Range Voting

[kevin_standlee]

The folks advocating Range Voting contacted WSFS (actually, the WSFS webmaster, sfrose) lobbying WSFS to change its voting system from the Instant Runoff Voting system we currently use for site selection and the Hugo Awards. Sharon told them how our rules work and suggested that if they want to change them, they come to WSFS business meetings and propose and debate the changes there, like all other rule changes. The advocate's response, in my opinion, amounted to, "Our proposal is so obviously Right that we shouldn't have to do all that hard, expensive work. You should change your rules because we tell you to do so."

I often tell people who come to me with rules-change proposals, "If you think it's worthwhile, come and submit it yourself. I'll help you with all of the technicalities to the best of my ability, but you have to make your own case, lobby people yourself, and get the votes by convincing people." Most of the time, this discourages them -- democracy is hard work! But sometimes we get people who are willing to work and debate, and sometimes we even get workable changes and improvements.

WSFS rules are intentionally designed to be resistant to change; however, they can be changed if people work hard enough at it. But it's not enough to just lobby a Board of Directors or subvert the Chairman; you have to convince the members.

Comments

Re: Range Voting

[tanngrisnir.livejournal.com]

You keep talking about science.

Looking at the range voting pages you refer to, I see the same word all over the place: "assumption". I see no actual studies of the use of range voting, only computer simulations based on assumptions.

Assumptions are not scientific evidence.

Re: Range Voting

[thebrokenladder.livejournal.com]

Well, Range Voting is monotonic, and FBLE compliant and IIA compliant - these things are all considered significant in voting method science, and this is not based on any assumptions; these things are mathematically provable.

When doing social utility efficiency calculations, we have to make assumptions about what percentage of voters are strategic vs. honest, and informed vs. ignorant, and how many candidates will run in the election, etc. etc. The point is that we varied these assumptions from 100% strategic, over a range to 100% honest, and the same with the other variables. In all of the combinations of parameters, Range Voting beat out the other systems. So don't take the word "assumption" the wrong way. The point is that Range Voting hugely outperforms other methods, no matter what we assume. If we assume that voters will be 100% informed about the candidates but also 100% strategic instead of honest, Range Voting kills the other methods. If we assume 50% of voters will be strategic and 50% will be honest, Range Voting kills the other methods. What Warren Smith expected, when he started out doing these simulations, is that in some models, Range Voting would win, but in other models it would lose, and then it would be a process of trying to find out which of those assumptions was the most like reality, so that we could determine which voting methods really were best. But quite to his surprise, Range Voting won in all of them, like I said. That's why he became such a zealous promoter of this method, and why I think quite highly of it also. Then the more you learn about it, the more wonderful properties it exhibits. It can be done on standard voting machines, IRV can't. Things like that. They just all add up, and then it becomes overwhelming.

And mind you, our real world exit polls show that Range Voting is easy to use - yes, even for voters in a small town in southeast Texas - and that it produces more fair representation of minor parties and independents.

Check out recent results from our online poll, with 1500 people: http://RangeVoting.org/2008.html and see how much better minor party candidates do, because there's not a significant incentive not to give them sincere ratings.