[EM] Changing my mind on one-sided strategy (+IRV complexity)

[Closed Limelike Curves]

Before today, I thought one-sided strategy was impossible. It seems bizarre
to imagine a situation where only one of the two parties is able to work
out the correct solution.

Today I came across a video explaining how to vote strategically in
Schulze. It said that, if you really want to make your vote count, you
should put your favorite at the top; then, you should truncate your ballot
below the candidates you think are unacceptable. This is great, right?
Clean and concise explanation of a minimal defense.

Except I lied. *The video was talking about IRV*. This video—produced by a
large, well-funded San Francisco advocacy group—was trying to "educate"
everyone into using the *exact opposite* of the correct strategy for IRV!

This strategy is both highly ineffective *and* socially disastrous. It
dramatically increases the risk of a center-squeeze. It would create even
stronger polarization and more extremism than in our current system of
FPP-with-primaries, where at least primary voters know to vote for
electable candidates.

That's not to say strategy can't be done. Alaska Democrats pulled it off in
the 2022 Senate race, where they managed to get everyone to rank Murkowski
first. Except... Republicans didn't manage the same for Begich. That's a
huge problem.

I don't know if the video I saw was stupidity or intentional
disinformation. Either way, it shows a big problem with IRV and
Condorcet-IRV hybrids: their complexity makes them very vulnerable to
one-sided strategy. We can't expect both parties, or all voters, will be
able to work out the best strategy and use it. It's completely possible
that only one party will understand runoffs well enough to exploit them.

I don't think you can expect voters to *consistently* execute any strategy
more complex than thresholding, in a way that cancels out across parties
and candidates. A great strength of approval and score is the strategy is
so clearly, blatantly obvious that nobody is disadvantaged.
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