But G&S didn't say that
everyone has reason to strategize. IRV, Benham and Woodall have little or
no strategy-need for members of a mutual majority.

Michael Ossipoff
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