The city of Burlington (not Vermont's capital but its biggest city) just conducted a mayoral election using IRV.  Each voter ranks the candidates, first choice second choice etc.  If no one wins in the first round, the least favored candidate is dropped and his/her votes are recounted based on the second preferance until one candidate emerges with 50% + 1.  No more "spoiler effect", no more voting for the lesser of the two evils (under IRV you get to rank the evils  ;)).  Our legislature is considering using IRV state-wide.

Thoughts?

The city of Burlington (not Vermont's capital but its biggest city) just conducted a mayoral election using IRV.  Each voter ranks the candidates, first choice second choice etc.  If no one wins in the first round, the least favored candidate is dropped and his/her votes are recounted based on the second preferance until one candidate emerges with 50% + 1.  No more "spoiler effect", no more voting for the lesser of the two evils (under IRV you get to rank the evils  ;)).  Our legislature is considering using IRV state-wide.

Thoughts?


I think it would be a good idea for local elections, but I think it would become hopelessly complex in anything larger then County level.

And each "recounting" only adds to the chance of somebody complaining about fraud, or error in counting.  But in cases like City Council or County Comissioner (which are frequently "highest 2-5 people" anyways) this might actually be detrimental, because it would vastly favor incumbants.

If you think 2000 was a mess, try to imagine a Presidential Election with this system.  Of course, under this system it is likely that George Bush Senior would have won re-election, since far more of his voters went to the Ross Perot Ticket then those from Bill Clinton.

We'd call it the Alternative Vote, a slightly simplified version of the Single Transferrable Vote, which when you're electing multiple candidates is much fairer, but a serious headache to count if you're not doing it on a computer; if your selections are computerised, though, the counting is fairly simple.

The biggest advantage of STV is (IMO) that it becomes possible to field more than one candidate from the same party without splitting your support and ensuring that both lose: it gives the electorate the power to choose how radical a flavour of politician they want.  There is a downside, of course: as evinced by a skinhead to whom my mother had just explained the above... His (unarguable) reply was: "But that would mean we'd have to read the stuff they send out"

I agree that it's a good idea for local and maybe even state elections, but I can't see it working in presidential elections.  What would happen is the repubs would vote for the repub 1st place and the independent 2nd place.  The dems would vote for dem 1st place and independent 2nd place.   Then when the repubs & dems are tied... you can see how that would mean an almost guaranteed win for the independent.  Kind of unfair to both sides.  Or if I've misunderstood you, it would mean the independent would be dropped and it would be the same situation, repub vs dem.

It does tend to work better for independents, but more for this reason: at the moment, lots of people don't vote for candidates they like "because there's no chance of them getting elected", and rather than vote for who they believe may be the best person for the job, they vote for someone who at least might win.

Have to admit, I've never really understood why so many people vote for candidates they don't like: a lot of the reason is probably that they want to keep someone else out (e.g. people vote Democrat 'cause they want to keep the Republicans out, or vice versa).  What this sort of electoral system does is free the voter from that kind of thinking: it *is* worth giving a minority candidate your vote, and if they just ain't popular enough, then your second choice has a chance of being elected.

It does tend to work better for independents, but more for this reason: at the moment, lots of people don't vote for candidates they like "because there's no chance of them getting elected", and rather than vote for who they believe may be the best person for the job, they vote for someone who at least might win.

Have to admit, I've never really understood why so many people vote for candidates they don't like: a lot of the reason is probably that they want to keep someone else out (e.g. people vote Democrat 'cause they want to keep the Republicans out, or vice versa).  What this sort of electoral system does is free the voter from that kind of thinking: it *is* worth giving a minority candidate your vote, and if they just ain't popular enough, then your second choice has a chance of being elected.


Ironically, this was what the original intent of the electoral college in the USA was.  The Founding Fathers figured that there would be a multitude of political parties and that the generic voter would be uninformed and uneducated, and thus designed a system whereby the President would ultimately be decided by the houses of Congress.  This backfired for the next 200 years because of the two-party dominant system, and only worked once, when John Quincy Adams was selected over Andrew Jackson.

I agree that it's a good idea for local and maybe even state elections, but I can't see it working in presidential elections.  What would happen is the repubs would vote for the repub 1st place and the independent 2nd place.  The dems would vote for dem 1st place and independent 2nd place.   Then when the repubs & dems are tied... you can see how that would mean an almost guaranteed win for the independent.  Kind of unfair to both sides.  Or if I've misunderstood you, it would mean the independent would be dropped and it would be the same situation, repub vs dem.


Actually, the exact opposite would happen.  The independents would never have a chance.

This is because there simply are so damned many of them.  You have the Loosertarians (excuse me, Libertarians), the Greens, the American Independents, the Socialists, and a few dozen others.  In each re-poll, they would be cut out one by one until only the Republcians and Democrats are left.

This would have much lower impact on Local elections, since "third party candidates" are a much lower factor.  Not to mention that a lot of local races are "partyless" in the first place.

In our last gobernatorial election there were three people running for lut. gov., 2 liberals (1 Id the other Dem) who split the vote, so the conservative Repub won, even though combined the liberals had a clear majority, something like 60% of the vote between them.  Thats the "spoiler effect".  So the candidate farthest from the policy/philosophy of the majority won.  Is that democracy?

In our last gobernatorial election there were three people running for lut. gov., 2 liberals (1 Id the other Dem) who split the vote, so the conservative Repub won, even though combined the liberals had a clear majority, something like 60% of the vote between them.  Thats the "spoiler effect".  So the candidate farthest from the policy/philosophy of the majority won.  Is that democracy?


In 1992 you had 3 major candidates for President, 2 Conservatives who split the vote so the Liberal won.  That was a spoler effect also, and it works both ways.

Yes, it is Democracy.  It is not a perfect system, but I think it has the least number of problems.  And adding complications like this into a Presidential election would make 2000 look like a walk in the park.