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<font face="Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif">Chris - as I understand
it, there's no reason to expect Condorcet voting to produce
satisfactory results if applied seat-by-seat to representative
assemblies. Some voting theory texts have a disclaimer near the
beginning: "We here discuss the election of a single office-holder
(eg. a president); election of individual members to an assembly
brings in additional considerations" (which are never discussed).<br>
At any rate, if a country is governed by a parliamentary
assembly, then the primary the aim of an election should be to
produce an effective government whose policies are as close as
possible to the consensus view of the electorate. This will not
usually be achieved by giving each constituency a representative
who is close to its local consensus. <br>
I made a proposal of my own a couple of years ago:
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://lists.electorama.com/pipermail/election-methods-electorama.com/2021-October/003113.html">http://lists.electorama.com/pipermail/election-methods-electorama.com/2021-October/003113.html</a>
<br>
My main concern was to avoid the minority governments which
generally arise when FPTP is replaced by less crude methods. As
for traction... I'm still its sole supporter.<br>
Colin<br>
</font><br>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 17/09/2023 17:52, C.Benham wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:5607adf7-8123-d36e-475f-f39b55daee9c@adam.com.au">
<br>
I've been thinking a bit why the Condorcet has so little popular
traction, why some quite intelligent
<br>
are wary of it and prefer IRV.
<br>
<br>
Suppose we are talking about electing members of a parliament (or
legislature) in single-member seats.
<br>
<br>
Typically the two largest parties, say one centre-left and and one
centre-right, will between them win nearly
<br>
all the seats and with luck the one that is preferred by more
voters than the other will get more seats
<br>
(and so in a Parliamentary system will form a government with its
leader becoming the Prime Minister).
<br>
<br>
<br>
So in this limited sense the result is very very roughly
"proportional". Assuming the small wing parties'
<br>
supporters are normally spread out in lots of different districts,
they will get no seats.
<br>
<br>
But suppose in a lot of the seats the contest looks like this:
<br>
<br>
47 A>>>C>B
<br>
43 B>>>C>A
<br>
10 C>A>>B
<br>
<br>
If this is IRV or FPP then A easily wins, but the CW is C.
<br>
<br>
But A is clearly the highest "social utility" candidate, and
assuming that voting is voluntary and at
<br>
least somewhat inconvenient or costly, then C has only been voted
the CW because both A and B
<br>
are on the ballot. If one of those candidates wasn't, then most of
his or her supporters would stay
<br>
home and allow the other to easily beat C.
<br>
<br>
And if something similar (electing a weak centrist that most of
the voters don't like) happens in enough
<br>
seats it could result in the "weak centrist party" being grossly
over-represented in the legislature.
<br>
<br>
So to allay these fears I suggest this compromise with IRV:
Smith+IRV//Approval:
<br>
<br>
*Voters strictly rank from the top however many or few candidates
they wish. Default approval is only
<br>
for the top-ranked candidate, but voters can extend approval to
one or more other candidates by marking
<br>
the lowest-ranked candidate they approve.
<br>
<br>
Elect the most approved candidate that is either in the Smith set
or is the IRV winner.*
<br>
<br>
Allowing above-bottom equal-preferences (at least without a lot of
extra complexity) makes Push-over strategising
<br>
easier.
<br>
<br>
So in the type of example I just discussed the IRV winner would
normally have a much higher approval score
<br>
than the CW, but the supporters of the IRV runner-up could change
that if they like by extending their approval
<br>
to the CW (who then might win, especially if the CW's supporters
refrain from extending their approval to the IRV winner).
<br>
<br>
Chris B.
<br>
<br>
</blockquote>
<br>
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