I talked with someone this morning asking me if I had a choice in one of the wards ( and I noted I didn't have to have a choice in that ward because I can't vote in that ward). But the person went on to explain that his partner is working hard for one candidate and he really favored a different candidate but to keep peace and happiness in his household he had to tell his favorite ," if we had IRV, you would be my second choice". This is an example of why I agree with the people who say it might give a broader assessment of all the candidates if you can think about who your 1st, 2nd and 3rd choices would be.
It certainly could make it more interesting in these supposedly "Non-partisan" races.
Another out I thought in order to meet the party's 60% rule would be as someone suggested yesterday using IRV and the top vote-getter in the end would then be voted on one last time for the 60%.
Annie Young a political party renegade
At 09:42 AM 3/11/05 -0800, flewn wrote:
First, I'd like to say that as a supporter of the non-DFL candidate for Ward 2 city council, it's not my place to tell y'all how to run this particular convention. From an outside perspective, it seems like the current rules controversy would be well served by a return to what everyone involved regards as "default" - so no one can be accused of gaming the system. My comments about using IRV for internal party processes should be seen as ideas for future endorsements, not as a solution to the current conflict in Ward 2.
Ok, now that that's out of the way, I have to respectfully disagree with Brian, Greg, Steve, Tony and Jeanne. Whew!
IRV's purpose is to find the candidate in a crowded field who has broad, if tepid, support. It always comes up with a 50% + 1 winner.
This fact alone does not make it incompatible with an election/endorsement threshold higher than 50%. Think about plurality elections: the Governor was elected with less than 50%, so plurality ballots could be seen as reliably producing a winner as well.
IRV would require complementary processes just as plurality voting does. These processes are not difficult, however, and there are proven, successful examples of them right here in Minneapolis.
Rather than, as Tony said, winnowing the field of candidates to two, IRV should be used for what it does best: finding the candidate with broad, 50% + 1 support. This candidate then competes with no endorsement. If she/he receives a percentage of the vote greater than the endorsement threshold (60%, 66.6%, 90%, whatever), she/he is endorsed. If not, there is no endorsement.
Steve raised some other concerns. First, that the counting process for IRV will take awhile. This is true, though maybe it wouldn't take as long as Steve thinks. It's easy enough to build an agenda that gives time for this counting, either in the form of a break or by moving on to other business (platform items, etc.)
Second, Steve writes: "from the delegates perspective, I think most support one person and don't really start thinking of who else might be okay until it becomes evident that their candidate isn't drawing anymore votes. I think it's going to require a complete change in mind-set to say on the first ballot that someone else other than his or her most-favored candidate is okay too."
This could be one of the greatest advantages to IRV in a convention setting. It gives delegates an incentive to consider the positives and negatives of all candidates before the convention. This mental process can keep things from getting terribly divisive: every candidate is running not just for every delegates first choice, but their second choice as well. Sometimes it helps to give people a procedural reason to be nice to one another.
Additionally, one of the greatest virtues of IRV elections is that electors cast votes based on their actual preferences, not on their perceptions of a given candidate's chances. The process of candidates evidently not drawing enough support and therefore losing support seems to me the exact sort of distortion of voting behavior we'd all want to avoid. Delegates should be deciding on their perceptions of the candidates' skills, positions, and experience, right?
I hope this helps. I believe one thing that all parties and partisans should be able to come together on is having the very best possible democratic processes, both intra- and interparty.
Robin Garwood
FVM board member
Cam Gordon supporter
Seward
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