--- On Sun, 18/1/09, Michael Allan <m...@zelea.com> wrote: > > I believe the practice/principle of having > > secret votes also often implies interest > > in allowing people to vote as they > > privately think. Difference between public > > and private opinions is thus often seen to > > mean some sort of unwanted pressure that > > makes people vote some other way than they > > really would like to vote. > > If private and public opinions differ, then which is the > manipulated > one?
If they deviate it is hard to imagine that the private opinion would not be the sincere one. > > > You and Kristopher went on to discuss how you > might solve this > > > problem [of coersion] by precluding the > possibility of public > > > expression entirely (as far as votes go), and > falling back to a > > > medium of private expression. > > > > Yes. Or at least by keeping the lowest > > layers secret. > > Even if that design path were a good one, it wouldn't > be open to us. > We may certainly *allow* for private voting at the > perhipery. Some > people will want it (maybe many), I agree. But we cannot > force it on > everyone. I think the common practice is to force privacy on everyone in order to allow the weakest of the society to keep their privacy. > > I don't see how secret voting would > > particularly limit public participation. > > Public voting maybe automatically > > forces/encourages public participation but > > secret votes allow that too. People are > > also free to tell how they voted even if > > their vote was secret. One limitation is > > that the voter can not prove to the > > candidate that she voted that she really > > voter for her. But that also does not > > limit public participation. > > It's true, private voting imposes no effective limits. > And mass > democracy allows us complete freedom. What's crucial > is not what it > imposes, but what it omits to facilitate. > > We can make up for some of its shortfalls by adding a > voting system to > the public sphere. A well designed voting facility will: It is true that public votes help implementing some features, but in most typical ("low level") elections privacy has been considered to be essential. Juho > > a. reveal the fact of agreement (and disagreement) on > issues - what > other people are agreeing to > > b. report the quantity of agreement - for and against - > in definite > numbers > > c. characterize the *quality* of agreement, especially > the concrete > options under discussion - exactly what people are > agreeing to, > and how the consensus (and dissensus) is distributed > > d. open participation to everyone in the community, with > no formal > restrictions on age, mental ability, citizenship, etc. > > e. help newcomers to join in the discussion by revealing > the > existing participants, and showing easy points of > entry at the > periphery > > f. keep the proximal scale of discussion to a humanly > mangageable > size, by organizing it in a tree structure, like the > votes > > g. promote consensus without forcing it, or limiting it > > h. provide assurance of ultimate action - a conduit for > consensus > votes to cross into legislative assemblies and general > elections ---- Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info