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I think I understand the way Debian’s Condorcet voting works, but my word it is not at all obvious! Are there better examples of ways in which results like thi

• jcranmer 7y ago
  Voting systems basically break down into two main processes: runoffs and Condorcet. In a runoff, you basically throw out failing candidates from the vote until you get a winner, with there being different criteria for who gets thrown out. In a Condorcet voting scheme, you instead consider all possible two-way races simultaneously. If one person wins all those races, they win the vote (Condorcet majority criterion). If such a person doesn't exist, different methods handle this scenario differently. A good way to think of it is like this. Runoff-style systems have the goal of maximizing happiness: prioritize giving more people their high-rank options. Condorcet-style systems have the goal of minimizing unhappiness: minimize giving people their low-rank options. If you have an electorate between two partisan candidates and a centrist candidate, most people are partisans who prefer their partisan candidate, and the partisans are roughly equivalent in strength, a runoff system is going to eliminate the centrist candidate first and give the election to a partisan, while a Condorcet system will find that more people prefer the centrist to the wrong partisan and give the election to the centrist.