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Without runoff elections its always going to veer towards a two party system. It would work if we did two votes: vote first for who you want, then second vote f

by dangero 10y ago

Without runoff elections its always going to veer towards a two party system. It would work if we did two votes: vote first for who you want, then second vote for the best choice from top two.

smokeyj 10y ago
Which leads to the next question. Why are we voting for a human at all? If members of an organization want a resolution passed anyone should be able to propose it - and if the magic threshold is met - then whala - the resolution is law. I want to be able to vote everyday. I want to be able to pick who I want to represent my vote - and change it at will. I want to be able to pick Bill Gates to represent me on technology issues, and Sal Khan to represent me on education. Government is just an organization, and an organization is a network. We should be using computer science terms to describe how we want this network to operate in terms of resolution, latency, redundancy, centralization/decentralization, upgrade protocls, failovers, and so on. What I'm trying to say is.. Let's purge the politicians and put the people in charge.
- dangero 10y ago
  I agree the replacement for current democracy is more technology based with provable transparency. Bitcoin's decentralized ledger breathes a lot of life into this concept.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- nebabyte 10y ago
  > If members of an organization want a resolution passed anyone should be able to propose it - and if the magic threshold is met - then whala - the resolution is law. ...You just described the legislative branch. Direct democracy has its own problems; even if you scale for proportions of people, the people leading their everyday lives do not have the time to inform themselves en masse of particulars about issues, and thus would be readily swayed by false information. (As can already be seen with voting on ballot measures, which are a headache enough just being statewide) And *viola
  - pikzen 10y ago
    *voila. Unless you really meant "raped", but for some reason I feel like this isn't it :^)
    - nebabyte 10y ago
      Touché. Though at least I was closer than he was :)
  - Spoom 10y ago
    Direct democracy tends to lead to tyrannies of the majority. I'd much prefer a multi-party system with some form of instant-runoff voting or mixed member proportional voting. *voila, as the French: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/voil%C3%A0 https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/voil%C3%A0
    - vkou 10y ago
      Representative democracy leads to tyrranies of the oligarchy. We don't need any more evidence for this. I too, however, would prefer a run-off election.
nitrogen 10y ago
Seems approval voting would be easy and predictable based on http://zesty.ca/voting/sim/ http://zesty.ca/voting/sim/
- ranger207 10y ago
  Interactive graphs based on that research: http://ncase.me/ballot/ http://ncase.me/ballot/
veidr 10y ago
There's a brilliant, modern solution to this problem, and if the failed US democracy that I was born into can be fixed, I think this will be one of the cornerstones: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instant-runoff_voting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instant-runoff_voting It's often called RCV (Ranked Choice Voting) because that's what it was dubbed in Maine, the only US state so far to approve a plan to implement it. It rolls the runoff(s) into one vote, and leaves the drudgery to computers (could be done by schoolchildren manually, though, or whatever).
slededit 10y ago
Its actually more surprising regions haven't figured out they can create their own voting blocs and gain outsized influence. This happens in Canada with the Bloc Quebecois basically being Quebec's political party in Canada. They trade votes on other things for concessions with Quebec. Scotland has done similar things.

by dangero 10y ago

Without runoff elections its always going to veer towards a two party system. It would work if we did two votes: vote first for who you want, then second vote for the best choice from top two.

smokeyj 10y ago

Which leads to the next question. Why are we voting for a human at all? If members of an organization want a resolution passed anyone should be able to propose it - and if the magic threshold is met - then whala - the resolution is law. I want to be able to vote everyday. I want to be able to pick who I want to represent my vote - and change it at will. I want to be able to pick Bill Gates to represent me on technology issues, and Sal Khan to represent me on education. Government is just an organization, and an organization is a network. We should be using computer science terms to describe how we want this network to operate in terms of resolution, latency, redundancy, centralization/decentralization, upgrade protocls, failovers, and so on. What I'm trying to say is.. Let's purge the politicians and put the people in charge.

dangero 10y ago
I agree the replacement for current democracy is more technology based with provable transparency. Bitcoin's decentralized ledger breathes a lot of life into this concept.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
nebabyte 10y ago
> If members of an organization want a resolution passed anyone should be able to propose it - and if the magic threshold is met - then whala - the resolution is law. ...You just described the legislative branch. Direct democracy has its own problems; even if you scale for proportions of people, the people leading their everyday lives do not have the time to inform themselves en masse of particulars about issues, and thus would be readily swayed by false information. (As can already be seen with voting on ballot measures, which are a headache enough just being statewide) And *viola
- pikzen 10y ago
  *voila. Unless you really meant "raped", but for some reason I feel like this isn't it :^)
  - nebabyte 10y ago
    Touché. Though at least I was closer than he was :)
- Spoom 10y ago
  Direct democracy tends to lead to tyrannies of the majority. I'd much prefer a multi-party system with some form of instant-runoff voting or mixed member proportional voting. *voila, as the French: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/voil%C3%A0 https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/voil%C3%A0
  - vkou 10y ago
    Representative democracy leads to tyrranies of the oligarchy. We don't need any more evidence for this. I too, however, would prefer a run-off election.

nitrogen 10y ago

Seems approval voting would be easy and predictable based on http://zesty.ca/voting/sim/ http://zesty.ca/voting/sim/

ranger207 10y ago
Interactive graphs based on that research: http://ncase.me/ballot/ http://ncase.me/ballot/

veidr 10y ago

There's a brilliant, modern solution to this problem, and if the failed US democracy that I was born into can be fixed, I think this will be one of the cornerstones: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instant-runoff_voting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instant-runoff_voting It's often called RCV (Ranked Choice Voting) because that's what it was dubbed in Maine, the only US state so far to approve a plan to implement it. It rolls the runoff(s) into one vote, and leaves the drudgery to computers (could be done by schoolchildren manually, though, or whatever).

slededit 10y ago

Its actually more surprising regions haven't figured out they can create their own voting blocs and gain outsized influence. This happens in Canada with the Bloc Quebecois basically being Quebec's political party in Canada. They trade votes on other things for concessions with Quebec. Scotland has done similar things.