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My favorite quote: > In multi-party systems, voters get the satisfaction of voting for smaller, ideologically purer factions — environmental parties, anti-immi

My favorite quote: > In multi-party systems, voters get the satisfaction of voting for smaller, ideologically purer factions — environmental parties, anti-immigrant parties, and so on. The impure compromises come when those factions are forced to form coalitions large enough to govern. The inevitable tradeoffs are part of the governing process, not the electoral process. In America, by contrast, the coalitions are the parties. Our system also produces alternation of power, and requires compromises among competing interests, but those compromises happen within long-standing caucuses; issues come and go, but the two parties remain. This forces the citizens themselves to get involved in the disappointing tradeoffs, rather than learning about them after the fact. No one gets what they want in a democracy; two-party systems simply rub voters’ noses in that fact. I've been wishing for IVR precisely because I want third parties to be viable, but this is an interesting point. You still have to have coalitions within government. Although maybe if there were more single-issue parties, they could push through change on issues that the other parties care less about.

thaumasiotes 10y ago
That's a great quote. Interestingly, it strongly conflicts with the first several paragraphs of the article: > For all the eloquence and passion and rage in these arguments, however, they suffer from a common flaw: there is no such thing as a protest vote. > In 2016, that system will offer 130 million or so voters just three options: > A. I prefer Donald Trump be President, rather than Hillary Clinton. > B. I prefer Hillary Clinton be President, rather than Donald Trump. > C. Whatever everybody else decides is OK with me. > That’s it. Those are the choices. All strategies other than a preference for Trump over Clinton or vice-versa reduce to Option C. > People who believe in protest votes do so because they confuse sending a message with receiving one. > But it doesn’t matter what message you think you are sending, because no one will receive it. No one is listening. The system is set up so that every choice other than ‘R’ or ‘D’ boils down to “I defer to the judgement of my fellow citizens.” Those paragraphs of invective are accurate as to the election, but they are not accurate at all as to US policy -- for the reasons described in your quote! The R and D policy platforms shift over time, as the vote share associated with the existing platforms moves away from 50%. Those "meaningless" protest votes are watched carefully by party operatives, because they are signals that guide what policies the parties shift to.

thaumasiotes 10y ago

That's a great quote. Interestingly, it strongly conflicts with the first several paragraphs of the article: > For all the eloquence and passion and rage in these arguments, however, they suffer from a common flaw: there is no such thing as a protest vote. > In 2016, that system will offer 130 million or so voters just three options: > A. I prefer Donald Trump be President, rather than Hillary Clinton. > B. I prefer Hillary Clinton be President, rather than Donald Trump. > C. Whatever everybody else decides is OK with me. > That’s it. Those are the choices. All strategies other than a preference for Trump over Clinton or vice-versa reduce to Option C. > People who believe in protest votes do so because they confuse sending a message with receiving one. > But it doesn’t matter what message you think you are sending, because no one will receive it. No one is listening. The system is set up so that every choice other than ‘R’ or ‘D’ boils down to “I defer to the judgement of my fellow citizens.” Those paragraphs of invective are accurate as to the election, but they are not accurate at all as to US policy -- for the reasons described in your quote! The R and D policy platforms shift over time, as the vote share associated with the existing platforms moves away from 50%. Those "meaningless" protest votes are watched carefully by party operatives, because they are signals that guide what policies the parties shift to.