[EM] IRV / RCv advances

[Christopher Colosi]

In promoting RCV, you can't just credit it in cases where the outcome would
have been the same given plurality / first past the post.

I can't speak for the others in this list, but London Breed was the front
runner and would have won in a traditional FPTP/plurality election.  She
nearly lost due to RCV and effectively spoke out against it when saying it
was the method we are stuck with.  You can make the claim that it was
"thanks to RCV" due to the fact that SF previously would have had a
separate run off election between her and the next top candidate (would
have been Leno or Kim), which she could have lost, but none of Breed's
supporters are saying "thanks to RCV".  So it is hard to argue that this is
good press to anyone beyond those who were already fans of RCV.  And that
causes me to question all the others in the list.

Living in SF, I can say that many people who filled out ballots correctly
really didn't understand how it worked.  Education on this stuff is tough.
The press didn't feel positive.

As a side note on this specific election with regards to RCV, it made me
question if we should still have a separate runoff when less than some
amount (maybe 2%) separates the candidates after all rounds.  When after
RCV it was still so tight of an election, the community may have been
better served (even if the outcome was the same) to get a week or two of
campaigning and a chance to choose solely between these two candidates.

On Thu, Jul 12, 2018 at 11:53 PM Richard Lung <voting at ukscientists.com>
wrote:

>
> It is ironic that the world seems to have this electoral reform battle of
> the big-enders versus the little-enders (from Gullivers Travels). That is
> to say the collectivist Europeans and their outliers, back a proportional
> count with party lists - such as sabotages individual choice, without a
> ranked choice for voters. While the good ole US of A does not forget
> individual representation with a ranked choice, but forgets equality of
> representation with a proportional count. The only exception is Cambridge
> Mass. using STV, and one or two minor cases of STV in Minnesota, I believe.
> One EM member says STV is BAD. As the ignored inventor of FAB STV, I know
> the limitations of traditional STV but essentially it is on the right
> lines, laid down by the original inventors, Carl Andrae and Thomas Hare,
> namely the quota-preferential method, as the Aussies pithily describe its
> essence.
>
> As for ranked pairing, my understanding is that it is not an independent
> method at all, but a means of cross-referencing a ranked choice electoral
> system. As previously mentioned to this email group, I wrote a supplemetary
> chapter on this, in my book FAB STV: Four Averages Binomial Single
> Transferable Vote.
>
> from
> Richard Lung.
>
>
>
>
> On 13/07/2018 02:37, Sennet Williams wrote:
>
> Sorry I don't get online much, but everyone should know that RCV is
> getting a LOT of good publicity.
> 1-Maine just had the first statewide IRV election in U.S. history.
> 2-since then, there have been op-ed(s?) in the NYT calling for RCV
> nationwide
> 3-London Breed has just become the first african american female mayor of
> SF: thanks to RCV.
> 4-Jesse Arreguin is the first latino mayor of Berkeley, thanks to RCV.
> 5-Jean Quan was the first asian mayor of Oakland, thanks to RCV.
> 6-Libby Schaaf, Oakland's new mayor, was elected thanks to RCV.
>
> If you want to pay attention, IRV/RCV/ranked pairs are inevitably the
> future, that is why  I don't understand this craziness discussing outdated
> election "systems."
> -Thanks for reading
>
>
>
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