Comments on: Bercow and burying bad news http://www.theliberati.net/quaequamblog/2009/06/23/bercow-and-burying-bad-news/ “ferocity with a purpose” Sat, 13 Mar 2010 20:30:54 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 hourly 1 By: Joe Otten http://www.theliberati.net/quaequamblog/2009/06/23/bercow-and-burying-bad-news/comment-page-1/#comment-214782 Joe Otten Wed, 24 Jun 2009 08:27:24 +0000 http://www.theliberati.net/quaequamblog/?p=2543#comment-214782 Borda is in my view deeply flawed. There is too great a temptation to mark down likely rivals to your preferred candidate, with the result that somebody nobody wants may be elected. Famously, when this objection was put to Borda, his response was "my system is designed for honest gentlemen". I've heard the claims that it produces a more consensual result, and that is clearly the intention as it infers and seeks to use strength of preference information. But this could just be a recipe for a minority who claim a stronger preference to outvote a majority who do not. Majority choice seems to be even worse in this respect. A Condorcet type system would be a slight improvement on AV, but to enforce a real bipartisan choice would take something like the system used in the Northern Ireland Assembly. Eg, use AV, but count each side of the house separately and exclude at each round the candidate with the lowest percentage of the vote on either side of the house. The eventual winner has the higher lower percentage of the last two. Borda is in my view deeply flawed. There is too great a temptation to mark down likely rivals to your preferred candidate, with the result that somebody nobody wants may be elected. Famously, when this objection was put to Borda, his response was “my system is designed for honest gentlemen”.

I’ve heard the claims that it produces a more consensual result, and that is clearly the intention as it infers and seeks to use strength of preference information. But this could just be a recipe for a minority who claim a stronger preference to outvote a majority who do not.

Majority choice seems to be even worse in this respect.

A Condorcet type system would be a slight improvement on AV, but to enforce a real bipartisan choice would take something like the system used in the Northern Ireland Assembly. Eg, use AV, but count each side of the house separately and exclude at each round the candidate with the lowest percentage of the vote on either side of the house. The eventual winner has the higher lower percentage of the last two.

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