5 ms·

Can You Gerrymander Your Party to Power?

15 points by jaredwiener 1y ago

mikestew 1y ago
https://archive.ph/RQ0hW https://archive.ph/RQ0hW if you just want the gist (it is a game to do what the title says). But you’ll need a subscription to do it, the button at the bottom of the archive page doesn’t work.
fl7305 1y ago
Of course you can gerrymander your way to power. You can turn a fairly small minority in votes to a majority of the seats. Professor Braunschweiger explains it well in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2EnuHsRJd4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2EnuHsRJd4
alexanderson 1y ago
A similar game which demonstrates different methods of gerrymandering can be found here: https://polytrope.com/district/ https://polytrope.com/district/
andrewla 1y ago
The whole discourse around gerrymandering is fundamentally broken because national politics is too influential compared to local politics. What should happen is that candidates should position themselves based on the districts that they represent. A West Virginia Democrat is a different creature than a New York Democrat, and a New York Republican is different than a West Virginia Republican. This is how it should be! The candidates should be trying to win races in their districts. Instead we have this horrifying attempt to fix the parties in time and space and say "this is what the national party represents" and try to shape districts to align to those parties. This is the tail wagging the dog. In a perfect world the districts should be shaped based on common interests, not based on voting record. Geography or population density are pretty good heuristics. Voting record is not because they are votes for candidates, not for parties.
- ninthcat 1y ago
  I don't think national elections need to have districts smaller than a state at all. If all of a state's seats in the House that are up for election were decided in a single state-wide election with multiple winners allocated with proportional representation, it is impossible to gerrymander. Many other countries have this kind of system.
  - andrewla 1y ago
    In the US there is pretty fierce opposition to the idea of giving political parties any legal status. In the US they are private companies that help candidates satisfy the legal requirements for candidacy (which are party agnostic) and politicians are voluntary members that can pool resources and engage in voluntary collective activities on behalf of their party. But the party itself has no real standing. [1] There are a variety of systems for doing proportional representation with parties, but the preference in the US has been to vote for people, not for parties. When I vote for my local candidate, I'm not voting for the local party bigwigs to decide who will be my representative in cigar-smoke filled back rooms whilst sipping brandy and complaining about the poors. Maybe this is a hopeless dream as more and more politics shifts to the national level, but I still like the idea of it. [1] There are some exceptions to this procedurally; there are majority/minority systems in various legislatures. And in presidential elections the nature of electors is kind of strange about this.
    - ninthcat 1y ago
      It's possible to do proportional representation with a ranked choice voting system where you vote for individuals rather than parties. Or you could allow voters to rank either parties or individual candidates based on their preference; an example of this is the Australian Senate election.
drivingmenuts 1y ago
Yes, you can and the Republicans have done it in Texas. Democrats have effectively no representation here.
- hackeraccount 1y ago
  "effectively" is doing a lot of work in that sentence. In the same sense that the Democrats have not representation in the Senate, the House or the Presidency. I mean, it's true but it's not the whole truth. Democrats in Texas are under-represented compared with their numbers. It's not fair or democratic but I wouldn't say they have no representation any more then Republicans in CA. or NY have no representation.
  - seanmcdirmid 1y ago
    California was undergoing non-partisan redistricting, which when they started, republicans actually picked up a seat or two. See https://gerrymander.princeton.edu/redistricting-report-card/ https://gerrymander.princeton.edu/redistricting-report-card/ New York actually is less gerry mandered than CA, neither CA nor NY list any party getting more representation than their votes. Illinois, however, is just as gerrymandered as Texas. States where Democrats have the strong advantage due to gerry mandering: * Illinois * Oregon * Nevada * New Mexico NY and CA are both states where representation roughly corresponds to votes. Democrats also have less strong advantages in Pennsylvania, Alabama, and Mississippi (out of all places!). I'm guessing Alabama and Mississippi are just flukes. States were Republicans have a strong advantage due to gerrymandering: * Utah * Kansas * Texas * Louisiana * Wisconsin (??) * Ohio * Kentucky * North Carolina * South Carolina * Georgia * Florida Arkansas and Oklahoma are moderately biased to Republican. Republicans have minor advantages in Maryland, New Hampshire, and Iowa. Given that representation is roughly balanced in NY and CA right now, the Democrats could probably get a bunch of seats out of those two states if they decide to gerrymander.
    - hackeraccount 1y ago
      I've read that the GOP in California gets about 40% of the votes in House elections to net them 17% of the seats. In NY I read it's 43% of the vote for 27% of the seats Is that true?
smitty1e 1y ago
You could amend the Constitution to define an algorithm to calculate districts. The bun fight would then move to the data informing the algorithm.
- compsciphd 1y ago
  1) you don't need to amend the constitution. The constition just requires proportional seats in the house per size of state, how those seats get allocated isn't defined by the consititution. It's currently defined by federal law (i.e. congress has the ability to define it) and is defined as single district voting. That can easily change if congress (i.e. the people) wanted it to 2) as others have noted, there's no reason we even need districts under the constitution. Just let people vote for a party and divide the seats that way. I did the math after the previous election and if we divided each states seats by the way they voted for president, california would have a lot more republican seats, but the republicans would still control the house with a smaller margin overall.
normalaccess 1y ago
Of course! Titular gerrymandering video by CGP Grey https://youtu.be/Mky11UJb9AY
- normalaccess 1y ago
  Also an excellent video by Alpha Phoenix on how you can make it almost impossible to detect. https://youtu.be/Lq-Y7crQo44 https://youtu.be/Lq-Y7crQo44
hackeraccount 1y ago
By definition you can Gerrymander your party to power - unless the ruling party has a death wish. The Gerrymander is a tool of a majority party that keeps the majority in power. It's not a magic bullet - it exchanges depth for width and in so doing it can expose risk of different types. I'm not saying it's right or fair, I think it's neither and wouldn't support it but it's politics. The best solution to my mind is to increase the number of representatives. I've heard the counter-argument to that and it has some plausibility but I reject those arguments because I'm close minded.

15 points by jaredwiener 1y ago

https://archive.ph/RQ0hW https://archive.ph/RQ0hW if you just want the gist (it is a game to do what the title says). But you’ll need a subscription to do it, the button at the bottom of the archive page doesn’t work.

fl7305 1y ago

Of course you can gerrymander your way to power. You can turn a fairly small minority in votes to a majority of the seats. Professor Braunschweiger explains it well in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2EnuHsRJd4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2EnuHsRJd4

alexanderson 1y ago

A similar game which demonstrates different methods of gerrymandering can be found here: https://polytrope.com/district/ https://polytrope.com/district/

andrewla 1y ago

The whole discourse around gerrymandering is fundamentally broken because national politics is too influential compared to local politics. What should happen is that candidates should position themselves based on the districts that they represent. A West Virginia Democrat is a different creature than a New York Democrat, and a New York Republican is different than a West Virginia Republican. This is how it should be! The candidates should be trying to win races in their districts. Instead we have this horrifying attempt to fix the parties in time and space and say "this is what the national party represents" and try to shape districts to align to those parties. This is the tail wagging the dog. In a perfect world the districts should be shaped based on common interests, not based on voting record. Geography or population density are pretty good heuristics. Voting record is not because they are votes for candidates, not for parties.

ninthcat 1y ago
I don't think national elections need to have districts smaller than a state at all. If all of a state's seats in the House that are up for election were decided in a single state-wide election with multiple winners allocated with proportional representation, it is impossible to gerrymander. Many other countries have this kind of system.
- andrewla 1y ago
  In the US there is pretty fierce opposition to the idea of giving political parties any legal status. In the US they are private companies that help candidates satisfy the legal requirements for candidacy (which are party agnostic) and politicians are voluntary members that can pool resources and engage in voluntary collective activities on behalf of their party. But the party itself has no real standing. [1] There are a variety of systems for doing proportional representation with parties, but the preference in the US has been to vote for people, not for parties. When I vote for my local candidate, I'm not voting for the local party bigwigs to decide who will be my representative in cigar-smoke filled back rooms whilst sipping brandy and complaining about the poors. Maybe this is a hopeless dream as more and more politics shifts to the national level, but I still like the idea of it. [1] There are some exceptions to this procedurally; there are majority/minority systems in various legislatures. And in presidential elections the nature of electors is kind of strange about this.
  - ninthcat 1y ago
    It's possible to do proportional representation with a ranked choice voting system where you vote for individuals rather than parties. Or you could allow voters to rank either parties or individual candidates based on their preference; an example of this is the Australian Senate election.

drivingmenuts 1y ago

Yes, you can and the Republicans have done it in Texas. Democrats have effectively no representation here.

hackeraccount 1y ago
"effectively" is doing a lot of work in that sentence. In the same sense that the Democrats have not representation in the Senate, the House or the Presidency. I mean, it's true but it's not the whole truth. Democrats in Texas are under-represented compared with their numbers. It's not fair or democratic but I wouldn't say they have no representation any more then Republicans in CA. or NY have no representation.
- seanmcdirmid 1y ago
  California was undergoing non-partisan redistricting, which when they started, republicans actually picked up a seat or two. See https://gerrymander.princeton.edu/redistricting-report-card/ https://gerrymander.princeton.edu/redistricting-report-card/ New York actually is less gerry mandered than CA, neither CA nor NY list any party getting more representation than their votes. Illinois, however, is just as gerrymandered as Texas. States where Democrats have the strong advantage due to gerry mandering: * Illinois * Oregon * Nevada * New Mexico NY and CA are both states where representation roughly corresponds to votes. Democrats also have less strong advantages in Pennsylvania, Alabama, and Mississippi (out of all places!). I'm guessing Alabama and Mississippi are just flukes. States were Republicans have a strong advantage due to gerrymandering: * Utah * Kansas * Texas * Louisiana * Wisconsin (??) * Ohio * Kentucky * North Carolina * South Carolina * Georgia * Florida Arkansas and Oklahoma are moderately biased to Republican. Republicans have minor advantages in Maryland, New Hampshire, and Iowa. Given that representation is roughly balanced in NY and CA right now, the Democrats could probably get a bunch of seats out of those two states if they decide to gerrymander.
  - hackeraccount 1y ago
    I've read that the GOP in California gets about 40% of the votes in House elections to net them 17% of the seats. In NY I read it's 43% of the vote for 27% of the seats Is that true?

smitty1e 1y ago

You could amend the Constitution to define an algorithm to calculate districts. The bun fight would then move to the data informing the algorithm.

compsciphd 1y ago
1) you don't need to amend the constitution. The constition just requires proportional seats in the house per size of state, how those seats get allocated isn't defined by the consititution. It's currently defined by federal law (i.e. congress has the ability to define it) and is defined as single district voting. That can easily change if congress (i.e. the people) wanted it to 2) as others have noted, there's no reason we even need districts under the constitution. Just let people vote for a party and divide the seats that way. I did the math after the previous election and if we divided each states seats by the way they voted for president, california would have a lot more republican seats, but the republicans would still control the house with a smaller margin overall.

normalaccess 1y ago

Of course! Titular gerrymandering video by CGP Grey https://youtu.be/Mky11UJb9AY

normalaccess 1y ago
Also an excellent video by Alpha Phoenix on how you can make it almost impossible to detect. https://youtu.be/Lq-Y7crQo44 https://youtu.be/Lq-Y7crQo44

hackeraccount 1y ago

By definition you can Gerrymander your party to power - unless the ruling party has a death wish. The Gerrymander is a tool of a majority party that keeps the majority in power. It's not a magic bullet - it exchanges depth for width and in so doing it can expose risk of different types. I'm not saying it's right or fair, I think it's neither and wouldn't support it but it's politics. The best solution to my mind is to increase the number of representatives. I've heard the counter-argument to that and it has some plausibility but I reject those arguments because I'm close minded.