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A question on voting. Ireland, where I live, uses the "single transferable vote" system. Irish people often favourably contrast it with the "first past the post" used in the UK. I was trying to explain the differences between the two to my girlfriend and illustrate the weaknesses of first past the post relative to STV. One weakness that jumps out even at a casual inspection is that first past the post massively incentivises tactical voting, which by extension likely gives a home advantage to incumbents. Are there any other significant weaknesses to first past the post? Conversely, are there any weaknesses to STV that make first past the post preferable?
I feel it's unfair to compare FPTP to STV directly, because FPTP in the UK is used for single member constituencies, but STV is used for multi-member constituencies. I think it's the bigger and more important difference. A multi-member district is much less susceptible to gerrymandering (you can still do packing, which isn't a problem by itself, but cracking is much less efficient when there are four winners and instead of packing 49% into a district you can only pack 19% and can still lose a seat if your candidates aren't perfectly balanced).
However, STV is a pain to process. FPTP is "bigger pile of ballots wins", while STV requires a rather involved procedure where you have to keep track of a combinatorial explosion of expressed voter preferences or recount them multiple times.
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