4 ms·

Under the US system as it is, with first-past-the-post voting and all votes for a state going to the presidential candidate who got the most, a third party can'

by not2b 5y ago

Under the US system as it is, with first-past-the-post voting and all votes for a state going to the presidential candidate who got the most, a third party can't gain any traction. Worse, third parties under the US system are another vehicle for corruption (example: Republicans paying fees and collecting signatures to get Greens on the ballot to divide the left vote and get a Republican in office, though this problem could be fixed with some form of instant runoff). You'd need constitutional reform. While imperfect, I think that German electoral system is much better. Any party that gets 5% or more of the vote is guaranteed fair representation, gerrymandering isn't a possibility. However, in a multiparty system deals still have to be struck to put together governing coalitions, so a party that insists on being purist is likely to be shut out.

amznthrwaway 5y ago
The third party would need to get local traction first. This is the best way forward on a number of dimensions, but most third party candidates go national instead, because while it cannot effect change, it is substantially more profitable.
dane-pgp 5y ago
> to get Greens on the ballot to divide the left vote and get a Republican in office If people are serious about voting reform (and they should be) then this "spoiler effect" can be weaponized: start a grassroots campaign to vote third party until the Democrats support changing the voting system at the state level (and vote in primaries for Democrats who support this change). This may lead to few tight state races being lost, but that means that only a small percentage of the population would be enough to get the Democratic Party officials to take notice. To make the signal even more clear, the third party chosen should be one that focuses as narrowly as possible on voting reform, such as the Alliance Party[0], which may also encourage some disgruntled Republicans to temporarily lend their votes, whereas they would be more reluctant to support the Green Party, for example. Of course there is a danger that voting reform would get portrayed as a pro-Democrat policy (if it isn't already), but once enough Republicans (in majority Democrat states) have experience casting their ballot in a more expressive and representative system, it will be harder for Republicans in other states to oppose it. [0] https://www.theallianceparty.com/political_reform https://www.theallianceparty.com/political_reform
- godelski 5y ago
  To be honest, a lot of this is already happening and I don't think the Democrats care. When voter turnout is high, Democrats win hands down. When voter turnout is low, Republicans win. But the kicker is that both parties thrive when they are losing. This may often be counter intuitive to many people but I think many have bad priors when modeling the game that politicians are playing.
  - not2b 5y ago
    Actually, Democrats are generally in favor of instant runoff voting, and many more liberal places have enacted it. But yes, there are a lot of professional campaign consultants who have the system wired that they profit whether they win or lose, and many of those work for Democrats.
    - godelski 5y ago
      > Democrats are generally in favor To be clear are we talking about the politicians or the people? The people, yes. Politicians I'm not so sure about. Also I'd encourage you to read my other comment which addresses ordinal voting (like IRV) and the issues with them. It might be why the party likes it (still having vote splitting in the primaries).
- michaelmrose 5y ago
  We are looking at a republican party the majority of which would happily end democracy to end the threat of them ever being tossed out again. Tipping the scales in their direction at this critical juncture to motivate Democrats seems like a spectacularly bad idea. Seems like it would be a better and safer idea to to work towards the same goal using primaries to tilt already democratic districts in the direction of reformers.
godelski 5y ago
> While imperfect, I think that German electoral system is much better. I often see people compare the US system to European systems and use "party" in both. I think this results in a pretty bad comparison, but takes some nuance to understand why. Democrats and Republicans are more accurately compared to coalitions in European systems than they are to European parties. As a point, AOC or Bernie have very different political ideologies than say Pelosi or Biden, yet are in the same party. Similarly Trump is very different ideologically than say John Kasich. While there is variance within European political parties I believe that we see a larger variance within American parties and thus it makes it more accurate to compare to coalitions. In addition to this we should recognize that most European systems are working under a parliamentary system which causes this proportionate representation. We don't quite have a system like that in America and it would be tough to change the entire system. This is why many people, such as myself, are proposing systems like STAR or Approval. By being able to score (or rate) candidates (instead of ranking) we can achieve a proportionate representation with very minimal change, especially since systems like Approval already work on current voting machines. It is also a lot easier and more transparent compared to many round systems from ordinal voting. >(example: Republicans paying fees and collecting signatures to get Greens on the ballot to divide the left vote and get a Republican in office, though this problem could be fixed with some form of instant runoff But I also want to be clear about this. Ordinal systems (such as IRV/STV) fix this kind of spoiler there is another spoiler that is fairly important: the favorite betrayer. That is because the green party here is called a weak spoiler, they don't have a large voter base. But we need to also be VERY concerned with strong spoilers. For example: if Bernie ran against Biden. Ordinal systems are still vulnerable to this type of spoiler while cardinal systems are resistant to both strong and weak spoilers. Edit: I wanted to add that we actually saw strong spoilers in the 2016 and 2020 elections, in the primaries. In 2016 it happened in both parties. Bernie and Clinton were a split. Many people didn't vote Bernie because they thought Hillary would better beat Trump. Similarly in the Republican party you had Trump, Cruz, and Kasich. Many Republicans liked a moderate like Kasich but didn't think he was a strong candidate. In the 2020 election we again saw this vote splitting in the Democratic primaries. While these cases are more obvious, such splitting also happens a lot in congressional races and other down ballot races.
- 5y ago
nerpderp82 5y ago
> While imperfect, I think that German electoral system is much better. Any party that gets 5% or more of the vote is guaranteed fair representation, gerrymandering isn't a possibility. How do we bring this to the US?

by not2b 5y ago

amznthrwaway 5y ago

The third party would need to get local traction first. This is the best way forward on a number of dimensions, but most third party candidates go national instead, because while it cannot effect change, it is substantially more profitable.

dane-pgp 5y ago

> to get Greens on the ballot to divide the left vote and get a Republican in office If people are serious about voting reform (and they should be) then this "spoiler effect" can be weaponized: start a grassroots campaign to vote third party until the Democrats support changing the voting system at the state level (and vote in primaries for Democrats who support this change). This may lead to few tight state races being lost, but that means that only a small percentage of the population would be enough to get the Democratic Party officials to take notice. To make the signal even more clear, the third party chosen should be one that focuses as narrowly as possible on voting reform, such as the Alliance Party[0], which may also encourage some disgruntled Republicans to temporarily lend their votes, whereas they would be more reluctant to support the Green Party, for example. Of course there is a danger that voting reform would get portrayed as a pro-Democrat policy (if it isn't already), but once enough Republicans (in majority Democrat states) have experience casting their ballot in a more expressive and representative system, it will be harder for Republicans in other states to oppose it. [0] https://www.theallianceparty.com/political_reform https://www.theallianceparty.com/political_reform

godelski 5y ago
To be honest, a lot of this is already happening and I don't think the Democrats care. When voter turnout is high, Democrats win hands down. When voter turnout is low, Republicans win. But the kicker is that both parties thrive when they are losing. This may often be counter intuitive to many people but I think many have bad priors when modeling the game that politicians are playing.
- not2b 5y ago
  Actually, Democrats are generally in favor of instant runoff voting, and many more liberal places have enacted it. But yes, there are a lot of professional campaign consultants who have the system wired that they profit whether they win or lose, and many of those work for Democrats.
  - godelski 5y ago
    > Democrats are generally in favor To be clear are we talking about the politicians or the people? The people, yes. Politicians I'm not so sure about. Also I'd encourage you to read my other comment which addresses ordinal voting (like IRV) and the issues with them. It might be why the party likes it (still having vote splitting in the primaries).
michaelmrose 5y ago
We are looking at a republican party the majority of which would happily end democracy to end the threat of them ever being tossed out again. Tipping the scales in their direction at this critical juncture to motivate Democrats seems like a spectacularly bad idea. Seems like it would be a better and safer idea to to work towards the same goal using primaries to tilt already democratic districts in the direction of reformers.

godelski 5y ago

> While imperfect, I think that German electoral system is much better. I often see people compare the US system to European systems and use "party" in both. I think this results in a pretty bad comparison, but takes some nuance to understand why. Democrats and Republicans are more accurately compared to coalitions in European systems than they are to European parties. As a point, AOC or Bernie have very different political ideologies than say Pelosi or Biden, yet are in the same party. Similarly Trump is very different ideologically than say John Kasich. While there is variance within European political parties I believe that we see a larger variance within American parties and thus it makes it more accurate to compare to coalitions. In addition to this we should recognize that most European systems are working under a parliamentary system which causes this proportionate representation. We don't quite have a system like that in America and it would be tough to change the entire system. This is why many people, such as myself, are proposing systems like STAR or Approval. By being able to score (or rate) candidates (instead of ranking) we can achieve a proportionate representation with very minimal change, especially since systems like Approval already work on current voting machines. It is also a lot easier and more transparent compared to many round systems from ordinal voting. >(example: Republicans paying fees and collecting signatures to get Greens on the ballot to divide the left vote and get a Republican in office, though this problem could be fixed with some form of instant runoff But I also want to be clear about this. Ordinal systems (such as IRV/STV) fix this kind of spoiler there is another spoiler that is fairly important: the favorite betrayer. That is because the green party here is called a weak spoiler, they don't have a large voter base. But we need to also be VERY concerned with strong spoilers. For example: if Bernie ran against Biden. Ordinal systems are still vulnerable to this type of spoiler while cardinal systems are resistant to both strong and weak spoilers. Edit: I wanted to add that we actually saw strong spoilers in the 2016 and 2020 elections, in the primaries. In 2016 it happened in both parties. Bernie and Clinton were a split. Many people didn't vote Bernie because they thought Hillary would better beat Trump. Similarly in the Republican party you had Trump, Cruz, and Kasich. Many Republicans liked a moderate like Kasich but didn't think he was a strong candidate. In the 2020 election we again saw this vote splitting in the Democratic primaries. While these cases are more obvious, such splitting also happens a lot in congressional races and other down ballot races.

5y ago

nerpderp82 5y ago

> While imperfect, I think that German electoral system is much better. Any party that gets 5% or more of the vote is guaranteed fair representation, gerrymandering isn't a possibility. How do we bring this to the US?