Re: OT: For information only !

Christophe Grandsire wrote:

> En réponse à Tristan Mc Leay :
>
>
>> One thing I don't get is why the French do their elections proper in two
>> rounds.
>
>
> Because most elections (at least those that require electing a single
> person) require an absolute majority (i.e. 50% of the valid votes + 1)
> to be decided. If the absolute majority isn't reached in the first
> round (it usually isn't seen the number of candidates, but if it did
> happen there would be no second round needed), the best two candidates
> go for a second round where we're sure an absolute majority will be
> reached.
>
> That's the only reason for this two-round system: necessary absolute
> majority. It makes sense when the election involves a single person
> (like in the presidential elections): a president put there because he
> got 20% of the votes wouldn't represent the people of the country as a
> whole.

So? You can get an absolute majority with only one round. You do all the
'rounds' at once, in the first round, by numbering your ballot. You
prefer the Jo Bloggs to John Smith, Smith to Tran Nguyen, Nguyen to Jim
Doe, Jim Doe to Fred Nurk, and Nurk to Vasco Pyjama; you number your
ballot appropriately. You progressively eliminate the ones who clearly
aren't going to win till come down to a race between two, when you'll
either get a 50-50 split or a winner. There's a number of ways of
counting these (instant run-off being the one I'm most familiar with, as
it's what we use in almost all elections for a single person here...).
What happens if lots of people voted for Bloggs, and lots for Pyjama,
but the people who wanted Bloggs would rather die than have Pyjama and
vice versa, but they'd all settle for Nurk, even though no-one voted for
him? With IRV, you'd eventually have a race between Nurk, Pyjama and
Bloggs...

Of course, no system is perfect but it always seemed better to me to
just do the election once and get the information you need... I was more
wondering if there was a significant advantage to the French one or if
it was just done that way because it was done that way.

--
Tristan.