Another excellent well-researched piece by Hill. I suppose the Australian "teal" is our "purple." And we surely could use more purple here. Fortunately the quiet power of ranked-choice voting and proportional representation is growing. I'm constantly confounded by the critics of RCV/PR claiming it's too confusing. (Hey, if the Aussies have been able to figure it out for a few years, and the citizens of the Big Apple did get through it once, it can't be rocket science.) Or, as critics also say, it's too new and needs to be thoroughly tested. (Sure, over a century of successful use down under is encouraging, but you can't be too careful.)
Alas, I fear critics of RCV/PR have concerns unrelated to those they claim publicly - not exactly an unknown phenomenon in political life. Could they be skeptical of democracy in general and of those pesky voters specifically? If so their opposition to RCV/PR is quite understandable. Anything improving democracy and empowering voters is to be resisted. RCV/PR puts our elections dangerously close to that slippery slope leading to precisely those "problems."
Another excellent well-researched piece by Hill. I suppose the Australian "teal" is our "purple." And we surely could use more purple here. Fortunately the quiet power of ranked-choice voting and proportional representation is growing. I'm constantly confounded by the critics of RCV/PR claiming it's too confusing. (Hey, if the Aussies have been able to figure it out for a few years, and the citizens of the Big Apple did get through it once, it can't be rocket science.) Or, as critics also say, it's too new and needs to be thoroughly tested. (Sure, over a century of successful use down under is encouraging, but you can't be too careful.)
Alas, I fear critics of RCV/PR have concerns unrelated to those they claim publicly - not exactly an unknown phenomenon in political life. Could they be skeptical of democracy in general and of those pesky voters specifically? If so their opposition to RCV/PR is quite understandable. Anything improving democracy and empowering voters is to be resisted. RCV/PR puts our elections dangerously close to that slippery slope leading to precisely those "problems."