Spoiler-free STAR Voting

Thank you for adding this policy. I started out as a strong advocate for RCV/IRV, but thanks to the work of the Equal Vote Coalition and Center for Election Science, I have become aware of additional voting methods.

Taking into consideration both the accuracy of the results and the practicality of implementation:

-My first choice for single winner (and proportional voting) is STAR Voting.
-My second choice is Approval Voting with a Top 2 Runoff.
-My 3rd choice is Approval.
-My 4th choice is Ranked Robin
-My 5th choice is RCV/IRV.

-And probably multiple other methods before resorting to FPTP as my last choice. :slight_smile:

I feel the RCV/IRV movements is well-intentioned, with good people who genuinely want to give voters more choice, build consensus, and improve vote-splitting. Their success is attributed to the headstart momentum they’ve built since 1992. Unfortunately, their growth has prevented them from being open-minded about advancements in the field, building coalitions within the movement, blinded them to the problems with IRV and the tsunami of backlash at the doorstop of all voting reform.

Much of the time, I do think IRV is an improvement to FPTP. But fundamentally, IRVs flaws combined with IRV supporters’ growing confirmation bias and disdain for other methods makes me very concerned for the overall voting reform movement and RCV less and less practical.

But I am also heartened by coalitions and momentum being built by others, and I think there is great opportunity ahead for voting reform.

To foster the continued success of voting reform as a whole and see these other methods succeed, I think we should continue to make a concerted effort to build coalitions and let multiple jurisdictions try different methods. We should champion each other’s successes by staying out each other’s jurisdictions (yes, I’m primarily calling out FairVote, but all reforms will need to be mindful of this going forward).

In jurisdictions where RCV/IRV is being used and the duopoly is not significantly threatened yet (center squeeze is not happening) we should let IRV be (for now). In jurisdictions where 3rd and 4th place candidates are competitive and generating center squeeze, we should be careful not to trample on voting reform as a concept; rather, I think we can go into these jurisdictions with the intent of building coalitions and providing actual solutions and replacements outside of FPTP.

Cheers to STAR Voting :beers::star2::star2::star2::star2::star2::beers:

1 Like