Voting system R&D (Re: 2017 update to the SPI voting algorithm for Board elections)

[Dimitri John Ledkov]

On 3 March 2017 at 13:46, Barak A. Pearlmutter <barak at pearlmutter.net> wrote:
>> You are advocating range voting.  I remain convinced that range voting
>> is a terrible voting system, because all but the most tactically aware
>> voters will cast hopelessly ineffective ballots.  This criticism
>> applies less to approval voting, but approval voting still involves a
>> lot of guesswork for voters.  Many people will cast ineffective
>> approval ballots.
>
> Why do think that is the case? I do not see any evidence for it.
>
> Range votes, or in their most simplified form approval votes, are at

Range voting is a voting method for single-seat elections and
therefore is not suitable for SPI board of directors election.

We elect 3 or more directors in each election.

> In the Burlington election, there were three main candidates: A, B,
> and C. With a hefty majority of ballots preferring A to C, and a hefty
> majority of ballots preferring B to C, the IRV system declared C the
> winner. Do you seriously not realize that this is very bad behaviour?
>

All A, B and C will be elected as board of directors in SPI case however.

We wouldn't even run the election, as they would be elected unopposed.

Do you understand at all, how SPI board of directors elections run?

>> Going on to those references you provided in August.  They were to
>> people who advocate range voting for single-winner elections.  As I
>> said in private email, I find it difficult to take seriously anyone
>> who proposes range voting for single-winner elections.
>
> Then and now, I do not understand your antipathy to range voting or
> approval voting.
>

It does not work for multi-winner elections... I think this needs
repeating again.

> I really don't understand why you're advocating STV when it has a long
> list of serious problems not just theoretically but which seem to
> appear quite often in actual practice.

It's the best system to elect proportional representation into the
multi-winner elections.

It sucks a lot for single-winner, luckily we are multi-winner.

We are picking the appropriate method for the appropriate elections,
and we are not using single-winner elections to justify choices for
multi-winner elections.

-- 
Regards,

Dimitri.