Freediver

“There is no fundamental democratic right to allocate preferences in any particular way.”

There certainly is (or should be) a fundamental democratic right to be able to allocate your preferences as you see fit. Anything else would not really be a preference, would it. The very notion of compulsory preferences is absurd and oxymoronic!

“Yes they can. You just put them at the bottom of the list.”

Oh dear. This appears to be proof that you don’t understand my major concern about CP voting. If you put the two major candidates at the bottom, your vote will end up counting for the one you put second last !! !! !! So you simply CANNOT vote against both major candidates!

“It only counted to the extent that it was a vote against the last candidate.”

YES! You can only effectively vote against the last candidate, if you put the major candidates last and second last.

Freediver, in response to your critique of optional preferential voting on Ozpolitic:

“The spoiler effect.”

If you are a strong supporter of the current political methodology and direction, then you could label OP voting as having a spoiler effect. But if you wish to see a change in direction, then you could call it a progressive effect on our political evolution. CP works towards maintaining the status quo. OP works more in favour of changing it. As far as I’m concerned, that makes OP eminently better.

“More extreme policies from the two major parties.”

Again, if you support the current political paradigm, you could say this. But I would say that the tendency for OP voting to encourage the major parties more carefully consider the views of the minor parties and to adjust their policies accordingly, has surely got to be seen as a good thing. You say that this could lead to instability in government. Well, where do you think the status quo is going to lead us?

“Increased chances of minor parties being elected.”

And you think this is a bad thing? OP voting gives a much truer reflection of the preferences of the people. And if that happens to be away from the major parties and towards minor parties and genuine political change, then good!

“It is inevitable that many people will be misled.”

Not at all. It is clear that few people really understand the sinister antidemocratic connotations of the CP system. OP is much simpler.

OP voting is a much better system for those who are not very interested or informed. All they need to do is mark one square for their favourite candidate and leave it at that, which is fine.

"Worse than this, if a voter specifically wants to vote against both of the two major candidates/parties, they CAN’T!! !! !!.

Actually, the only way to vote against both major parties is to rank them both last. If you fail to do this, it actually works to their advantage.

Kalin, with the senate it is even more important to carefully rank all candidates, because your vote can contribute to the election of multiple people. I have no problem with the voting above the line scheme. I have no problem with your scheme either, provided it achieves the same thing as ranking all candidates and voters are not likely to be mislead by it.

"If you put the two major candidates at the bottom, your vote will end up counting for the one you put second last !! !! !!

So you should put the one you dislike least second last. There is no rational reason to not want to choose between the lesser of two evils.

"YES! You can only effectively vote against the last candidate, if you put the major candidates last and second last.

That is an absurd interpretation. You could just as easily argue that you can only vote for the first preference. It is a meaningless argument. You vote against the candidate you rank second last, in the sense that you indicate your preference for every other candidate, bar one, above him. OP does not allow you to vote against anyone to any greater extent.

"CP works towards maintaining the status quo.

Only in the sense that CP is the status quo.

"OP works more in favour of changing it. As far as I’m concerned, that makes OP eminently better.

For that line of argument to make sense, you would have to say what the net result would be, and why you think it would be better.

Dammit, I keep running out of posts.

"It is clear that few people really understand the sinister antidemocratic connotations of the CP system.

There are no sinister antidemocratic connotations. People just get confused with the whole 'voting for' and 'voting against' bit. If you think of it as ranking candidates in order of preference (which is what it is), there is nothing at all sinister about it.

"OP voting is a much better system for those who are not very interested or informed.

In other words, too lazy to contribute to our democracy.

http://ozpolitic.com/forum/YaBB.pl?num=1187572706

Freediver, I think Ludwig does have a point though that OP is better for the uninformed.

Your assertion that such people are lazy and don't want to contribute to our democracy is right, but irrelevant. Such people make up the bulk of our society, else it wouldn't be just the three of us discussing this point. The voting system needs to reflect the reality, not the ideal. After all, not being involved is a democratic right too.

Whilst you are right that there is no reason why people should give up a choice between the lesser of two evils, the reality is that most people get to the bottom of the list and aren't making a choice at all, since they have no idea. It is better that people in that situation do not cast a vote at all. Call them lazy if you will, but the system shouldn't force people to choose between candidates they know nothing about.

Ludwig, Freediver,

Noting the posting limit is 'cramping' expression, why don't we move this discussion to Freediver's site.. he posted it before. It's an excellent site (though I'm not a fan of the colour scheme).

Freediver,

Could you set up a thread for this topic?

Just a thought. The posting limits here are my only issue with OLO.