Hi,
I think Mr. Lomax missed the big point (though I agree he is right to
criticize Instant Runoff). The big point is that the authors of books
on Robert's Rules showed zero awareness of the existence of Condorcetian
preferential voting methods--or perhaps they were aware but their
analysis was made before the technological age made it easy to
exhaustively tally all the voters' pairwise preferences--so their
"recommendation" of single winner STV preferential voting was only
relative to a few even worse methods. Clearly, Condorcetian methods
have properties that are much closer to the properties of the Single
Elimination Pairwise method that RR advocates, because Condorcetian
methods are not subject to the criticism they made of STV that it can
easily defeat the best compromise.
(Approval can easily defeat the best compromise too, because many voters
will fail to approve compromise candidates out of fear of defeating
preferred candidates, which in turn will deter potential candidates from
competing. If Mr. Lomax likes Approval due to its cheapness and
simplicity, I'll point out that the family of voting methods known as
Voting for a Published Ranking are as cheap as Approval, easier for the
voters, some methods of the family are as simple, and if I'm right about
how candidates would behave would tend to elect a good compromise.)
It would be worthwhile, I think, to reach out to recognized experts in
Robert's Rules and teach them about better voting methods, and then see
what they recommend.
Another deception by the IRVings is their widespread claim that IRV
eliminates spoiling. It's an even bigger deception, much more
important. A variation of IRV that permits candidates to withdraw from
contention after the votes are published, before the votes are tallied,
would be much better at eliminating spoiling and electing the best
compromise.
Regards,
Steve
-------------------------------------------------
Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote:
I'm quoting the current FairVote "introduction" to a substantial quote
from Robert's Rules of Order, Newly Revised (RRONR), on preferential
voting.
Robert's Rules of Order (RRO), the well-known guide to fair
procedures, makes the point that an election by a mere plurality may
produce an unrepresentative result. It recommends voting methods that
can determine a majority winner when electing single-seat offices. At
conventions of private organizations, etc., where the electors can
cast repeated ballots, RRO prefers a system that allows open ended
repeat balloting with no runoff eliminations to finally elect a
majority winner. Such a system may be time consuming but can allow a
compromise candidate to emerge after a number of ballots. However, in
elections where open-ended re-voting is not practical, such as in
elections by mail (or governmental elections), instant runoff voting
(called "preferential voting" in RRO) is the recommended procedure.
In the section detailing the procedure for conducting an instant
runoff election RRO states that "It makes possible a more
representative result than under a rule that a plurality shall
elect..... This type of preferential ballot is preferable to an
election by plurality."
The full text is below. (Again, note that the term "preferential
voting" is another one for instant runoff voting). It is from:
Robert's Rules of Order Newly Revised
In Chapter XIII ยง45. 10th edition, 2000, pp. 411-414
(Used with permission from The Robert's Rules Association,
<http://www.robertsrules.com/>www.robertsrules.com)
The text is close enough to the truth that it is plausibly deniable
against a charge of pure deceiption, but it is also highly misleading.
Basically, it's designed to leave an easy impression that Robert's
Rules of Order "recommends" "IRV," even though the introduction
doesn't actually say that (any more, it may have said it at one time.)
And if "IRV" means what FairVote has been promoting in the U.S.,
specifically a runoff replacement -- implicit in the name that they
invented, and which name was not used by RRONR -- then it's directly
and demonstrably false. The difference is subtle enough, what might
seem like a technical detail to some, but it's quite a good example of
"the devil is in the details."
IRV, as used in the U.S., is a form of election by plurality.
"Preferential voting," as described by RRONR, is a method which never,
following their rules, elects by plurality, but it is more efficient
at discovering a majority than pure plurality, so it will avoid some
runoffs, hence it is "preferable to an election by plurality."
However, note, "preferential voting" is *not* "instant runoff voting."
FairVote wants the reader to conclude that. However:
Preferential voting has many variations. One method is described here
by way of illustration.
Then they describe Single Transferable Vote, though they do not name
it. Later, in reference to it, they call it "this form." However, if
we look at the description, there is what many might think an
inconsequential difference. I know I missed it at first. If you read,
say, the rules for Ranked Choice Voting for San Francisco or for
Australian "Optional Preferential Voting," you will find that the word
"majority" is used to refer, in describing the process, to a "majority
of ballots containing a vote for continuing candidates," i.e., those
who have not been eliminated. The description of RRONR's example of
preferential voting refers to "a majority of ballots." Exhausted
ballots, those where a voter only voted for or only ranked eliminated
candidates, continue to be part of the basis for a majority.
The process continues:
until one pile contains more than half of the ballots, the result
being thereby determined.
In Australia, what they call "Preferential Voting" refers to "an
absolute majority." That is not exactly the same as "a majority of
ballots," for Australia excludes ballots with some invalid or
invalidating vote, which allows PV to always find a majority, because,
in Australia, full ranking is required or the ballot is invalid.
RRONR talks about the possible effect of incomplete ranking:
Sometimes, for instance, voters decline to indicate a second or other
choice, mistakenly believing that such a course increases the chances
of their first choice. In fact, it may prevent any candidate from
receiving a majority and require the voting to be repeated. The
persons selected as tellers must perform their work with particular
care.
This is a description of the Later No Harm Criterion. RRONR actually
errs here, because that additional ranking may cause the election to
find a majority and thus terminate, whereas withholding it could, as
they describe, cause the election to fail, and then their favorite
might win in subsequent process. There are some conditions, not
uncommon, where this is a reasonable possibility.
The main point here, though, is that "this form of preferential
voting" isn't "Instant Runoff Voting." It reduces, but does not
eliminate, the possibility of needed some further process, such as a
runoff, depending on what the bylaws specify. If the bylaws do not
specify what happens, the default in Roberts Rules is that the
election -- the whole process, including nominations -- is repeated.
They do allow existing nominees to be included by default, unless they
withdraw. No eliminations.
In real public runoff elections, the rules generally specify that the
top two remain on the ballot, none of the others are placed there.
Some rules, such as the default in California, allow write-ins in the
runoff, and these write-ins sometimes win, they are not irrelevant.
Then, RRONR goes on to criticize "this form of preferential voting,"
i.e., the STV form.
The system of preferential voting just described should not be used
in cases where it is possible to follow the normal procedure of
repeated balloting until one candidate or proposition attains a
majority. Although this type of preferential ballot is preferable to
an election by plurality, it affords less freedom of choice than
repeated balloting, because it denies voters the opportunity of
basing their second or lesser choices on the results of earlier
ballots, and because the candidate or proposition in last place is
automatically eliminated and may thus be prevented from becoming a
compromise choice.
Note that the common form of Top Two Runoff is a compromise with what
Robert's Rules of Order is prescribing. They would have a vote-for-one
election process repeat indefinitely until one candidate has a
majority. It's possible to have a public election system that is very
close to this, but it would require a shift in our concept of what an
election is. If the U.S. electoral college were elected with
proportional representation, and if it were functioning as originally
conceived, it could continue the election through an indefinite number
of ballots. But, aside from this, it's been considered adequate to
have two stages, when a majority is not found in the first stage, and
the probability that the election will complete with a majority is
greatly enhanced or even ensured, the latter being done by rigorous
elimination of all candidates but the top two.
RRONR is not a book about voting systems, these systems are actually a
detail for them; the rules *require* that all decisions, large or
small, be made by majority vote on Yes/No questions. There are easy
tweaks to the two-stage election process that make it far closer to
the pure democracy that RRONR requires by default. But RRONR is a
manual about existing practice, and only the IRV form of preferential
voting is in current use for public elections.
However, the problem they describe, that it "denies voters the
opportunity of basing their second or lower choices on the results of
earlier ballots," is very real, and is a common argument for Top Two
Runoff voting, which really does shift results from the first ballot
based on the new campaign and new consideration by the voters.
Further, the elimination of a "compromise candidate" is what is called
Center Squeeze, and with nonpartisan elections, it is reasonably
common; if it were not reasonably common, RRONR would not mention it.
Other forms of preferential voting do not suffer from this problem.
So, does Robert's Rules of Order recommend IRV?
No.
What RRONR suggests for use under some conditions is different from
"Instant Runoff Voting." If we used STV, as an example, for primary
elections (the first stage in a Top Two Runoff practice), and we used
it as a two-winner process -- which functions better than
single-winner IRV -- and we considered the election done if any
candidate gained an "absolute majority," and if, then, a runoff is
needed, we allowed or continued to allow write-in votes, we would have
a system far closer to what Robert's Rules suggests than what we have
as IRV in the U.S.
U.S. IRV almost always elects the first-round leader. (The same is
true for Optional Preferential Voting in Australia: FairVote points to
Preferential Voting in Australia as an example of what IRV is, but, in
fact, the U.S. is using a damaged form of Optional Preferential
Voting. Australia always allows full ranking, the U.S. implementations
have mostly been limited to three ranks, even in races with over
twenty candidates.) In nonpartisan elections, so far, there is not one
example of the runner-up going on to beat the first round leader after
the vote transfers. Top Two Runoff changes the first round result in
roughly one-third of runoff elections. Partisan elections are a little
different, because it's much more likely, when there is only one minor
party with a percentage of the vote that is greater than the
difference between the top two, that the vote transfers go, for the
most part, to only one of the top two candidates.
If we want to use preferential voting, there are better and simpler
and cheaper forms to use, including Bucklin voting, which was known as
"preferential voting," when it saw fairly wide use in the United
States almost a century ago. Bucklin is not only cheaper, it is
substantially more likely to find a majority, so if it were used as a
primary, it would be less likely to need a runoff. I would estimate
that roughly one out of three runoffs would be avoided.
There is an extremely cheap method, surprisingly good, considered by
some voting system theorists to be one of the best methods, and by
nearly all to be better than Plurality or even than IRV, and that is
what I call Open Voting, known commonly as Approval Voting. I don't
like the name Approval, even though the votes have that effect,
because it implies that one should vote for all candidates that one
"approves." Maybe, maybe not. Open Voting is simply Plurality except
that all the votes are counted. If a voter votes for more than one
candidate, say for two, both votes are counted. The winner is the
candidate with the most votes. Because some people quickly and easily
think that this violates one-person, one-vote, it does not. If, after
the election is decided, one looks back and eliminates the moot extra
vote, it would not change the election result. Open Voting can be seen
as a kind of alternative vote.
Bucklin Voting is Open Voting, except that the voters rank the
candidates, and counting proceeds in rounds like IRV, except that each
new round adds in the old votes instead of substituting them. Thus
there are no candidate eliminations, but the voter can still specify
which candidate is the favorite. In the last round, Duluth Bucklin
allowed the voter to mark as many candidates as desired, which allows
the system to handle, intelligently, many more candidates than
three-rank IRV. But, in fact, with all forms of preferential voting,
many voters only vote for their favorite, and usually this is
relatively harmless, and it is especially harmless if the methods are
used for a first round. Bucklin does not suffer from Center Squeeze in
real elections. When a majority has not been found, it has counted all
the votes, it has neglected none. IRV elections do not report many of
the votes which have been cast, either because the candidates were
eliminated while the votes were still covered up by a candidate with
higher rank, or because there were two candidates left, when counting
stops, and some of these ballots remaining may contain a vote for the
opposite candidate. This happens much more in nonpartisan elections
than in elections where only a major party candidate might win.
I would recommend that anyone in a position to influence what voting
systems a community decides to use, and who has realized that there is
deceptive propaganda out there on voting systems, subscribe to the
Election Methods mailing list, for a while, and ask any questions they
may have, or propose their preliminary conclusions. They will get
responses from many points of view, including from supporters of IRV,
but also including serious experts about voting systems. The EM list
includes discussion of many arcane details of some complex voting
systems, and much of this may not be of interest to the general
public, and sometimes debates rage on this list indefinitely,
sometimes because the questions are difficult, and sometimes because
there are partisans who will argue till the cows come home, but the
truth will be there, and someone who asks, carefully reads the
responses, and then asks again, until it's clear, will find that truth.
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