Ranked Choice Voting is not a product. It’s a process, a method of determining the winner in an election. Advocating for change is not equivalent to selling a product.
Those of us who have concluded that we must adjust the voting system in order to get better candidates, election outcomes, and more effective governance look for evidence of “better.” Agreeing on what is better and why is part of advocacy work.
Conversely, the problem might be the use of the term ranked choice voting. voters may not know what is goal of RCV - why use ranked votes?
both multi-winner STV and single-winner IRV (RCV) uses ranked voting.
(those systems use rankings on ballots as contingency votes/back-up preferences.
(approval voting even uses ranked ballots but the system is not the same and the way rankings are used is not the same.)
Runoff election systems (as the term is normally used) can be either Two-Round System or "Exhaustive ballot" system (this term is used in wikipedia for system where numerous separate rounds of voting may be required).
Instant-runoff voting is good term if it is taken to mean that runoffs are conducted based on the initial ranked votes and although not "instant", is quicker than having to gather all voters over again to vote once again.
a good term but not totally clear.
Alternative Voting is old term for what we (some) now call IRV.
perhaps the term "majority-winner ranked vote election system" is more clear.
by the way, if election system is good enough, you don't actually need primaries of any kind.
STV was long promoted as way to avoid primaries.
with transferable votes, adverse result from vote splitting is usually avoided.
same for list PR. perhaps same for IRV.
but IRV cannot produce scientifically-deduced proportional representation -
we need a multiple-winner contest to have proper PR.
so whether you call IRV by the name "ranked choice voting" or the name "majority-winner ranked votes election system" or "runoff voting" is not big issue.
Under any name, it is not any better at fairness or proportional rep. than FPTP
Ranked Choice Voting is not a product. It’s a process, a method of determining the winner in an election. Advocating for change is not equivalent to selling a product.
Those of us who have concluded that we must adjust the voting system in order to get better candidates, election outcomes, and more effective governance look for evidence of “better.” Agreeing on what is better and why is part of advocacy work.
Conversely, the problem might be the use of the term ranked choice voting. voters may not know what is goal of RCV - why use ranked votes?
both multi-winner STV and single-winner IRV (RCV) uses ranked voting.
(those systems use rankings on ballots as contingency votes/back-up preferences.
(approval voting even uses ranked ballots but the system is not the same and the way rankings are used is not the same.)
Runoff election systems (as the term is normally used) can be either Two-Round System or "Exhaustive ballot" system (this term is used in wikipedia for system where numerous separate rounds of voting may be required).
Instant-runoff voting is good term if it is taken to mean that runoffs are conducted based on the initial ranked votes and although not "instant", is quicker than having to gather all voters over again to vote once again.
a good term but not totally clear.
Alternative Voting is old term for what we (some) now call IRV.
perhaps the term "majority-winner ranked vote election system" is more clear.
by the way, if election system is good enough, you don't actually need primaries of any kind.
STV was long promoted as way to avoid primaries.
with transferable votes, adverse result from vote splitting is usually avoided.
same for list PR. perhaps same for IRV.
but IRV cannot produce scientifically-deduced proportional representation -
we need a multiple-winner contest to have proper PR.
so whether you call IRV by the name "ranked choice voting" or the name "majority-winner ranked votes election system" or "runoff voting" is not big issue.
Under any name, it is not any better at fairness or proportional rep. than FPTP
STV = single transferable vote.
yes it is where each voter has a single transferable vote in a contest that elects multiple winners.
terminology varies but Single in STV does not mean single winner. if that is what you thinking.
No, I was just spelling out the acronym for people who might not know.
We're doing it in Michigan! Check out RankMIVote.org for more!
That's great Kathryn. Good luck with your work there!