Smith Primary to Approval
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Two-stage voting systems seem like a hard sell in the USA. However, I think a two-stage system is an extremely natural way to satisfy principles of majority rule and self governance.
My opinion is that an ideal single-winner system consists of a first round (or primary) of rank-based voting. If there is a Condorcet winner, no second round is needed. This can be decided easily by a run of B2R and checking if the winner is Condorcet.
Otherwise, the Smith set can be computed and made public. Once known, a second round of approval voting can be run over the Smith set.
Does this have any objectionable properties other than requiring two rounds of voting?
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Offhand, I don't see any reason to object, provided that the primary election method conforms to Shentrup/Frohnmayer balance.
Is it compliant with the favorite-betrayal condition? Does that matter much?
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On the technical properties there are no issues here.
On the practical considerations there are a number.
- It requires explaining the Smith Set
- It requires explaining Condorcet winners
- It requires explaining Approval voting.
- It requires introducing two new voting methods , with two different ballot types, each with different instructions, at the same time.
I recommend having one voting method only. If you want to have a primary and general then use the same good method for both and don't narrow it down too much before the general. That's actually simpler and will get much broader support from stakeholder factions and minor parties who want real choices on the general election ballot.
Condorcet is accurate enough to just skip the primary all together unless there are too many candidates. If you want Condorcet with a simple tiebreaker why not just make the tiebreaker between the finalists (tied candidates) automatic in the event that it's even needed? In the tiebreaker, each voters ballot counts as a vote for their favorite(s) still in the running. If a voter ranked two candidates equally that would count as a vote for both. The finalist with the most votes wins.
The tiebreaker never even has to be explained. It's literally just a built in tiebreaker like a Plurality provision might call for a drawing of lots or a coin toss, but the ballots already have the tiebreaker info they need so it can be done instantly.
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@sarawolk I can envision a natural progression as: (1) implement straight approval, (2) eventually indicate the shortcomings of approval in guaranteeing election of Smith set candidates, (3) reform to include a ranked primaries to restrict to the Smith set before the final approval vote.
I agree it is not feasible to implement the kind of change needed for the mentioned kind of system all at once.
If approval were established somehow, the (rational, IMO) debate relevant to (2) and (3) would probably be about majoritarianism versus participation and maybe some tactical considerations.
Your point about tie-breaking is fair. For example, why not use Bucklin voting restricted to the Smith set, adjusting ranks to include only those candidates, which is similar to your suggestion. One major reason in that specific case is because it fails independence of clones.
I’m not necessarily just after a simple tie breaker. My concern is with reconciling majority cycles, which can destabilize the system. Something like approval in a second round enables the competing majorities to compromise more directly with full information. Otherwise a true majority may feel jilted by an arbitrary tie breaking rule.
