6 ms·

Well, because two-party systems are an emergent phenomena of First-Past-The-Post voting (Duverger's law), any move away from FPTP would favor third parties. Al

Well, because two-party systems are an emergent phenomena of First-Past-The-Post voting (Duverger's law), any move away from FPTP would favor third parties. Almost immediately, the GOP and the DNC would start losing votes to the Libertarian party and the Green party, so they'll both rally against any change to the existing system. Any major shift toward better voting systems will have to start in local elections where voters are fed up with both parties. Maine is doing an awesome job leading the way on the state-level.

vmchale 6y ago
I'm not sure they'd lose elections though.
- lallysingh 6y ago
  Agreed. Libertarians will probably put Republicans as preference 2, and similarly for Green -> Dems. It should, however, get more people out to vote, and that's a good thing. It also gives hard feedback to the parties about their constituent's real politics. If a party wins but sees their votes mostly coming from #2 preferences, the next round of primaries will probably shift further from the center. Similarly, if they see themselves as #1, they can shift back towards the center.
  - nickff 6y ago
    I agree with your first statement, but: "It should, however, get more people out to vote, and that's a good thing." is not necessarily true, though you're presenting it as axiomatic. Currently, the average voter is poorly informed, the marginal voter is uninformed, and the non-voters are misinformed. I challenge you to read any book about voter ignorance and come away with your current view.[1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Against_Democracy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Against_Democracy
    - clairity 6y ago
      you don't have to have perfect information spread throughout a population to make good collective decisions amongst it. it's ok if much of the electorate is somewhat ignorant or poorly informed, as long as that's relatively uncorrelated (i.e., there's no systemic coercion of choice). but that's exactly what parties are designed to subvert to their advantage. so then, what we need to do is to do everything we can to move away from party politics, including better voting mechanisms and removing the outsized influence of money in politics.
      - nickff 6y ago
        The problem isn't systematic coercion of choice, it's widespread popular biases and a general lack of knowledge. If you are interested in improving democratic outcomes, you need to understand the individuals you're encouraging to vote.
        clairity 6y ago
        > "The problem isn't systematic coercion of choice, it's widespread popular biases..." what is "widespread popular biases" but systemic coercions? and no, we specifically don't need to understand individuals, just the systemic coercions (so we can counteract them).
        nickff 6y ago
        'Systemic coercion' implies outside influence; citizens suffer from a number of internal biases, entirely aside from outside issues. Please just take a look at some of the literature on voter ignorance.
        clairity 6y ago
        there's no reasonable evidence that people are too dumb/ignorant to make a good electorate. that's primarily ego talking. and we don't need to correct for internal biases over a population because, by definition, internal biases are uncorrelated. but you said "popular", which is a social bias that correlates beliefs.
  - reducesuffering 6y ago
    I feel compelled to note that while historically Libertarians have been more likely to vote for Republicans as second preference, I don't think that's true any more with the veer the Republican party has taken in the past 4 years of the administration.
    - rrrrrrrrrrrryan 6y ago
      The GOP's center of gravity has been shifting away somewhat from the views of its historical base. Over the past couple of decades, Libertarians aren't becoming Republicans, but Republicans are becoming Libertarians.
      - reducesuffering 6y ago
        That's an interesting perspective. I think it's still a bit of both. Yes, GOP has been shifting away from small-government, balanced budgets, and free trade, leaving the Libertarian platform to pick up those staunch proponents. However, the socially liberal aspects of the Libertarian party, like drug decriminalization, criminal justice reform, and gay marriage have been cornerstones of Libertarianism and Republicans would still be crossing over on those issues that haven't been a part of the historical Republican base. Another interesting difference is that the current Libertarian nominee's environmental platform is based on Nuclear, solar, and other renewables[0], in contrast to Republicans' usual Oil and Gas position. [0]https://jo20.com/issues/environment/ https://jo20.com/issues/environment/
- rrrrrrrrrrrryan 6y ago
  In the console video game world, there was a period of time when you either had an Xbox or a PlayStation, but everyone also had a Nintendo Wii as their second system. Some very casual gamers only had a Wii. It's not hard to imagine a local election where both the DNC and the GOP put forth lackluster, hyper-polarizing candidates, and a reasonable third party candidate who's everyone's #2 pick wins. It's not so much that these other systems would enable third party candidates to win, it's that they would reward less polarizing candidates with more broad appeal.
zajio1am 6y ago
Note that important part of forming two-party systems are single-member districts. It seems unlikely that just removing FPTP and keeping single-member districts changes this in a significant way.
- dane-pgp 6y ago
  A good example of a proportional (and thus multi-party) system that uses single-member districts is MMP[1]. You could argue, though, that this system doesn't fully keep single-member districts because some of the representatives are chosen from a national or regional list and such lists are effectively giant districts. There is still much to be said in support of non-FPTP single-member systems, though, since they allow factions within a party to break off and present their own policies. Even if such a splinter party never replaced the party it split from, it could still prevent the bigger party from becoming too complacent and reliant on being the lesser of two evils. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixed-member_proportional_representation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixed-member_proportional_repr...

vmchale 6y ago

I'm not sure they'd lose elections though.

lallysingh 6y ago
Agreed. Libertarians will probably put Republicans as preference 2, and similarly for Green -> Dems. It should, however, get more people out to vote, and that's a good thing. It also gives hard feedback to the parties about their constituent's real politics. If a party wins but sees their votes mostly coming from #2 preferences, the next round of primaries will probably shift further from the center. Similarly, if they see themselves as #1, they can shift back towards the center.
- nickff 6y ago
  I agree with your first statement, but: "It should, however, get more people out to vote, and that's a good thing." is not necessarily true, though you're presenting it as axiomatic. Currently, the average voter is poorly informed, the marginal voter is uninformed, and the non-voters are misinformed. I challenge you to read any book about voter ignorance and come away with your current view.[1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Against_Democracy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Against_Democracy
  - clairity 6y ago
    you don't have to have perfect information spread throughout a population to make good collective decisions amongst it. it's ok if much of the electorate is somewhat ignorant or poorly informed, as long as that's relatively uncorrelated (i.e., there's no systemic coercion of choice). but that's exactly what parties are designed to subvert to their advantage. so then, what we need to do is to do everything we can to move away from party politics, including better voting mechanisms and removing the outsized influence of money in politics.
    - nickff 6y ago
      The problem isn't systematic coercion of choice, it's widespread popular biases and a general lack of knowledge. If you are interested in improving democratic outcomes, you need to understand the individuals you're encouraging to vote.
      - clairity 6y ago
        > "The problem isn't systematic coercion of choice, it's widespread popular biases..." what is "widespread popular biases" but systemic coercions? and no, we specifically don't need to understand individuals, just the systemic coercions (so we can counteract them).
        nickff 6y ago
        'Systemic coercion' implies outside influence; citizens suffer from a number of internal biases, entirely aside from outside issues. Please just take a look at some of the literature on voter ignorance.
        clairity 6y ago
        there's no reasonable evidence that people are too dumb/ignorant to make a good electorate. that's primarily ego talking. and we don't need to correct for internal biases over a population because, by definition, internal biases are uncorrelated. but you said "popular", which is a social bias that correlates beliefs.
- reducesuffering 6y ago
  I feel compelled to note that while historically Libertarians have been more likely to vote for Republicans as second preference, I don't think that's true any more with the veer the Republican party has taken in the past 4 years of the administration.
  - rrrrrrrrrrrryan 6y ago
    The GOP's center of gravity has been shifting away somewhat from the views of its historical base. Over the past couple of decades, Libertarians aren't becoming Republicans, but Republicans are becoming Libertarians.
    - reducesuffering 6y ago
      That's an interesting perspective. I think it's still a bit of both. Yes, GOP has been shifting away from small-government, balanced budgets, and free trade, leaving the Libertarian platform to pick up those staunch proponents. However, the socially liberal aspects of the Libertarian party, like drug decriminalization, criminal justice reform, and gay marriage have been cornerstones of Libertarianism and Republicans would still be crossing over on those issues that haven't been a part of the historical Republican base. Another interesting difference is that the current Libertarian nominee's environmental platform is based on Nuclear, solar, and other renewables[0], in contrast to Republicans' usual Oil and Gas position. [0]https://jo20.com/issues/environment/ https://jo20.com/issues/environment/
rrrrrrrrrrrryan 6y ago
In the console video game world, there was a period of time when you either had an Xbox or a PlayStation, but everyone also had a Nintendo Wii as their second system. Some very casual gamers only had a Wii. It's not hard to imagine a local election where both the DNC and the GOP put forth lackluster, hyper-polarizing candidates, and a reasonable third party candidate who's everyone's #2 pick wins. It's not so much that these other systems would enable third party candidates to win, it's that they would reward less polarizing candidates with more broad appeal.

zajio1am 6y ago

Note that important part of forming two-party systems are single-member districts. It seems unlikely that just removing FPTP and keeping single-member districts changes this in a significant way.

dane-pgp 6y ago
A good example of a proportional (and thus multi-party) system that uses single-member districts is MMP[1]. You could argue, though, that this system doesn't fully keep single-member districts because some of the representatives are chosen from a national or regional list and such lists are effectively giant districts. There is still much to be said in support of non-FPTP single-member systems, though, since they allow factions within a party to break off and present their own policies. Even if such a splinter party never replaced the party it split from, it could still prevent the bigger party from becoming too complacent and reliant on being the lesser of two evils. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixed-member_proportional_representation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixed-member_proportional_repr...