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Category: Ranked-choice voting

Notes on preferential voting in America, emphasizing developments from about 1990 to present.

Some key points from “More Parties or No Parties”

Photo by Phil Howe. Book available for purchase and in Oxford Scholarship Online.

The space of politics is multidimensional. What we call “left” and “right” are negotiated positions.

Interest groups (broadly understood) do the negotiating. They are assumed to want control of government. They form coalitions to get it.

Every democracy has some coalition structure, even if it does not track party division.

‘Shifting coalitions’ lead to electoral reform: incumbent groups seeking insulation, out-of-power groups seeking realignment, or opposing groups seeking to discipline noncommittal players (a polarizing mode).

Electoral reform is change in any of five electoral-system components: assembly size, district magnitude, ballot type, allocation rules, and rules about nominations.

Two-party politics makes it tempting to cater to factions, not parties, when proposing and designing reforms. Witness the current emphasis on ballot type and nominations (ranked-choice, approval voting, nonpartisan primaries). Witness the unpopularity (outside political science) of allocation rules that presume party grouping (such as party-list proportional representation, including mixed-member).

In the past, reformers promoted single transferable vote (STV) and ranking generally in order to cater to factions, not parties.

In other countries, multiparty politics facilitates use of ranked-choice: giving voters understandable entities to rank, instructing voters on how to rank (vote management), regulating candidate entry (vote management), and generating political will to administer a complex system.

In the United States, ranked-choice reforms tended to last as long as the coalitions that imposed them.

Vote management was imperfect and slow to emerge. It usually involved a bipartisan coalition that sold itself in “good government” terms.

Due to vote management, STV produces winners who usually would be the same under open-list proportional representation (OLPR).

An exception is when the coalition structure shifts, such that some voters do not rank candidates in the way that party (or interest-group) leaders might want. Said voters are part of a coalition structure that is different from the prevailing one.

If the alternative coalition deprives “left” and “right” of control of government, they may join in blaming the electoral system. This can lead to a polarizing repeal episode.

Reasons for abandonment of majoritarian ranked-ballot rules are not yet well-understood. One theme in the literature is ranking truncation. Another is the production of surprise results. These may have reinforced each other: many voters not ranking very many choices, determined candidates capitalizing on this.

The repeal of early ranked-choice systems left in place features that had been needed to pass ranked-choice. These include nonpartisan ballots, numbered-post elections, and single-digit assemblies.

This post also appeared at on Medium.

The darkness of anti-party reform

Compare this recent comment from Nevada…

It may take some time to educate voters, but that’s OK if it allows us to break away from this wretched two-party system, in which both parties put forth horrible candidates.

…to an older one from 1911:

The Grand Junction plan has destroyed all municipal political machines. It provides for non-partisan nominations by twenty-five individual petitioners. The headless non-partisan and short ballot was adopted. Such a ballot results practically in an educational qualification for voters, and greatly reduces the number of ignorant and corrupt votes.

What is new (and not) about the proposed Portland charter?

Not much is new — except for combining staggered elections, via the single transferable vote (STV), with a mayor-council system.

An opponent of the proposed Portland (OR) charter writes:

This combination of multi-member districts and ranked choice voting, which has never been tried in any other large U.S. city, is being sold on the idea that it would promote racial, ethnic and gender diversity. But I for one am not buying. Before you decide that Portland, of all places, needs such a convoluted process to avoid electing only white males, take a look at the makeup of our current city council.

The key features of the proposed charter are: elections via STV in multiple multi-seat districts, council expansion from 5 to 12 seats, staggered elections (two districts at a time), nonpartisan elections, and a separately elected mayor.

STV in a “large U.S. city” clearly is not new. Some large cities have been New York (1937-47), Cincinnati (1925-57), and Worcester (MA, 1949-61). Those date ranges are from first election to repeal. Cincinnati was the 18th largest city in the U.S. at the time it repealed STV. Worcester was (and remains) the second-largest city in New England. All three are key cases from my book. There were other large cities.

STV used across multiple multi-seat districts in a large U.S. city also is not new. Cleveland (1923-31), West Hartford (1921-3), and New York City each had multiple multi-seat districts. West Hartford was not that large, but the other two certainly were. (In modern times, Eastpointe [MI] and Albany [CA] have adopted STV with multiple multi-seat districts.)

What about STV for a large assembly? Most cases had councils of 7 or 9 seats. New York City’s fluctuated with voter turnout, owing to use of a fixed quota (75,000 valid first-choice votes), and ranged from 17 (1943) to 26 seats (1937). Cleveland’s assembly had 25 members.

What about STV with staggered elections? Boulder (CO, 1917-47) had these — 3 of 9 seats at a time. (In modern times, Eastpointe [MI] uses STV with staggered elections.)

What about STV with a separately elected mayor? See New York City. All other cases had the council-manager form of government.

So, New York City comes closest to having what Portland might — minus NYC’s Board of Estimate, party endorsements on ballots, and fixed quota — and minus Portland’s staggered elections.

Also interesting is Portland’s current charter, which originated (1913) in an earlier movement for ‘majority-preferential’ elections. Pro- and anti-party reformers alike decried this reform package — including when it came with runoffs instead — which was based on numbered-post elections:

“[T]he fatal defect in all these systems is that they do not provide for minority representation,” wrote one reformer. “All of them eliminate all minorities from the governing body, either council or commission. This defect the proportional representation system will remedy.”

The above critique led directly to the “representative council” plan of local government, a.k.a. council-manager with STV elections. (Note: “all these systems” above also referred to council-manager government without proportional representation.)

So, from the perspective of replacing numbered-post elections with STV, Portland is doing what some old reformers advised. (Eastpointe [MI] did the same when it adopted STV in 2019.)

If you are interested in the Portland charter fight, Jay Lee and Maja Harris (blog) are excellent to follow.

Cross-endorsement fusion is better than instant runoff (and approval)

I spent a chunk of Memorial Day weekend writing up some thoughts on fusion. They apparently are part of this case (which does not affect my views). Here is the opening paragraph:

I have been asked to share some thoughts on political parties, democratic stability, and the relationship of each to ballot fusion (understood here to mean cross-endorsement). What follows is based on my doctoral education and ongoing research into so-called ‘multiparty reforms.’ A key theme will be that the number of parties matters less than whether the electoral rules facilitate coalition, then make such coalitions unambiguously known to voters. Cross-endorsement fusion has desirable properties on both fronts: promoting coalition, then telling voters on the ballot what coalition they aim to place in control of government.

The ideas in the ‘expert report’ are based partly on material from an early draft of my book, but which I decided to save for stand-alone publication.

That part of the book deals with “making reform work,” especially against the joint backdrop of presidentialism and the Electoral College. I might as well share the language now.

No consideration of multiparty American democracy is complete without attention to the presidential system of government. There are two big problems: the Electoral College unit rule, then the so-called separation of powers. I will suggest ballot fusion as a way to deal with both. The reason is that it promotes more efficient bargaining than the leading alternatives, namely, ranked-choice voting and runoffs.

In the American system of presidential elections, a third-party candidacy poses two big threats. One is that the trailing candidate may win the election — not only because the system advantages low-population states, but also due to spoilers in electorally pivotal states. Another is that there may not be a majority in the Electoral College, throwing the decision to the House of Representatives (where each state delegation votes in block). The strongest institutional explanation for our two-party system is the “unit rule” allocation of a state’s electors to the popular-vote winner in said state. This system solidified in 1836, not accidentally alongside the two-party system itself (E. J. Engstrom 2004). Had we become democratic in the era of multiparty democracy, it is likely we would use some other method to elect the President. Clearly, if we are to have majority rule and multiparty government, there needs to be some new mechanism for presidential elections.

With either problem, the issue is to promote bargaining, leading to some coalition with majority support. One possible option is electoral fusion. Under fusion, two or more parties nominate a single candidate, and voters may support that candidate on as many ballot lines as there are nominating parties.

Fusion is not the same cross-filing, which allows the candidate to choose which party labels appear near their name (Masket 2009) […]

Fans of other systems (e.g., runoffs, single-seat RCV) may counter that their preferred remedies achieve the same result. […] One thing is certain, however. Under fusion, the incentive is for two or more parties to agree on just one candidate. They do not compete for votes: first-choice, second-choice, or otherwise. Rather, they pool effort behind victory for the coalition. Evidence also suggests that fusion increases voter turnout, mainly by mobilizing voters who do not turn out for either major party (Michelson and Susin 2004; Kantack 2017). For more information on fusion, including its history in American elections, see a comprehensive book by Lisa Disch (2002).

At this point, some may note that no proposal deals with the Senate. Even if we can design a system for multiparty coalition within the separation of powers, the Senate still entrenches a minority veto. Further, the critical determinant of this veto — an equal number of Senators per state, regardless of population — cannot be removed from the Constitution.

My expert report only deals indirectly with the presidentialism issues above.

Back to the future: ‘nonpartisan’ proportional representation

Yesterday, I received an email from the Open Primaries organization. It included the following words. What’s interesting is the suggestion that proportional representation (PR) be designed to cater to independents. Independent-politics reformers typically oppose PR, and PR supporters typically have party proportionality in mind.

There is an accelerating conversation about electoral reform happening. Proportional representation, ranked choice voting, nonpartisan and open primaries, nonpartisan redistricting (and more) are all hot topics.

We’re particularly interested in conversations, campaigns and activities that bridge the gap between structural reform and rising independence. For reform to be maximally effective it needs to be grounded completely in where the American people are and where they are headed.

And they are going independent!

Chapter 3 of More Parties or No Parties documents a similar fusion at the height of the Progressive Era. It didn’t end well!