Did Changes to Election Methods Hand Romney a Win?

Latest Republican Presidential Race is Being Closely Defined by Changes to Election Method Setup

Democracy, elections and voting at Democracy Chronicles

Election Methodology on Watch:

Recently, there was an article on Fair Vote’s webpage that discussed some of the recent changes in election methods used in the Republican Primary for President. Fair Vote is an impressive organization with some very specific recommendations for changes to election methodology that can be found on their website.

As Democracy Chronicles has just begun a series on election methodology, I would recommend taking a look at Fair Vote’s website and getting familiar with their proposals because we will be exploring the issue in depth in the coming months. The article, “The 2012 GOP Nomination Contest Affirms Value of New Rules”, is an interesting look at the impact of election methodology changes within the Republican Party.  The full article can be found here but I have pasted an interesting excerpt here:

In 2010, the Republican National Committee (RNC) changed its rules in order to delay the start of voting, to discourage the front-loading of state contests, and to allocate early states’ delegates by proportional representation instead of winner-take-all. Despite the usual anti-democracy talk of insiders who wished Romney could have eliminated his competition after just a few states had voted, the Republican National Committee’s Rules Committee this week handily rejected proposals to go back to a more compressed schedule full of winner-take-all primaries.

The article continues about election methods voting:

There can be little doubt that the meta-narrative of the 2012 Republican primary was the way in which Romney—despite an unrivaled ground operation, a redoubtable financial war chest, the powerful services of an “uncoordinated” Super PAC, the backing of the party establishment, and polls that designated him as the most competitive Republican against Obama—struggled. The question is why—and whether the process did more to rally the party around Romney than would have a quick knockout victory. As we turn to the general election, the answer to this question could be very important.