"After all, if the majority of them feel neither of the myriad of available candidates represents them, shouldn't they be able to require a new set of candidates by voting None of the Above? "
If you have a decent preference / ranking voting system, then that should encourage a diversity of candidates from the outset.
If a voter still can't commit to backing any of those candidates, then there's not much reason to believe that much would change if the options were reset. You'd just end up with a whole bunch of people voting 'none of above' because each of their differing ideal candidates weren't in the running that particular time.
I think that people need to remember that our societies contain diverse and conflicting opinions. The only way for a democracy to function and still be worthy of the term 'democracy' is if it's built on compromise. Our representatives don't represent us as individuals, but (hopefully!) large swathes of society... which means that they can't pander to our each and every idea or belief. We shouldn't be encouraging a sentiment of 'give me a candidate that is exactly what I want or I'm not playing' rather than a 'let's have a discussion, find some areas of mutual agreement, agree on some trade-offs for the areas that we don't agree, and then find a candidate who can run on that platform'.
The ideal system is one that allows people to look at a wide range of options, then takes away the less popular options until you are left with a 'this or that' choice. Some systems aren't very good at that first part, but that doesn't mean that it helps to opt out of the final 'this or that' choice.
But what if "none of these candidates represents my opinions" is actually the most popular option? Why should the majority be forced to put up with someone who clearly isn't preferred by them?
That stance only makes sense if you are expecting an exact match... but democracy isn't meant to be a tyranny of the individual citizen.
For example, none of the candidates who ran in my constituency were a particularly good match for my personal politics... but I neither expected them to be nor wanted them to be. The candidates in my constituency are aiming to secure a place in government by being the best representative for 'most people' in my constituency. That means that they have to run on a platform with broad (rather than individual) appeal.
That may leave a lot of people feeling like none of these candidates are especially appealing or worth getting excited about... maybe even a majority of people. However, a shared discontent is nothing to build a government around given that a far-left socialist and a far-right libertarian might both be within this 'majority of people'.
Here's the deal. 45% vote for None of the Above. 32% vote for Hillary. 20% vote for Trump. 3% vote for other candidates. Shouldn't the None of the Above have a say here? Shouldn't such a result mean that new candidates should run, until the people recognize one of them as their favorite?
'None of the Above' had a chance to make their preference known but didn't.
If we are imagining that the 45% have a shared idea of what kind of candidate they all want and that candidate was missing, then that's definitely a very big niche that should be exploited... but what exactly is stopping this happening in this hypothetical situation?
I can't imagine such an unexploited niche existing for very long at all... if a majority of people would vote for it, then there won't be a shortage of politicians will pander to it.
What is more likely is that you have 45% of voters all holding out for any one of a hundred different imaginary candidates... and there isn't anything to be done with that. A majority of mutually incompatible minority opinions isn't something that you can form a government around.
Here's a thought experiment; imagine a society where there are five political divisions, each with appeal to 20% of that society. Let's now imagine that each division has it's own political party and fields it's own candidates for political office.
If we put any one of those parties in power, we are left with a position where 80% of people are discontent. The majority opinion will always be against whichever one party is in power.
There are two ways of resolving this.
The first is you institute a system of 'first past the post' voting where only one party 'wins', which creates an eventual drift to a two party system. In this situation, 40% of people get a 50/50 chance of getting exactly what they want and the others are voting tactically for a compromise candidate. The end result is that politics becomes a choice between a 'left-of-centre' candidate and a 'right-of-centre' candidate with 80% of voters being left discontent with the outcome either way.
The second is that you institute a proportional system of voting where you elect a body of 100 politicians with 20 from each party. The advantage is that every voter gets to vote 'with their conscience' and cast a vote for a candidate that genuinely reflects their political views and practices.... However, the end result is that you have 100 politicians who have to engage in all kinds of uncomfortable and miserable compromises in order to build a cross-party political platform around which a coalition government can be formed... thus resulting in a centrist government that 80% of voters are left feeling discontent about.
On the whole, I prefer the latter... but there's no getting around the fact that any form of democracy that's worth the name will involve some kind of compromise towards a bland middle-ground that risks leaving most people feeling dissatisfied. No amount of not voting or voting 'none of the above' will change this; it's just a reality of trying to govern any kind of diverse nation where people can't be expected to agree on politics.
So yeah, we all need to be grown ups and accept the fact that most of us are not going to get our preferred choice of government... just as we have to with most group decisions (e.g. if you're deciding to go out to a restaurant with ten friends, then you need to accept the need to find a restaurant that suits the group as a whole rather than trying to find a restaurant that is everyone's favourite, which might just mean going to a restaurant that everyone 'is okay with' yet is no one's favourite).
> If we put any one of those parties in power, we are left with a position where 80% of people are discontent
Yes, but Candidate A has won a slight majority over Candidates B, C, D and E. They still have the largest group supporting them. If the largest group is the one who says that none of the five candidates is any good, shouldn't THAT choice be the winner? Especially if that group is the overwhelming majority?
What if we modify this and put a requirement that if 50%+1 of all votes are None of the Above, there should be another election?
What if we modify this and put a requirement that if 50%+1 of all votes are None of the Above, there should be another election?
Sensible suggestion. With the bottom two or three candidates dropping out leaving three or four options on the ticket. This is exactly the way to focus voters minds.
(If we had another EU referendum right now the vote would be very different. Gaze at the precipice if you must, but do not jump.)
"Yes, but Candidate A has won a slight majority over Candidates B, C, D and E. They still have the largest group supporting them. If the largest group is the one who says that none of the five candidates is any good, shouldn't THAT choice be the winner? Especially if that group is the overwhelming majority?"
In a race of five candidates, there are only five possible winners.
What you're suggesting is that people should be allowed to vote for everyone losing and no one winning, which means that no government is formed (and, as you suggest, the whole thing has to be repeated over again).
The problem is that the very act of voting 'None of the Above' shows a lack of willingness to vote tactically. If everyone took that perspective, we can expect people to only vote for their ideal candidate... at which point re-running the election
However, there's no reason to believe that the exact same problem wouldn't reoccur next time.
Imagine the following scenario with a two candidate election:
30% of Blues vote Blue Party 20% of Reds vote Red Party 15% of Violets vote 'None of the Above' 15% of Purples vote 'None of the Above' 10% of Greens vote 'None of the Above' 10% of Yellows vote 'None of the Above'
If people only vote for their ideal party, then the result remains the same even if you add in extra candidates. The only way to change the outcome is for voters to vote for their second preference (not none of the above).
If you have a First Past the Post voting system, this means that the whole thing gravitates to a two party system; the violets vote for the Blue Party, the Purples vote for the Red Party, and everyone ignores the Greens and Yellows.
"What if we modify this and put a requirement that if 50%+1 of all votes are None of the Above, there should be another election?"
Having a second election won't necessarily change anything for the reasons stated above.
What I would be happy with is some kind of STV system; start off with a large number of diverse candidates and have everyone rank them by preference, if no candidate receives a majority of first-preference votes then start eliminating the less popular candidates and redistribute those votes in preference order. Keep doing this until one candidate has a majority vote share.
This has the effect of automating the tactical voting process so that voters don't have to makes guesses about how others will vote; it's still likely that power will shift between centrist parties, but everyone gets to have a fair stab at electing an outsider.
I don't know how familiar you are with various voting systems, but if you want to encourage a diversity of candidates and you're not familiar with systems like AV, then I'd suggest watching this:
That's a campaign video for the AV referendum in the UK, which was (somewhat frustratingly) voted against.
AV allows for both a diversity of candidates to run in one election without the need for tactical voting, which allows people more choice. You get to throw your first preference vote at the candidate you most agree with and also give your compromise candidates (in order of preference).
Unlike the 'smallest minority of votes wins' FPTP voting used in many nations, AV doesn't punish you for voting for a potentially unpopular candidate. If the USA presidential election was done on a nation-wide AV vote, then there would have been no need to reduce the options down to just two candidates (Sanders could still have run without it hurting Hilary's chances of winning).
If you have a decent preference / ranking voting system, then that should encourage a diversity of candidates from the outset.
If a voter still can't commit to backing any of those candidates, then there's not much reason to believe that much would change if the options were reset. You'd just end up with a whole bunch of people voting 'none of above' because each of their differing ideal candidates weren't in the running that particular time.
I think that people need to remember that our societies contain diverse and conflicting opinions. The only way for a democracy to function and still be worthy of the term 'democracy' is if it's built on compromise. Our representatives don't represent us as individuals, but (hopefully!) large swathes of society... which means that they can't pander to our each and every idea or belief. We shouldn't be encouraging a sentiment of 'give me a candidate that is exactly what I want or I'm not playing' rather than a 'let's have a discussion, find some areas of mutual agreement, agree on some trade-offs for the areas that we don't agree, and then find a candidate who can run on that platform'.
The ideal system is one that allows people to look at a wide range of options, then takes away the less popular options until you are left with a 'this or that' choice. Some systems aren't very good at that first part, but that doesn't mean that it helps to opt out of the final 'this or that' choice.
Reply
Reply
For example, none of the candidates who ran in my constituency were a particularly good match for my personal politics... but I neither expected them to be nor wanted them to be. The candidates in my constituency are aiming to secure a place in government by being the best representative for 'most people' in my constituency. That means that they have to run on a platform with broad (rather than individual) appeal.
That may leave a lot of people feeling like none of these candidates are especially appealing or worth getting excited about... maybe even a majority of people. However, a shared discontent is nothing to build a government around given that a far-left socialist and a far-right libertarian might both be within this 'majority of people'.
Reply
Here's the deal. 45% vote for None of the Above. 32% vote for Hillary. 20% vote for Trump. 3% vote for other candidates. Shouldn't the None of the Above have a say here? Shouldn't such a result mean that new candidates should run, until the people recognize one of them as their favorite?
Reply
If we are imagining that the 45% have a shared idea of what kind of candidate they all want and that candidate was missing, then that's definitely a very big niche that should be exploited... but what exactly is stopping this happening in this hypothetical situation?
I can't imagine such an unexploited niche existing for very long at all... if a majority of people would vote for it, then there won't be a shortage of politicians will pander to it.
What is more likely is that you have 45% of voters all holding out for any one of a hundred different imaginary candidates... and there isn't anything to be done with that. A majority of mutually incompatible minority opinions isn't something that you can form a government around.
Reply
If we put any one of those parties in power, we are left with a position where 80% of people are discontent. The majority opinion will always be against whichever one party is in power.
There are two ways of resolving this.
The first is you institute a system of 'first past the post' voting where only one party 'wins', which creates an eventual drift to a two party system. In this situation, 40% of people get a 50/50 chance of getting exactly what they want and the others are voting tactically for a compromise candidate. The end result is that politics becomes a choice between a 'left-of-centre' candidate and a 'right-of-centre' candidate with 80% of voters being left discontent with the outcome either way.
The second is that you institute a proportional system of voting where you elect a body of 100 politicians with 20 from each party. The advantage is that every voter gets to vote 'with their conscience' and cast a vote for a candidate that genuinely reflects their political views and practices.... However, the end result is that you have 100 politicians who have to engage in all kinds of uncomfortable and miserable compromises in order to build a cross-party political platform around which a coalition government can be formed... thus resulting in a centrist government that 80% of voters are left feeling discontent about.
On the whole, I prefer the latter... but there's no getting around the fact that any form of democracy that's worth the name will involve some kind of compromise towards a bland middle-ground that risks leaving most people feeling dissatisfied. No amount of not voting or voting 'none of the above' will change this; it's just a reality of trying to govern any kind of diverse nation where people can't be expected to agree on politics.
So yeah, we all need to be grown ups and accept the fact that most of us are not going to get our preferred choice of government... just as we have to with most group decisions (e.g. if you're deciding to go out to a restaurant with ten friends, then you need to accept the need to find a restaurant that suits the group as a whole rather than trying to find a restaurant that is everyone's favourite, which might just mean going to a restaurant that everyone 'is okay with' yet is no one's favourite).
Reply
Yes, but Candidate A has won a slight majority over Candidates B, C, D and E. They still have the largest group supporting them. If the largest group is the one who says that none of the five candidates is any good, shouldn't THAT choice be the winner? Especially if that group is the overwhelming majority?
What if we modify this and put a requirement that if 50%+1 of all votes are None of the Above, there should be another election?
Reply
Sensible suggestion. With the bottom two or three candidates dropping out leaving three or four options on the ticket. This is exactly the way to focus voters minds.
(If we had another EU referendum right now the vote would be very different. Gaze at the precipice if you must, but do not jump.)
Reply
Reply
Reply
In a race of five candidates, there are only five possible winners.
What you're suggesting is that people should be allowed to vote for everyone losing and no one winning, which means that no government is formed (and, as you suggest, the whole thing has to be repeated over again).
The problem is that the very act of voting 'None of the Above' shows a lack of willingness to vote tactically. If everyone took that perspective, we can expect people to only vote for their ideal candidate... at which point re-running the election
However, there's no reason to believe that the exact same problem wouldn't reoccur next time.
Imagine the following scenario with a two candidate election:
30% of Blues vote Blue Party
20% of Reds vote Red Party
15% of Violets vote 'None of the Above'
15% of Purples vote 'None of the Above'
10% of Greens vote 'None of the Above'
10% of Yellows vote 'None of the Above'
If people only vote for their ideal party, then the result remains the same even if you add in extra candidates. The only way to change the outcome is for voters to vote for their second preference (not none of the above).
If you have a First Past the Post voting system, this means that the whole thing gravitates to a two party system; the violets vote for the Blue Party, the Purples vote for the Red Party, and everyone ignores the Greens and Yellows.
"What if we modify this and put a requirement that if 50%+1 of all votes are None of the Above, there should be another election?"
Having a second election won't necessarily change anything for the reasons stated above.
What I would be happy with is some kind of STV system; start off with a large number of diverse candidates and have everyone rank them by preference, if no candidate receives a majority of first-preference votes then start eliminating the less popular candidates and redistribute those votes in preference order. Keep doing this until one candidate has a majority vote share.
This has the effect of automating the tactical voting process so that voters don't have to makes guesses about how others will vote; it's still likely that power will shift between centrist parties, but everyone gets to have a fair stab at electing an outsider.
Reply
https://youtu.be/3Y3jE3B8HsE
That's a campaign video for the AV referendum in the UK, which was (somewhat frustratingly) voted against.
AV allows for both a diversity of candidates to run in one election without the need for tactical voting, which allows people more choice. You get to throw your first preference vote at the candidate you most agree with and also give your compromise candidates (in order of preference).
Unlike the 'smallest minority of votes wins' FPTP voting used in many nations, AV doesn't punish you for voting for a potentially unpopular candidate. If the USA presidential election was done on a nation-wide AV vote, then there would have been no need to reduce the options down to just two candidates (Sanders could still have run without it hurting Hilary's chances of winning).
Reply
Leave a comment