[EM] Why I prefer ranked-choice voting to approval voting

[Jameson Quinn]

2016-10-16 16:29 GMT-04:00 Michael Ossipoff <email9648742 at gmail.com>:

> Robert--
>
> 1. First, Burlington has special importance, as a city that showed
> interest in a better voting system, and then experienced IRV's inadequacy.
>
> So, Burlington is a place where, more than anywhere else, proposal of
> genuinely good methods is particularly promising and called-for.
>
> So, is there an already-existing
> Organization or committee that is discussing voting system proposals for
> Burlington?
>
> How would one contact them?
>
> 2. All here agree that IRV isn't what you want. It's been shown that all
> of the better methods we're discussing would have elected the Democratic,
> the apparent CWs.
> Therefore it isn't necessary to rule any of them out yet.
>
> Approval, Score & Bucklin are simple, solid, and they all have
> use-precedence. Approval in medieval Venice for a long time, Score in
> Sparta, Approval again in electing the U.N. secretary-general,  & Bucklin
> in at least 39 cities during the Progressive Era.
>
And I doubt that those are their only precedence instances.
>

You're missing Approval's use in Greece from 1860-1917, and Bucklin's use
(at Condorcet's posthumous suggestion) in pre-Napoleonic Geneva.

Robert is looking for a method with a low cognitive burden. MAS is the
answer. It's based on Bucklin, but simplified as much as possible. Simple
voting heuristics would give strategically optimal ballots in most
scenarios. It's expressive enough to distinguish a favorite from an
acceptable compromise from an unacceptable candidate: the main messages
that any voter should be able to send.

As a stepping-stone to MAS, approval is the first step. Unambiguously
better than plurality, it gets most of the benefit with literally no extra
complexity. Yes, it has some cognitive burden; but, as spoiled ballots and
scenarios like Burlington show, actually less than IRV.

Jameson

> Approval or Score was used for electing the Pope for quite a while.
>
> Any Condorcet method has more complexity, & no use-precedence. Even if you
> prefer Condorcet, why not first get  _some_ good method, some improvement.
>
> Approval doesn't even need any new balloting equipment or count software.
>
> Expense of changing to Approval: Zero.
>
> Something completely new, more controversial & complicated could be
> proposed later.
>
> Michael Ossipoff
>
>
> .
> On Oct 15, 2016 11:49 AM, "robert bristow-johnson" <
> rbj at audioimagination.com> wrote:
>
>>
>>
>> ---------------------------- Original Message ----------------------------
>> Subject: Re: [EM] Why I prefer ranked-choice voting to approval voting
>> From: "Michael Ossipoff" <email9648742 at gmail.com>
>> Date: Sat, October 15, 2016 2:32 pm
>> To: "Jeff O'Neill" <jeff.oneill at opavote.com>
>> election-methods at electorama.com
>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>> --------------
>>
>> > Jeff:
>> >
>> > My reply was mostly to your justification of your lesser-evil voting.
>> >
>> > As for IRV, it can be said more simply:
>> >
>> > IRV was repealed in Burlington because it violated majority wishes. The
>> > Democrat it eliminated was someone who was majority-preferred to
>> everyone
>> > else.
>> >
>> > A majority consisting of Democrats & Republicans wanted the Democrat
>> > instead of the Progressive.
>> >
>> > That's what the Republicans thought that they were ensuring when they
>> > ranked the Democrat in 2nd place:
>> >
>>
>> which essentially punished the GOP Prog-haters for voting sincerely.
>>  despite the (false) promise that they could vote for their favorite
>> candidate without fear of helping elect their least favorite candidate.
>>
>> ...
>> >
>> > No voting-system can guarantee that the CWs will always win.
>>
>> well, if there **is** a CW, any Condorcet method will guarantee that the
>> CW wins.
>>
>> all of this differentiation between sincere CW and just CW is really too
>> difficult because we cannot open people's cranium and peer inside to see
>> what their sincere vote is.  i think the only reasonable assumption is
>> that, with sufficient *credible* assurance (that tactical voting will not
>> help their political interest any more than sincere voting) that all
>> ballots are sincerely marked.
>>
>>
>> > But the better methods, like Approval, Score & Bucklin, gjve hir a
>> better
>> > chance than IRV did in Burlington.
>>
>> of course, a Condorcet method will do better than any of those.  why
>> bother with something non-Condorcet if the target is electing the CW?  i
>> don't get it.
>>
>> and direct comparisons cannot be made.  Approval collects too little data
>> compared to a Ranked Ballot and Score forces the voter to concoct and yield
>> too much data.  it can only be compared if the ballot format is the same.
>>  so different RCV methods can be direct compared.  but comparing methods
>> with different ballots requires assumptions to be made.
>>
>>
>> > IRV gave the win elsewhere in a way that the people in Burlington
>> rightly
>> > perceived as arbitrary.
>>
>> not "arbitrary" but incorrect.
>>
>>
>> > For one thing, Approval, Score, & Bucklin allow the CWs's preferrers a
>> > better chance to protect hir win, to not give it away.
>>
>> and Ranked Pairs of Schulze allow an even better chance.
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>>
>> r b-j                  rbj at audioimagination.com
>>
>> "Imagination is more important than knowledge."
>>
>>
>>
>
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