Voting System Reform Commission: Part 2

[Peter]

This thread will contain the discussions of Part 2 of the VSRC.

Our mandate in this is as follows:

"The Commission will discuss any and all systems of voting that they feel would be appropriate for use in Atlasian federal elections, including the current system of preferential voting."

First of all we will establish a list of voting systems that we will discuss. I can think of the following off hand:

FPTP
FPTP with runoff (the French/Louisiana system)
Preferential Voting (the present system)
Approval Voting (Southeast System)
Approval Voting with Runoff
Condorcet Voting
Borda Count

Any other suggestions will be considered.

[Peter]

We will consider all of these, though I have to say that Bucklin Voting looks quite a bizarre way to run an election.

[Peter]

We will consider all of those options presented on the Wikipedia page under the Single Winner Voting Systems list.

I motion to automatically reject: Exhaustive Ballot (Papal conclave system), Motion and Amendment, and Random Ballot. This motion is considered to be carried unless there is an objection.

Our method of consideration will be as follows:

Basically, I will say what voting system we are presently considering, possibly with a brief synopsis of what happens in it (which due to my gross laziness will probably be copied from Wikipedia). We will then proceed to discuss the voting system, and hopefully develop a consensus as to whether the voting system is appropriate for Atlasia or not.

When we have finished all on our list, we will then return to consider in greater detail all of those we considered to be appropriate.

We will start with First Past The Post (FPTP). The system needs no explaination as it is the one that most of us are used to in the real world.

[Peter]

Given that nobody has spoken up in its favour, I assume we have consensus to reject FPTP as inappropriate to Atlasia.

Next we have: Two-round runoff voting. This is better known to some of us as Second Ballot and is used in French Lower House and Presidential elections, as well as most elections in Louisiana. Effectively it consists of a first round of pure FPTP, with a second round runoff between the two highest finishers of the first round.

[Peter]

I have mixed feelings regarding this electoral system. It has advantages and disadvantages like all of the systems we will consider. That said I think it could be appropriate in an Atlasian context, and thus I feel it is worthy of greater consideration later, though I do feel that other systems may be more appropriate.

Also, this eliminates the problem of a high preference for someone actually hurting then.

Whilst voting for somebody may not hurt them, it may not be the best thing you can do for your preferred candidate.

Consider the following election line-up and suppose for sake of argument that I am a Joe Republic supporter and that I am to be the last voter

Joe Republic - 30 votes
Ernest - 20 votes
AuH2O - 20 votes

Clearly Joe will go through to the last round facing either Ernest or AuH2O or perhaps both if they tie. The best thing I can do as the last voter is to vote for AuH2O to ensure that Joe has him as opposition. Tactical voting will remain just as prevalent as it is now.

[Peter]

There seems to be at least some interest in FPTP with Runoff, so we shall certainly consider that later in our more in depth considerations.

Next on the list is Elimination Runoff, one which I should have rejected earlier for much the same reasons as Exhaustive Runoff. It is considered rejected unless there is an objection.

Next on the list is Approval Voting (without Runoff). It is described rather aptly by Wikipedia as: Voters may vote for as many candidates as they like. Candidate with most votes wins.

This system is presently used by the Southeast Region for Gubernatorial elections.

[Peter]

Once again, Imust bump this, since it has become particulary relevant.

Well, I think our mandate was to decide which electoral system to use, not how to reform the kinks of the present ones.

Also, I frankly got tired of doing this considering the first report which did obviously take an amount of work, got totally ignored.

[Peter]

The List System is only appropriate for legislative elections, and thus only our Senate. Given that our Constitution effectively states that all Districts/Regions return only one member, a list system would require a large amount of constitutional changes to implement.

[Peter]

Given that the Senate already has actual legislation pending consideration, I suspect any report we produce will be summarily ignored if passed given that it will be moot.

Further, I have little to no intention of writing another report that will be summarily ignored. Bono is right about one thing - if you want an issue to die, you assign a commission to study it.

I wish to announce that I will step aside as Chair. I personally recommend Emsworth to take over if he will accept, but that is entirely up to him and other commission members.