<html><head></head><body><div style="color:#000; background-color:#fff; font-family:HelveticaNeue, Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, Lucida Grande, Sans-Serif;font-size:13px"><div><span></span></div><div class="qtdSeparateBR" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_7065" dir="ltr">The French presidential election isn't IRV though is it? It's just a two-round system - <a id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_7004" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_presidential_election,_2012">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_presidential_election,_2012</a> In such an election it's much clearer that you might not want to vote for your favourite in the second round than in IRV.</div><div class="qtdSeparateBR" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_7086" dir="ltr"><br></div><div class="qtdSeparateBR" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_7155" dir="ltr">But Jameson, I think your centre squeeze illustration is a good one. I've seen many people (mainly on the Center for Election Science forum) saying that IRV is bad because there are situations where voting for your favourite results in a worse outcome for you, but without an explanation for the mechanism, and when and why anyone might know when not to rank their favourite top.</div><div class="qtdSeparateBR" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_7142" dir="ltr"><br></div><div class="qtdSeparateBR" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_7162" dir="ltr">So as I understand it, you've got three candidates: L, C and R - C is the Condorcet winner. Someone's preference order might be L>C>R, but by submitting that ranking, C gets eliminated first and L could then lose to R in the run-off. But by ranking C first, C would be a sure winner over R in a run-off, so it's a safer vote, especially if your main priority is for R not to get elected.<br></div><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_7010"><br></div><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_7046"><br></div><div class="yahoo_quoted" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6860" style="display: block;"> <blockquote id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6859" style="padding-left: 5px; margin-top: 5px; margin-left: 5px; border-left-color: rgb(16, 16, 255); border-left-width: 2px; border-left-style: solid;"> <div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6858" style="font-family: HelveticaNeue, Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, Lucida Grande, Sans-Serif; font-size: 13px;"> <div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6857" style="font-family: HelveticaNeue, Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, Lucida Grande, Sans-Serif; font-size: 16px;"> <div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6856" dir="ltr"> <font id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6947" face="Arial" size="2"> <hr size="1" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6946"> <b><span style="font-weight: bold;">From:</span></b> Jameson Quinn <jameson.quinn@gmail.com><br> <b><span style="font-weight: bold;">To:</span></b> Jeff O'Neill <jeff.oneill@opavote.com> <br><b><span style="font-weight: bold;">Cc:</span></b> election-methods <election-methods@electorama.com><br> <b><span style="font-weight: bold;">Sent:</span></b> Saturday, 15 October 2016, 14:29<br> <b><span style="font-weight: bold;">Subject:</span></b> Re: [EM] Why I prefer ranked-choice voting to approval voting<br> </font> </div> <div class="y_msg_container" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6925"><br><div id="yiv6315392677"><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6924"><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6923" dir="ltr"><br clear="none"><div class="yiv6315392677gmail_extra" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6922"><div class="yiv6315392677gmail_quote" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6921"><blockquote class="yiv6315392677gmail_quote" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6920" style="margin: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex; border-left-color: rgb(204, 204, 204); border-left-width: 1px; border-left-style: solid;"><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6919" dir="ltr"><div class="yiv6315392677gmail_extra" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6918"><div class="yiv6315392677gmail_quote" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6917"><span class="yiv6315392677"></span><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6945"><br clear="none"></div><blockquote class="yiv6315392677gmail_quote" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6916" style="margin: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex; border-left-color: rgb(204, 204, 204); border-left-width: 1px; border-left-style: solid;"><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6915" dir="ltr"><div></div><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6914">But there's an important, and predictable, class of election scenarios where it's strategically crucial NOT to rank your favorite first: center squeeze scenarios. If you have two candidates at ideological opposite points, with a third candidate in the middle near the median voter, it is actually quite common for the center to have the lowest first-choice support and get prematurely eliminated. This kind of thing happened in Burlington 2009; in multiple recent French elections; tragically, in Egypt 2011; and would have happened in the US 2000 if Nader had gotten over 25%. In this case, the correct strategy for one group of voters is to rank their true first choice in second place. Understanding this, and correctly seeing when it applies, is a HUGE cognitive burden for IRV voters.</div></div></blockquote><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6926"> </div><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6927">When you say that "it is actually quite common for the center to have the lowest first-choice support and get prematurely eliminated," we need to clarify "quite common." If you mean 5-10% of the time, then I could believe that, but if you mean 50% of the time, then I would disagree. It would be really interesting if a statistician could collect the data and present results.</div></div></div></div></blockquote><div><br clear="none"></div><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6944">Depends on various factors, but generally I'd put it in the 10%-50% range. It's happened in 2 of the last 4 French presidential elections so 50% is not a crazy estimate.</div><div> </div><blockquote class="yiv6315392677gmail_quote" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6932" style="margin: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex; border-left-color: rgb(204, 204, 204); border-left-width: 1px; border-left-style: solid;"><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6931" dir="ltr"><div class="yiv6315392677gmail_extra" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6930"><div class="yiv6315392677gmail_quote" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1476608930759_6929"><div><br clear="none"></div></div></div></div></blockquote></div></div></div></div></div><br></div> </div> </div> </blockquote> </div></div></body></html>