[NCG-EL-REF] Proportional methods like Reweighted Range or STV Voting for future NCSG Elections?

[Neal McBurnett]

[I posted earlier to the NCSG-discuss list about this, and heard support for it.  So I'm sending an updated version of my post to this list.]

One thing I think we really should strive for is some form of Proportional Representation, which helps ensure that viewpoints of the electorate are represented proportionately in the elected slate.

  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proportional_representation

I.e. if we have 3 seats available, and a third or more of the electorate really wants candidate D, they should be represented by candidate D.  That is true even if over half of the electorate strongly support candidates A B and C.  I see it as an issue that the current NCSG scheme would probably elect a slate of A B C and leave a big set of voters unrepresented.

Proportional Representation is used by most democracies.  E.g. Wikipedia notes that "Some form of proportional representation is used for national lower house elections in 94 countries"

It also tends to increase turnout because people are more likely to have their vote make a difference.

There are at least two reasonable options I see for getting proportional representation for NCSG:

 One widely used method is the Single Transferrable Vote (STV).  It would require voters to rank the candidates on the ballot, and then uses an elimination and reapportioning procedure to try to ensure that the voter is represented by their top picks.

  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_transferable_vote

As a ranked choice method, it suffers from some complications in ballot design, and can be confusing to use and understand.

A more recent alternative method that I've seen is Reweighted Range Voting, which was used in some of the awards in the OSCARs, and was used in Sweden in 1910:

  http://rangevoting.org/RRV.html

Instead of ranking the candidates, the voter scores them, e.g. from 1 to 10. But like STV it uses quotas and ballot reweighting.  This page argues that it has several advantages over STV:

  http://rangevoting.org/PRcond.html

I'm not sure yet what I'd recommend, but I think a relativly technical group like ours could adapt to either.

As Cheryl Langdon-Orr noted, it seems like ICANN could support us in this, since "the ICANN ALAC / At-Large Community, has, since 2007 used a variety of voting and ballot options for different purposes including STV variants and ICANN has provided us with an account and access with the *very flexible and transparant* third party 'Big Pulse' proprietary online system (which also does nice public opinion polling as well BTW)  so ICANN has an account with the providor and I see no reason why NCSG could not utalise that if it wished...

Cheers,

Neal McBurnett                 http://neal.mcburnett.org/