On Mar 22, 2009, at 4:24 PM, Kristofer Munsterhjelm wrote:
Again, the election method better get decided on before the
election, so that the voters can be told the rules and thus be able
to express their thoughts to whatever extent they choose within
what those rules support:
Condorcet: A=B is fine for about equals; A>B or A<B ranking
for different liking, but amount of difference is neither needed
nor expressible.
IRV: like above, except A=B not permitted, for counting would
not know what to do when A=B must be deciphered as top ranks.
score: ratings must be decided - for A>B>C, obvious to rate A
high and C low, but where to place B to get maximum or minimum
difference between A and B or between B and C is difficult.
I'm not sure about IRV - has anyone devised an STV variant that
handles equal rank? If not, then you're right - again, I'm not sure.
From what I've seen of voting equipment, most limitations seem to be
in the name of expediency. For instance, SF's RCV three-rank method
keeps voters from ranking more than three candidates - probably to
accomodate existing equipment.
What limitations may exist (such as your IRV example) may be handled
by having a voting machine that permits all ranking types (full,
truncated, equal rank), then having parameters that limit according
to what kind of voting system is being used in the back end (e.g no
equal rank).
All of my implementations of election methods in software allow for
equal rankings. In IRV or STV they cast a 1/N vote for each of N tied-
rank active choices. (If I were to vote for A and B in some round, I'd
cast 1/2 vote for each, but if one got eliminated, I would cast a full
vote for the remaining one in the next round.)
If you like Java, peek at this:
http://code.google.com/p/voteutil/source/browse/trunk/java/org/bolson/vote/IRV.java
I would also like to note to Raph that hosting files on the yahoo
groups is making them not viewable to me, because I don't feel like
jumping through yahoo's hoops right now.
----
Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
