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Notes -
Something I recently noticed - increased push to implement ranked choice voting everywhere. What is more strange, it always seems to be Dems promoting it and Republicans opposing it. My question is - why? First of all, why push it now, and second, why the partisan divide? I mean, if it, say, gave advantage to the minority party, then you'd expect minority Rs push it too somewhere. But it's not what I am seeing.
My cynical take is that ranked choice voting is preferred by the more "wonkishly inclined" because it's less intuitive/provides more opportunity for gamesmanship than simple FPTP or Approval voting.
The partisan split is thus explained by the majority of journalists and academics being Democrats, and the Republicans being immediately suspicious for precisely the same reason.
It also makes a certain amount of sense in that (in the US at least) the left has been more prone to schism than the right and thus alternatives to FPTP can be reasonably characterized as helping the left more.
Why would journos/academics prefer gamesmanship?
Personally, I don’t care about RC vs. approval vs. other wonkish competitors. They’re all better than FPTP!
The important part is picking a rallying point, and RCV has some early momentum. We can hash out the details once we’ve reduced the influence of a two-party system.
Because expanded opportunities for gamesmanship increases thier power/status relative to the stereotypical "low information voter"
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