Recommendations for using the appropriate voting systems in small groups including voting in organizations, clubs, committees, meetings, and even families
(Style edits on 8-26-14)
For voting in organizations, clubs, committees, meeting and even families, election method choice is very important. The choice of voting systems (often referred to as “methods”) depends on how similar the alternatives are, how strongly their merit-differences are felt. That determines, for instance, whether you insist on automatic majority rule enforcement, as opposed to just maximizing the liked-ness of the outcome. The choice is also influenced by how amicable the organization or voting situation is. That determines how compromising the voting system should be.
But, whether the decision is by consensus or voting, discussion is often very desirable before the decision is made. But there are times when it might not be: Maybe when people express their wishes in the discussion, some of the participants will feel obligated to give others their way. In those types of situations, voting, by secret ballot, might be preferable.
So, in any group, big or small, there can be situations where voting is the best way to make a collective choice. So let me suggest voting systems for various conditions with two main distinctions. The first:
1. When maximizing overall satisfaction is the important thing, more important than automatic majority rule. …and/or maximum count-ease is desired:
Use Approval or Score.
In Approval, each voter can approve one or more alternatives–as many as s/he wants to approve. To avoid vulnerability to people strategically taking advantage of previous voting, the ballots shouldn’t be displayed until they’re all voted. A voter approves an alternative by writing its name, or by marking a box next to its name, on a ballot.
In Score each voter gives to each alternative a rating from 0 to N, where N can be any pre-specified number. For instance, in 0-10 Score, each voter rates each alternative from 0 to 10. In 0-100 Score, each voter rates each alternative from 0 to 100.
Of course Approval amounts to 0-1 Score. Approval has the simplest and easiest handcount, but Score adds flexibility, allowing built in fractional ratings , which are useful when Approval’s yes/no would be difficult to decide, or when one desires to strategically give somewhat less than full support to a potential rival.
2. When automatic majority rule is desired:
Automatic majority rule is achieved by compliance with the Mutual Majority Criterion. Here is that criterion’s definition:
Definition of the Mutual Majority Criterion:
A mutual majority (MM) is a set of voters, comprising a majority of the voters, who all prefer a certain same set of alternatives to all of the other alternatives. That set of alternatives is their MM-preferred set. If a MM vote sincerely, then the winner should come from their MM-preferred set.
Definition of Sincere Voting:
A voter votes sincerely if s/he doesn’t vote an unfelt preference, or fail to vote a felt preference that the voting system in use would have allowed hir to vote in addition to the preferences that s/he actually did vote. To vote a felt preference is to vote X over Y when preferring X to Y. To vote an unfelt preference is to vote X over Y when not preferring X to Y.
But, compliance with MMC loses its meaning and value if members of a mutual majority are tempted to “defect” against each other, and/or are afraid to support each other’s alternatives because fear of being taken advantage of in that way. That situation is called the “chicken dilemma”. MMC compliance has value only with voting systems that don’t have the chicken dilemma.
Definition of the Chicken Dilemma:
Say your faction prefer A, and another faction prefer B. Your 2 factions, combined are a majority, and both detest C, strongly preferring A and B to C. The A voters help B, but the B voters don’t help A. Though the A voters are more numerous than the B voters, B wins, because the B voters took advantage of the A voters’ co-operativeness.
That’s the chicken dilemma. For any method more complicated than Approval or Score, there’s no excuse to have the chicken dilemma. All of the voting systems recommended here, other than the simple Approval and Score, meet the Mutual Majority Criterion and don’t have the chicken dilemma. The choice among the voting systems that give automatic majority rule depends on certain conditions, listed below:
2a) When conditions are amicable:
Then, you want a method that elects the Condorcet winner (CW) compromise (defined below). To not do so would be uncompromising and a bit inimical.
Definition of the Condorcet winner (CW) compromise (see Sincere Voting above):
X is socially preferred to Y if more voters prefer X to Y than prefer Y to X. The CW is an alternative that is socially preferred to each one of the other alternatives.
Definition of the Condorcet Criterion:
If there’s a CW, and if everyone votes sincerely, then that CW should win.
Compliance with the Condorcet Criterion guarantees that all majorities will be satisfied, as opposed to only mutual majorities. That property is desirable for amicable organizations and amicable voting situations. Additionally, a voting system that dis-satisfies some majority, however constituted, is vulnerable to replacement, when a majority of the participants demand its replacement.
Here are a few suggested Condorcet-Criterion-complying voting systems for amicable conditions when automatic majority rule is desired (If you want show-of-hands voting (or its Internet equivalent), and/or if there are many alternatives, no counting software, and little time, then do Sequential Pairwise Voting):
Sequential Pairwise Voting (SP):
Arrange the alternatives in a vertical list, in reverse order of their order of proposal. …or hold a Vote-For-1 balloting, and order the alternatives in reverse order of their vote-count scores. Vote between the top 2 alternatives in the list. The winner then goes against the next alternative in the list, in another 2-way vote., etc. Repeatedly, do a 2-way vote between the current winner and the next alternative in the list. The winner is the last remaining unbeaten alternative. (That’s the winner of the vote that includes the alternative at the bottom of this list).
SP has a number of important properties. Of course, like all of the voting systems recommended here, other than the simple Approval and Score, SP meets the Mutual Majority Criterion (MMC), and doesn’t have the chicken dilemma. Additionally, SP meets the Condorcet Criterion (defined above). It also meets the Smith Criterion, defined as the smallest set of alternatives that all are socially preferred to everything outside that set. If everyone votes sincerely, then the winner should come from the Smith set. Every method that meets the Smith Criterion also meets the Mutual Majority Criterion.
If you’re interested in an explanation of why SP doesn’t have the chicken dilemma, then here’s why:
If the B voters defect against A before it’s time to vote on B, then you (as an A-preferrer) will notice that, and you can penalize them by refusing to support B when it’s time to vote on B. If you’ve already helped B, before it’s time to vote on A, then the B voters will have no reason to defect against A, because B must have already been eliminated by losing its 2-way vote. …unless B’s 1st vote, after you’ve helped B, is between B and A, in which case it isn’t defection when the B voters sincerely vote B over A. In short, SP has no chicken dilemma.
Admittedly, if protection from defection is necessary, then SP requires you to protect yourself against that defection. Your protection consists of deterrence, where the would-be defector knows that you’ll retaliate if s/he defects. For that threat to be credible, it must be known that you’d retaliate even if it worsens your outcome. That need to protect yourself from defection, and that potential need to retaliate in a way that worsens your result, are a disadvantage of SP. But simplicity has its price. SP is simple and easily-counted, in comparison to the rank methods defined below.
Deluxe features, such as automatic defection-deterrence by the voting system, requires more elaborateness and count-labor. The deluxe methods described below are suitable if you have count software, or very few alternatives to choose among, or plenty of time for a time-consuming hand count. For the purpose of the rank methods defined below, X “beats” Y if more ballots rank X over Y than rank Y over X.
Definition of Benham’s method (also called “Benham” or “Condorcet-IRV”):
Do IRV until there is an un-eliminated alternative that beats each of the other un-eliminated alternatives. Elect hir.
Definition of IRV (Instant Runoff):
Repeatedly, cross off or delete from the rankings the alternative that tops the fewest rankings.
Of course (in plain IRV) the winner is the candidate who remains un-eliminated, when all but one have been eliminated.
(Of course, as soon as an alternative tops a majority of the rankings, that alternative is assured a win, by the above-stated rule, and so it can be immediately declared the winner.)
I recommend a website that will conduct, for you, a fully-automated poll, using Benham (also called Condorcet-IRV). The website has complete instructions for setting up a poll. As is pointed out at the website, its automated polling service can be used for voting by organizations and families. For those purposes, the website provides private polls, in which only certain selected individuals (members of the organization or family) can vote. Of course the results of those polls aren’t publicly viewable.
That website also allows you to set up a public poll, in which anyone can participate, and whose results anyone can view. But our topic here is voting in organizations and families, and, for that purpose, you want a private poll. I highly recommend the Condorcet Internet Voting Service, linked to above. It is operated by a Cornell University professor. Actually, polls at that website are countable by any of a variety of rank-count rules. To achieve the desirable criteria stated in this article, the best count rule at that website is Condorcet-IRV.
The way it works, when you set up your poll, you don’t specify a voting system (but of course you should tell the voters what count rule is official for that vote). When looking at the poll’s results, you choose count method by which you want the result to be displayed. Of course, because you’ve told your voters that it’s a Condorcet-IRV poll, then the relevant count-result to look at is the Condorcet-IRV count result.
Therefore, when you’re at the “results” page, check the box in the right margin, near the top. It will have a list of several rank-count rules. One of them is Condorcet-IRV. Each has a box in front of it that you can click on, to select that count rule.
The default count rule is “Schulze”. You want Condorcet-IRV, so click on Condorcet-IRV. Then the results displayed will be the Condorcet-IRV count results. In this article, that voting system is also referred to as “Benham”. So, the Condorcet Internet Voting Service makes it easy for an organization or family to very easily use one of the most deluxe voting systems.
Now, if you want to count the ballots yourself, then actually, SP is as good as Benham, and a lot easier to count. But Benham is deluxe, in the sense that it isn’t necessary for voters to observe and penalize defection, because Benham automatically penalizes defection. In Benham, it’s simply a matter of sincere ranking. A mutual majority have no reason to do other than rank sincerely. In fact no one has need to do other than rank sincerely. That’s also true of Woodall and Schwartz. Woodall is defined immediately below:
Definition of Woodall Method:
Do IRV till only one member of the initial Smith set remains un-eliminated. Elect hir.
For the purpose of this definition, the Smith set is defined in terms of actual votes:
X beats Y if more ballots rank X over Y than rank Y over X.
The Smith set is the smallest set of alternatives such that all the set’s alternatives beat everything outside the set.
Though both Benham and Woodall always choose from the Smith set, Woodall is more particular about which Smith set member it chooses. For that reason, Woodall achieves slightly better social utility than does Benham.
Definition of Schwartz Woodall for large electorates:
Schwartz Woodall is like Woodall, except that it uses the Schwartz set (defined below, after Schwartz Woodall) instead of the Smith set.
Those 2 sets are identical if there are no pairwise ties. But when there aren’t many voters, there can be pairwise ties. Then, the Schwartz set is a bit more exclusive than the Smith set. You can get into the Smith set by tying one of its members and beating all the non-Smith-set alternatives. That won’t get you into the Schwartz set. So the Schwartz set is more deluxe, for small-electorate voting.
Definition of Schwartz Woodall for small electorates:
Do IRV till only one member of the initial Schwarz set remains un-eliminated. Elect hir.
Let me define the Schwartz set. It has 2 equivalent definitions. Both definitions define the same set:
Beatpath definition of Schwartz set:
There is a beatpath from X to Y, if X beats Y, or if X beats A and
there is a beatpath from A to Y.
If there is a beatpath from Y to X, but not from X to Y, then X is not
in the Schwartz set.
Otherwise X is in the Schwartz set.
Unbeaten set definition of Schwartz set:
- An unbeaten set is a set of alternatives none of which are beaten by anything outside the set.
- An innermost unbeaten set is an unbeaten set that doesn’t contain a smaller unbeaten set.
- The Schwartz set is the set of alternatives that are in innermost unbeaten sets.
That is the end of Schwartz set definitions. I recommend Schwarz Woodall as the deluxe voting system for amicable conditions. Sequential Pairwise is really just as good, though not as deluxe. Sequential Pairwise is, of course, much easier to count. Benham and Woodall are discussed in a journal article by James Green-Armytage.
2b) When conditions are not amicable:
The a) methods (for amicable conditions) are ok under inimical conditions too. But the methods described below might be preferred.
Plain IRV, instead of Schwartz Woodall:
Plain IRV (defined above), like all of the methods recommended here, other than Approval and Score, meets the Mutual Majority Criterion and doesn’t have the chicken dilemma. IRV doesn’t always elect the CW compromise (defined above), making IRV less compromising, and maybe a bit inimical. But IRV is simpler to count than Schwartz Woodall, or Benham.
And, in inimical conditions, the CW compromise might even not be desired. It might be felt that only mutual majorities should be honored, and that there’s no need to compromise with voters who aren’t in a mutual majority, and that it isn’t necessary to let voters outside the mutual majority have a say in which mutual-majority-preferred alternative wins.
But be aware that a method that doesn’t meet the Condorcet Criterion could (as stated above) be vulnerable to replacement, if it results in a dis-satisfied majority who insist on replacing it with a method that meets the Condorcet Criterion (and therefore doesn’t dis-satisfy any majority, however constituted).
What if the organization or voting situation is inimical, and show-of-hands voting is desired, or there are many alternatives, no count-softare, and little time? Then I suggest:
Exhaustive Balloting, also called “Elimination Voting”:
Do a Vote-For-1 vote among all the alternatives. Eliminate the alternative that gets fewest votes. Repeat till only one alternative remains. (Actually, you might as well stop as soon as an alternative gets votes from a majority, because that alternative will win anyway.) Of course this could be done by show-of-hands, or its Internet equivalent. It’s even easier to count than IRV.
An advantage of Exhaustive Balloting, over Sequential Pairwise, is that Exhaustive Balloting automatically deters defection, and the voter doesn’t have to protect himself via a deterrent threat to retaliate. If the organization or voting situation is inimical, then there’s be greater chance of a need for that concern. That’s why Exhaustive balloting is likely to be better than Sequential Pairwise (SP) for inimical organizations or voting situations.
And, of course, an inimical organization or voting situation doesn’t need the compromising-ness of methods that meet the Condorcet Criterion. That’s why, when automatic majority rule is desired, and a simple and easy show-of-hands count is desired, I recommend SP for amicable organizations and voting situations, and Exhaustive Balloting (Elimination Voting) for inimical organizations and voting situations.
Those are my recommendations. All of them except for Approval and Score meet the Mutual Majority Criterion, and have no chicken dilemma.
Also see our entire section called Voting Methods Central.
Richard Fobes says
Currently the illustration that is labeled “score voting example” is a 1-2-3 ballot, not a score ballot.
I agree that in informal situations Approval voting is simple and works fine.
If access to a computer is available, there are lots of choices, almost all of which are better than the single-mark ballot that governments use.
There are two methods to avoid: (1) “Limited voting” where each voter has a specified number of “points” to distribute among the choices. (2) The “Borda count” method in which a voter is supposed to assign a number like 5 to their top choice, 4 to their next choice, and so on, and then the numbers for each choice are added and the choice with the highest sum is declared the winner. Alas, when the DIY approach is used to write software for a voting method, these two are the easiest to think of, so they are not uncommon to be used by people who do not understand election methods, yet they both are quite unfair.
Michael Ossipoff says
Richard Fobes writes:
[quote]
Currently the illustration that is labeled “score voting example” is a 1-2-3 ballot, not a score ballot.
[/quote]
I hadn’t noticed that before. Thanks for pointing it out. We’ll substitute a ratings ballot, or re-label that a rank-ballot.
[quote]
I agree that in informal situations Approval voting is simple and works fine.
[/quote]
Yes, Approval is always good enough, under any conditions. Approval is surely the best choice when we want to find what is considered _excellent_ by the most people–as when awarding the Oscar, for example, or family votes on movies to rent or attend. …or when we want to find out what is acceptable, rather than unacceptable to the most people.
But Approval is ok for all other votes too–just maybe not always the very best. When the important thing is to just find out what is liked by the most people, and all the voter wants to do is register what s/he likes, then, too, Approval can be regarded as the best, though, then, Score is a possibility too.
But when the voter feels a need for strategy, then we probably would prefer a voting system that automatically enforces majoritry-rule, even if only for a mutual majority (as does IRV). …or sometimes better yet, for all majorities, as do Benham, Woodall, and Schwartz Woodall.
But, in any vote in an organization, forum, or family, where count software isn’t available, and there are lots of alternatives (or where people don’t want to deal with a rank-count at all), then the easy count of Approval or Score could be a good choice.
Then, the objection that we’d like automatic majority rule can be answered by pointing this out
In an Approval or Score vote, even though you might not know what way of voting is optimal, in terms of the other voters’ votes (which are un-knowable before the results are in), you still know what _feels like your best guess_. If that doesn’t sound like much consolation, remember that the other voters are in the same boat. They don’t have better predictive informtion than you do, and so their voting strategy will have to be guessed, just like yours. And so you aren’t disfavored.
True, majority rule isn’t automatically assured, as it would be in good rank method, but automatic majority rule is as unavailable to your opponents as it is to you.
For that reason, Approval or Score is actually ok in any voting sitution. And the count-simplicity of Approval or Score could make it a good practical choice.
Yesterday I proposed a Score poll at electology.org, partly because Score is officially preferred by the forum membership, but partly because of the count-difficulty of the rank methods. I don’t know the best way to mark the ballot in my own poll, because (unless it’s simple matter of purely acceptable and unacceptable alternatives)that’s often how it is in Score and Approval. But, as i said, one person’s best guess is as good as another’s, and so no voter is at a disadvantage, and so there’s nothing unfair about Score’s lack of automatic majority rule enforcement.
[quote]
If access to a computer is available, there are lots of choices, almost all of which are better than the single-mark ballot that governments use.
[/quote]
Of course. And if a computer, with count software, isn’t availble, as is often the case, then you could still use Schwartz Woodall, Benham, or Woodall, with a handcount, if there are only a few alterntives. Or you could use IRV, which has the advantages that I told of in my article. You’d then be giving up the Condorcet Criterion, but Approval and Score don’t meet it either (though they often do better at electing Condorcet winners).
Another way to use a rank method, if you don’t have count software, would be to conduct your poll at the Condorcet Internet Voting Service, which I highly recommend. It can be reached at:
https://www.cs.cornell.edu/andru/civs.html
One of the rank-count methods they offer is Condorcet-IRV, and that’s the one that I recommend. You can set up a public poll or a private poll, and of course, for organizational or family voting, a private poll is what you’d want.
[quote]
There are two methods to avoid: (1) “Limited voting” where each voter has a specified number of “points” to distribute among the choices. (2) The “Borda count” method in which a voter is supposed to assign a number like 5 to their top choice, 4 to their next choice, and so on, and then the numbers for each choice are added and the choice with the highest sum is declared the winner.
[/quote]
Yes, I don’t recommend either of those.
Michael Ossipoff
Adrian Tawfik says
I fixed the image label. Thanks for the head’s up!
Jonah says
I loved this article — what a great resource! I’m in exactly the position of trying to recommend some sort of more expressive voting scheme for my Coop, as we’re currently firmly caught in the first-past-the-post chicken dilemma trap. I’m going to give CIVS a try, as I’m pretty sure we’re not quite amicable enough to do approval voting.
I did find that the various font sizes and text styles made it a bit hard to read, and did a disservice to the excellent content of the article. You might consider doing a typographical pass through the article.
Anonymous says
Hi Jonah–
Yes, CIVS is the best voting service that i know of. I’ve done many polls there, about political parties and categories of political parties.
You’ll find this out at the CIVS homepage, but when you use CIVS you can do a public poll or a private poll. For a private poll, your voters each receive a URL for the election. For a public poll, anyone could participate, and the poll will be published at the CIVS website if you so choose.
Of course you want a private poll, for the members of your co-op.
When you make a poll, you don’t designate a voting-system at CIVS. People cllcking on “results” will find a voting-systems menu at the upper right corner of the “results” page. Anyone thereby checking on results can have the poll counted for them, and the results reported below, by any of the four Condorcet rank-count rules that CIVS offers.
The one you want, to avoid chicken-dilemma, is Condorcet-IRV. That’s how it’s designated there. Another name for Condorcet-IRV, the name that I use, is Benham’s method. But my articles say everything about Benham that I could say here, so I might as well not repeat it here.
Condordet-IRV meets the Chicken-Dilemma Criterion (CD). The Chicken-Dilemma Criterion is defined at electowiki. Electowiki can be found by going to https://www.electorama.com, and then, at the upper right of the homepage, writing “Chicken-Dilemma Criterion” (maybe with or without the hyphen) in the search subject space, and clicking on “Search”.
Likewise, you can search there for “Benham’s method”, which, as I said, is another name for CIVS’s Condorcet-IRV.
So I agree that CIVS is your best choice for voting in your co-op.
Though CIVS doesn’t have you designate a voting-system, you, of course, should clarify to your co-op voters that the CIVS co-op voting will be officially counted by Condorcet-IRV.
In other words, tell them that the Condorcet-IRV result will be the official one.
Though CIVS is how I’d do the co-op voting, because of the deluxeness of Condorcet-IRV, I should say something about what you could use if you had to do the vote right in your meeting-hall, without a rank-count available. In that case, for your electorate, I’d suggest Show-of-Hands IRV, also known as Elimination-Voting. I defined it in my article that you referred to, and so there’s no need to restate the definition here.
But, on the other hand, the definition is so brief that, why not:
Show-of-Hands IRV:
Go throught the list of alternatives, one at a time, asking people to raise their hand if they want to the currently-pointed-to alternative. When they’ve all gotten that voting opportunity, then eliminate the one that got fewest votes.
Then vote on the remaining ones, as described above.
Repeat till there’ s only one left.
But, if you want to, you can stop when an alternative gets votes from a majority of the voters–because it would win anyway if you completed the count till only one was left.
[end of Show-of-Hands IRV definition]
While I’m at it, I might as well state, here, the brief definition of Condorcet-IRV (Benham’s melthod):
Condorcet-IRV:
First, the definition of (ballot) IRV:
Votrers rank alternatives in order of preference, equal ranking and short-rankings allowed.
An alternative tops a ranking if that ranking doen’t rank anything over it, and ranks it over something.
(Of course, if you rank X, and don’t rank Y, you’re ranking X over Y)
Determine which ranking currently tops the fewest rankings. Delete it from the rankings.
Repeat till only one alternative remains un-deleted. It wins.
Condorcet-IRV:
1. “X beats Y” means that the number of ballots ranking X over Y is greater than the number of ballots ranking Y over X.
2. Do IRV till there’s an un-deleted alternative that beats each one of the other un-deleted alternatives.
That alternative wins.
[end of Condorcet-IRV definition]
By the way, having suggested Condorcet-IRV, at CIVS, and having mentioned Show-of-Hands IRV, I’d like to mention a third possibility:
If people insisted on keeping the entire election and count in the meeting hall, and if you don’t have a computer count set up, but if you didn’t mind doing a public hand-count in the co-op meeting, then you could use IRV, via ballots, with a public handcount, observed by all members.
But I suggest that, if a local, entirely-in-the-meeting-hall count is desired, then it would be more convenient, easier, quicker to just do Show-of-Hands IRV, instead of ballot IRV.
Best wishes for your co-op and its collective decisionmaking.
Post here to report what you use, and how well it works for you, and what you ultimately like and choose, if you have time and inclinatioin to do so. The information would be of interest to our readers, and to me as well.
Michael Ossipoff
Jonah says
Thanks for the recommendations! I’ll bring my conclusions back here.
As a side note, I simulated the IRV failure in the Burlington VT mayoral election in CIVS & Condorcet-IRV, and as expected the correct winner was elected, rather than the disastrous result they got in real life. Nice to see theory and reality in agreement there!
Jonah says
(Coming back round trip on this)
I never got to try CIVS here. It happened that the contentious decision which seemed to warrant it was sort of made for us by some external circumstances changing. I did get some nice comments on the suggestion.
I can’t help but think that if people encounter ranked-choice voting in some parts of their lives, they’ll inevitably start wondering why we can’t elect our politicians in the same way! Here’s hoping…
Adrian Tawfik says
Thanks for your comments Jonah, I have learned a lot about setting up posts in WordPress and this article has now been edited to reflect the errors in font you were seeing. Unfortunately Im not done fixing all errors on previous posts. Much appreciated heads up though!
Jonah says
Nice, thanks!
Adrian Tawfik says
the theme is made by someone else. just go to contact us and send a message for more info!
Michael Ossipoff says
IJonah–
The main thing important thing is that you made the suggestion and that there was interest in it. If voting is needed again, people will be ready to consider CIVS. That’s an accomplshment in itself.
KYou wrote:
[quote]
I can’t help but think that if people encounter ranked-choice voting in some parts of their lives, they’ll inevitably start wondering why we can’t elect our politicians in the same way! Here’s hoping…
[/quote]
Yes it would be better if we could conduct our elections by a better voting system,. For all purposes, the best voting systems are rank-balloting methods, in my opinion. But different ones are best for different voting conditions (as described in my article about voting systems for various voting-conditions).
For public political elections, under current conditions? Approval would be good. ICT, a rank-balloting method, would be somewhat better. But really, for current conditions, where there’s dishonest disinformational media, and a gullible public, even the best rank methods aren’t much better than Approval.
Score (also called Range, or the Point System) seems to give better results than Approval.
Score and Approval would, of course, be easier to get than ICT.
But I don’t consider voting-systems for current conditions to be an important subject, because, under current conditions, i’s impossible to get any reform, including voting-system reform.
If we could elect a better party to office, such as the Greens or the Justice Party, then, in the resulting honest and legitimate government, we’d have honest, open media. And, because it would take a less gullible electorate to achieve that election-result, public gullibility wouldn’t any longer be a problem either.
For those two reasons, if we elected a better party to office, the disinformation-generated lesser-of-2-evils problem wouldn’t exist. I call that “The Green Scenario”.
In the Green Scenario, Instant Runoff (IRV) would be an excellent votiing system. Even better would be Benham’s method or Woodall’s method. Those are all rank-balloting voting systems, discussed in my articles here.
But, as I’ve discussed in my most recent Democracy Chronicles articles, the first thing we need, if we’re going to have any electoral success, is honest, verifiable vote-counting. ‘Without that, the elections are illegitimate. Everyone must demand verifiable vote-counting, or we get nowhere.
For that subject, I refer you to my last two articles at Democracy Chronicles.
Michael Ossipoff