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<p>Thanks for mentioning this report, Rob.<br>
</p>
<p>It's very long, about 6500 words not counting footnotes, but has
a lot of very useful detail and is very well written. I recommend
it to everyone interested in the current politics of election
reform in the U.S., even if you're opposed to IRV, as I am, and
favor Condorcet, approval voting, and other election methods over
IRV. The article also helps make clear why IRV, despite its
shortcomings, is still far better than plurality voting, which IRV
advocates have failed to convincingly enough explain to voters and
which in turn is the main reason IRV was rejected by voters in
2024 except in DC and, just barely, Alaska.<br>
</p>
<p>One of article's weaknesses is that it lumps top two and other
top-N methods together as similar kinds of reforms and says
nothing about why the spoiler problem is especially problematic
with top two but increasingly less so with other top-N methods and
how how approval voting would produce much better top-N methods.
It also says nothing about Condorcet and other ranked voting
methods or about approval and other alternative non-ranking
methods. However, there has been so little effective advocacy of
Condorcet and other methods in the U.S. that the author had little
reason to mention them, especially since he was focused on methods
that have been widely advocated and voted on in recent referendums
and by state legislators. Including a discussion of alternatives
to IRV and alternative top-N and other methods would have required
either a much longer and more complicated article or a separate
article.</p>
<p>I'm copying this to the Brookings email address, so maybe the
author, Darrell M. West, will consider writing a separate article.
If he reads this and may consider writing a separate article, I
strongly urge him to write to Rob.</p>
<p>-Ralph Suter<br>
</p>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 5/20/2025 3:01 PM, <a
class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="mailto:election-methods-request@lists.electorama.com">election-methods-request@lists.electorama.com</a>
wrote:</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap">Message: 1</span></div>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:mailman.1.1747771316.3268964.election-methods-electorama.com@lists.electorama.com">
<pre wrap="" class="moz-quote-pre">Date: Mon, 19 May 2025 15:30:17 -0700
From: Rob Lanphier <a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E"
href="mailto:roblan@gmail.com"><roblan@gmail.com></a>
To: <a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="mailto:election-methods@lists.electorama.com">election-methods@lists.electorama.com</a>
Subject: [EM] December 2024 report: "The future of the instant runoff
election reform"
Message-ID:
<a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E"
href="mailto:CAK9hOYknuSJ5Oce+1peVHw71yaGzBkapctXO84PzQ2AE4Zv_1Q@mail.gmail.com"><CAK9hOYknuSJ5Oce+1peVHw71yaGzBkapctXO84PzQ2AE4Zv_1Q@mail.gmail.com></a>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
Hi folks,
I thought y'all might be interested in this report from Brookings:
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="https://www.brookings.edu/articles/the-future-of-the-instant-runoff-election-reform/">https://www.brookings.edu/articles/the-future-of-the-instant-runoff-election-reform/</a>
I'm curious what y'all think of the report.
</pre>
</blockquote>
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