No, its vastly simpler: the problem with gerrymandering is that there is no good way to draw single-member winner-take-all districts, and the solution is just don't do that. Multimember districts with a system that provides proportional representation within each district (e.g., five-member districts with STV) solve the problem pretty much completely.
Algorithmic line-drawing of single-member winner-take-all district pretty much guarantees poorly-representative districts, but without anyone being able to control how and where they are bad (well, except that there are quite a lot of algorithms that can be chosen, so the political choice of which to choose will be influenced by the effect the particular algorithm would have on the particular jurisdiction adopting it.)
A) The status quo is massive Gerrymandering, so something like the Shortest Splitline Algorithm would be a massive improvement.
B) The point is not to make quasi-proportional-representation with districts. The point is to make a legislature whose laws are representative. To that end, it does not matter if the constituents of a given district happen to have a lot in common.
Playing around with how district lives are drawn isn't democratic reform, it's democracy theater, a means of diverting attention without changing anything meaningful.
Gerrymandering can add ~30% of representatives for the party controlling it, so changing it to a party method does improve things a lot, even if it is arguably very far from perfect.
Its only a thing when the "perfect" is not a real alternative.
Systems that produce more proportional representation than any means of line drawing in single-member winner-take-all districts are real alternatives that are well-established in the real world.
But changing how districts are drawn actually does happen in this country. California degerrymanderified their process a few years ago.
[1]like the Olson criterion, which when optimised by a computer program results in district boundaries apparently likely to return mostly Republicans in California...
Most gerrymandering doesn't bias rural districts; it biases suburban districts that are marginal majorities (usu republican) only after redrawing the lines. Any automatic line redrawing algorithm will defeat this, since it takes a lot of perverse effort to draw boundaries that are sufficiently biased to serve Machiavellian pols.
You just lay out about 75-80% of your districts with traditional geographic community lines so each area gets a representative for its local interests responsible to local voters. Then voters vote for their local rep and also for a preferred party. You count the reps elected from districts by party and the remaining PR reps are allocated to fill in the discrepancy between that result and the party preference votes.
New Zealand, Mexico, and Germany use some variation of MMP for their legislatures, so it's working in prosperous stable first world countries already.
But even when the USA sees the light on proportional representation, there will continue to be winner takes all elections. Executive positions (president, governor, mayor), senators, judges, ballot issues, etc.
In those cases, approval voting is the correct answer. Easy to explain, easy to tabulate, most mathematically fair, hardest to game.
Per Duvenger's Law, approval voting would probably also help replace the current two party system with more choices.
So yes, you can gerrymander Senate seats. It's just harder and less reliable than House seats.
I mean, hell, at this point, a lot of "state lines" are either way too far in (resulting in close-by cities within the same broad metro-area having no common government in the Northeast) or way too far out (resulting in close-by cities in the Bay Area having no common government that doesn't also serve rural Central California).
The point of drawing constituency lines is to unite people who have common interests while giving mutual autonomy to people with competing interests. The current states in the USA do none of that: they basically just systematize the shapes of former colonial land-holdings.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_Five_of_the_United_Sta...
The phrase "the Constitution prohibits this amendment" doesn't make any sense because an amendment to the Constitution cannot by definition be unconstitutional.
1. An amendment eliminating all actual powers of the Senate, either with our workout creating some new body to which those powers are transferred, or
2. An amendment eliminating the restriction on amendments eliminating the equal representation of States in the Senate.
What if New Jersey and Michigan just decide they want to be as they are, but excluding Camden and Detroit respectively?
Or would you do something whimsical like draw lines based on football/baseball teams and cleave states like CT in half?
Maybe, maybe not. Most of those don't fundamentally have to be single-winner elected things, e.g., executive positions don't have to be single-winner systems; multiseat executives do exist, after all -- even many US states have multiseat executives, but do those by single-winner election with seats allocated by portfolio (see, e.g., California's "Constitutional officers".)
> In those cases, approval voting is the correct answer.
Approval voting is, IMO, generally a poor choice for most elections (its good for elections in groups where disapproval or approval is tied to some substantive commitment -- e.g., if you are voting on where to go to for lunch, and "approve" on an option means "I will go if this option is chosen".) It doesn't make a lot of sense for most other purposes (because "approval" doesn't mean the same thing across different ballots -- this is actually true, though to a far lesser degree, of systems that require a forced ranking ballot, which is why I prefer ranked voting systems that can use unforced rankings) -- for ballot props that potentially might conflict, a system that merges features of majority and approval makes some sense (that is, it takes a majority to pass, but in the case of conflict the larger majority trumps the smaller one) and is, in fact, already used in some places (e.g., its what California already uses for ballot props.)
> Easy to explain, easy to tabulate, most mathematically fair, hardest to game.
IRV isn't much worse on any of those, and is if anything more familiar (and if you are using STV for multiseat elections, IRV is identical, so even though its a little harder to explain on its own, if you are using STV elsewhere, IRV for single-seat elections is pretty much free in terms of complexity, either of explanation or administration.)
I was an active IRV proponent. Then I figured out they require computerized tabulation (for non trivial elections, such as my jurisdiction) and are infeasible to audit.
How to we enact it?
I also see a small problem.
Party representatives stand outside of polling places and present voters with lists of party endorsed candidates. People who currently vote solely on the basis of party will just approve only candidates who are on the party provided list.
The two major parties control virtually every legislative body in the country and the current system serves them best.
Knee-jerk answers like "Vote the bums out" isn't realistic. I'm thinking back to when the people of Washington DC voted back into office as their mayor, a man who was videotaped smoking crack cocaine. Even when it should be a simple matter, party politics trumps common sense.
(And this applies to any electoral reform that there is resistance to by incumbents, not just approval voting, which I don't particular prefer.)
In states with citizen initiative processes that bypass incumbent office holders, by that method. Elsewhere, by building support in the electorate and then running candidates on a platform of doing that, and keeping organized in the electorate to hold those candidates accountable.
Join your local party and sneak it into your platform.
Use it whenever it makes sense. I used approval voting for feature planning and triaging bugs.
Our study group uses it to choose dinner.
Etc.
"Sees the light"? Proportional representation is far from a panacea. It tends to lead to a fragmented government (which is usually bad). It also privileges party over individual candidates (which can be good or bad, but those who dislike partisanship would certainly disapprove). There are other factors at play as well.
Most (in)famously, the Weimar Republic used PR. That didn't end well.
Among modern, established democracies, proportionality of representation is pretty closely linked to public satisfaction with government, and public participation with government. Its as close to a panacea for effective democracy as you could have -- which isn't surprising, proportionality of representation is a pretty direct measure of the extent to which a government is democratic.
> It tends to lead to a fragmented government (which is usually bad).
Any government in a system with a diversity of viewpoints is either going to be minoritarian or coalition based; winner take all tends to majority-of-a-majority -- which can be minoritarian -- and, whether it is that or not, tends also to involve non-overt coalition building in structuring big-tent parties. PR systems tend to be more likely to be actually majoritarian, and tend to feature explicit -- and thus more accountable -- coalition building. It doesn't lead to "fragmented" government by any meaningful measures.
Itssometimes portrayed as leading to less stable government, because in parliamentary systems its associated with more rapid turnover of government administrations/cabinets, but by another measure, it leads to more stable government, as while there is more frequent turnover of cabinets, there is more continuity between successive governments/cabinets, and more continuity in governments/cabinets over time.
> It also privileges party over individual candidates (which can be good or bad, but those who dislike partisanship would certainly disapprove).
Certain methods of achieving proportionality (e.g., party list systems) may do so; candidate-centered election methods with rules that produce proportional results (like single transferrable vote in small multimember districts) do not. In fact, such systems would do the opposite compared to the status quo system in the US, emphasizing individual candidates over party by offering more competition, even in general elections, between individual candidates even in districts with a clear majority for a single party.
> Most (in)famously, the Weimar Republic used PR. That didn't end well.
Constitutional provisions for Presidential rule-by-decree had a lot to do with that, PR -- or even the particular form of PR used by the Weimar Republic -- well, if you want to argue that that was responsible for something, then go ahead and make that argument.
When one of these "modern, established democracies" manages to maintain a stable government (or even survive) for as long as the United States has, perhaps that statement could be made.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proportional_representation#Li...
Other than perhaps the Scandinavian countries, that's not exactly a list that makes one optimistic about stability.
Edit: "Constitutional provisions for Presidential rule-by-decree had a lot to do with that, PR -- or even the particular form of PR used by the Weimar Republic -- well, if you want to argue that that was responsible for something, then go ahead and make that argument."
See my response to the other poster below. The PR system (and the myriad of squabbling parties produced by it) led to there being no effective government for two subsequent parliamentary elections.
Y Norway
Y Australia
Y Switzerland
Y Netherlands
United States
Y Germany
Y New Zealand
Canada
Singapore
Y Denmark
Y Ireland
Y Sweden
Y Iceland
United Kingdom
Y Hong Kong
South Korea
Japan
Y Liechtenstein
Y Israel
France> Which of them would you not consider a stable government?
Whoa, that's some strawman. The standard we're looking to prove is "proportionality of representation is pretty closely linked to public satisfaction with government".
Whoa, that's some strawman.
No. The person who was being replied to specifically wrote about stability.
"Has" up to what date? Is there some set length of time they have to surpass? Or are you suggesting the US can't learn anything from other countries until after it collapses and is outlived? Seems like a moot point by then.
That's a lovely artificial requirement you've made there. I assume this means that you think the US system of government is inferior to the UK system of government, since longevity is apparently the only requirement?
And apparently having an extremely bloody secession war counts as 'stability'? Or being at war with your neighbours for most of the first half of your life? The US lost 50% more people fighting itself than when fighting the Axis in WWII a century later.
Wanting a system of government with proven stability is not a "straw man".
"I assume this means that you think the US system of government is inferior to the UK system of government"
The UK doesn't have PR either. And no, it means nothing of the sort. My argument is that PR tends to be unstable, not that the US system is the only possible stable system.
Still, I like you completely sidestepped the question of how 'stability' matches up with having a civil war that was one of the bloodiest in history. You're not actually interested in finding the best form of government; you're only interested in defending your own.
Nice attempt to shift the goalposts. Not going to work.
Stability isn't the only goal, but it's an important one.
"Still, I like you completely sidestepped the question of how 'stability' matches up with having a civil war that was one of the bloodiest in history.
Britain had a nasty civil war also.
"You're not actually interested in finding the best form of government; "
No, because I don't believe that there is a "best" form of government. Attempting to immanentize the eschaton usually (always) winds up with a few million people dead.
I'm interested in avoiding forms of government that are demonstrably bad, based on past performance.
Pr also gives to much power fringe party's eg Germany totally abandoning nukes to keep the 1 or 2 greens onside to prop up Angela's government.
Abandoning nuclear energy is a widely accepted move by the majority of the population and across political parties. If anything the people wanting to keep nuclear energy, are in a minority. A minority that is not willing to risk actually advocating for nuclear energy.
And I bet until last week the German "consumer" loved diesel powered cars (and the tax benefits) and ignored the down sides of targeting CO2 vs NOX
The phase out of nuclear power isn't the result of a coalition trying to appease a radical fringe component. It's broadly reflective of public will in Germany.
http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/Country-Profiles/Countries...
Even if it were a reason, reversing again on this topic and not abandoning nuclear power would have no impact on prices by itself. New nuclear plants would have to be built which would take decades, even if you could find locations where such a plant would be tolerated.
Is the causal relationship really that proportional representation drives political representation and satisfaction?
Democracies with a high level of political participation may be likelier to adopt experiments like proportional representation...and then public satisfaction is driven by the high level and effectiveness of political participation.
Having lived in Italy, I am not that impressed by the politics there, and think that proportional representation with party lists is part of the problem.
I think STV is pretty interesting, but producing one winner is no bad thing either. Of course, as per Arrow, nothing is perfect.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrow%27s_impossibility_theore...
Already the case.
It also privileges party over individual candidates
Distinction without a difference. Even if the focus is on the candidates, they're all firmly partisan with little variation.
Most (in)famously, the Weimar Republic used PR. That didn't end well.
No, that is not the point. Hitler eating sugar had nothing to do with his government. Proportional representation did. That's how he came to power. Look it up.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_Hitler#Appointment_as_ch...
"Hindenburg reluctantly agreed to appoint Hitler as chancellor after two further parliamentary elections—in July and November 1932—had not resulted in the formation of a majority government."
They had large number of splinter parties, all of whom hated each other's guts, and which were unable to form an effective government. The Nazis were not a majority (no one was), but were a large, well-disciplined bloc. The rest is, as they say, history.
>Distinction without a difference. Even if the focus is on the candidates, they're all firmly partisan with little variation.
Does it matter whether the politicians are partisans unified in party goals? It seems that in the USA, politicians frequently go against their own parties, relative to other countries. Is partisanship in favour of non-party aligned interest groups part of what you perceive as a problem? Please describe a non-partisan politician, party, or system.
Lastly, I think we can all agree that a single anecdote does not make the case for or against the PR system, though it does show that PR is not a sufficient condition for stable and everlasting democracy.
Ironically, I suspect SuperPACs are contributing to the decay of Republican cohesion -- the party has lost its strong control over re-election. At this point the only thing Republicans in Congress can agree upon is that they dislike anything they suspect a Democrat -- especially the President -- of liking.
As for Democrats, Will Roger's famous quote is something like "I am not a member of any organized political party. I am a Democrat."
Just look at the fixes the German Federal Republic put into place in 1949. That turns out to work quite well, allowing party plurality while still maintaining effective coalitions.
Germany and New Zealand use MMR in some of their elections.
The stalemate of the past two terms in the US doesn't say much for winner-takes-all.
> It also privileges party over individual candidates
Only depending on the proportional rep type. But again, in the US, there are only two parties. Very rarely you might glimpse an independent, but they mean nothing in the overall political landscape. There is no functional way for another party to rise in the current political system in the US - so party is inherently privileged over individuals.
> Most (in)famously, the Weimar Republic used PR. That didn't end well.
Ah, you're just trolling.
Edit: chock full of nazis, apparently: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proportional_representation#Li...
You think it's bad with two parties who can't agree on anything? Try twenty parties who can't agree on anything.
"Ah, you're just trolling."
No, I certainly am not trolling. The multitude of parties in the Weimar Republic, which could not form an effective government for two entire election cycles, were directly responsible for Hitler's rise to power.
What, multipolar politics, like modern Germany or Sweden or Australia? Wealthy, socially progressive countries with high standards of living?
You're just spreading FUD. PR was one of a great many factors involved in the rise of Hitler, but keep in mind that the US system also let a president get elected that didn't win the popular vote, who then went on to destroy a foreign country to drum up domestic political support. Literally hundreds of thousands of people died in Iraq to make Bush more popular in the US, despite Iraq having nothing to do with threats to the US. But it would be stupid to say that the US electoral system was directly responsible for the Iraqi bloodbath.
And as I say in the other comment, there are a shitload of countries using PR that aren't fascists.
Modern Germany does not have PR. For good reason.
" PR was one of a great many factors involved in the rise of Hitler, but keep in mind that the US system also let a president get elected that didn't win the popular vote"
The U.S. President has never been elected by popular vote. Again, for good reason. Feature, not bug.
I do think the algorithm presented here is too simplistic. It's likely to create situations where people have to travel long distances to their polling places and, if anything, we should be optimizing for voter turn out. It could, perhaps, work if cities were never split between districts, but even then people who live just over the border may have to travel quite a ways to vote.
I wonder whether we're arguing over the best bad idea rather than something simpler which would yield a better result. Is there really a benefit to geographically grouping voters? I'd argue that you're likely to get better representation from grouping voters by age range rather than locality. We've consistently seen policies that benefit older demographics over younger demographics...perhaps if there was a candidate elected only by 20-somethings, that demographic would actually be represented for once.
Not only does that inconvenience polling places, but I think it does impose some socio-political outcome. I'm not sure whether it's good or bad, but the decision to not have cities voting as a block, and instead to include slices of them with their suburbs and outlying rural areas, certainly impacts the way representation will be determined.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Myth_of_the_Rational_Voter
Essentially, low voter turnout is a correlated symptom of de-facto oligarchy.
Gerrymandering is a different problem made worse by the Supreme Court's decision that every elected body with the exception of the Senate requires proportional representation.
Since districts are drawn by state legislatures, and state legislatures are only driven by districts cut up by population, there's no incentive do to anything but preserve/expand the numbers for your party. In other words, you don't get the "adult supervision" role that the US Senate delivers (for better or for worse), and get the quality of governance that you see in the US House -- that is drivel.
That's perhaps true, and I observe what you say to be correct, but the lack of an acknowledged fair solution means that the existing solutions are all (party) political.
When Party A is in charge, they gerrymander in one direction, and when Party B is in charge, they then gerrymander in exactly the other (or perhaps a convenient tangent). The purpose of gerrymandering is to unfairly extend the period that you're in power.
Having an ostensibly party-neutral solution that all parties can agree to is a useful solution.
It's not immediately clear that this solution will really be fair, but it's not immediately clear that it's unfair, and at least it removes the politicking over boundaries.
If even a few regions start using this solution with the recognition that it is party-neutral, then parties in power elsewhere will start to be pressured into doing the same, to avoid appearing undemocratic.
It's a one-step improvement on what happens now.
Fairness is simply maximal competitiveness.
Or instead, red and blue will actually start listening to their constituents because if they do then they could get two and if they don't they could get zero.
So over many elections, the aggregate result would be fair.
Let me put it another way, which system would you prefer to live in?
The point of voting isn't to get fair representation. You can't have fair representation in this sense due to the Pigeon-Hole principle. You can have it in a long term, systemic sense.
every time an individual result is unfair... it's still unfair
Duverger's Law suggests that a two party system is the logical result of winner takes all elections, because aspirant will attempt to win with the smallest coalition.
In other words, fair redistricting will reduce polarization.
The only way I can think of to get both is to increase the number of representatives. The House of Representatives was originally supposed to scale with the size of the population, and they eventually put a stop to that. If they had continued, then we'd have a house with a makeup that matches national polling much more closely than it does now, and gerrymandering wouldn't be as much of a problem. Isn't it true that as you add more representatives, gerrymandering distortions lessen?