Seth Henry

CAS 100A

The Instant-Runoff Voting System Intro I. Imagine a society in which control of the government is out of the hands of the people. A. What if I told you that we may very well be heading down that path? B. I know that we can fix it. Orienting Material A. Throughout my life it has always been extremely important to me that I have control over the way that I can live, and in todays society the only real way to go about that is through civic engagement. B. To properly engage in civil life we must have the ability to make a statement in governmental policy. C. However, to really make a statement, but we must also confirm that our votes are actually meaningful. D. We have always grown up with a two-party political system, choosing between the lesser of two evils. We should not need to do that whatsoever. There are many problems in the current way we elect our president that we need to address, and the Instant-Runoff voting system is the policy that will do that. Preview A. The problems of the current voting system vastly outweigh the positives and we need to do something about it. B. One way to fix this is by adopting an alternate voting system. C. The Instant-Runoff voting system is the best way to fix our problem.

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Body I. There are too many problems in the current voting system for us to continue its use in the United States. A. The current voting system forces voters to vote tactically. i. According to the Center for Election Science tactical voting "is when voters cast an insincere ballot in order to increase their expected value for an election outcome." ii. This is the epitome of the idea of voting for the lesser of two evils that has become necessary in today's socio-economic climate. iii. Who in this class voted in 2012? Did you agree with everything that the candidate that you were voting for had to say? iv. As time progresses, this will massively damage a political spectrum and force them to tend toward a two party system. B. Over time, tactical voting forces a political spectrum to tend toward a two-party system.

Seth Henry

CAS 100A

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i. Currently in the United States, we have a blatant two-party system that does not encapsulate the ideals of many Americans. 1. How many of you find yourselves perfectly identifying with either of the two primary political parties? 2. According to CNN Election statistics Mitt Romney took 47% of the vote and Obama took 51% of the vote. That leaves at least 2% of Americans that actively do not identify with the current system. 3. If we continue to have to vote for the lesser of two evils than how will we ever be able to know that they will do what we actually want them to. ii. Political candidates have lost all sense of accountability. 1. How often do we hear politicians telling us that they will do things and then not returning? 2. According to the New York Times article on American troops still in Afghanistan, the war in Afghanistan has become Mr. Obamas War. 3. We certainly need to look into other ways of holding our politicians accountable. The Instant-Runoff voting system works in a very specific way. A. The Instant-Runoff voting system allows voters to rank their votes. i. According to Ben Raues article on the Instant Runoff Voting System in Australia on Fairvote.org, they use what [they] call a preferential voting system. ii. In a preferential voting system, the voters are given the opportunity to rank their votes in whatever fashion they like. If there were six different candidates, they would be able to list whom they wanted to vote for in order from one to six. iii. After taking these votes in we must establish a way to count such a vote. B. The Instant-Runoff voting systems ballot counting method is surprisingly simple. i. According to C. G. P. Grey, an educational YouTube channel, in his video explaining the Instant-Runoff Voting System, after ballots are taken in we first look at the candidate that is in last place due to everyones first numbered votes and eliminate them from the race. ii. Then, we merely take the voters that voted for the eliminated candidate, look at their second choice, and change their vote to count for their second place choice. iii. We then continue this process until a clear majority is found and they are declared the winner. C. Next, we must analyze exactly what makes this better.

Seth Henry

CAS 100A

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The Instant-Runoff voting system is vastly superior to the current voting system that we have all come to know and love. A. By allowing voters to vote preferentially, we can create a political society with more than two vastly opposing viewpoints. i. If we think globally and look at what other nations are doing to help make their voting systems fairer, maybe we can understand why we should adopt this system. ii. According to the Australian Electoral Commission, Australia currently implements the system that I have previously described. iii. Referring back to Ben Reaus article about the use of the Instant-Runoff voting system in Australia, he points out the fact that it has allowed them to reach a point that they now have six political parties. iv. Rob Richies article on FairVote.org discussing the Irish Presidential Election with the runoff voting system explicitly points out, that if we were to adopt this system in the United States, it may allow us to have more political parties due to the fact that when they voted, the votes were proportionally distributed. v. Both of these systems have vastly more political parties than we do, thus saying something directly about their systems versus ours. B. These systems with a greater number of political parties are able to encapsulate many more of the views of the people in those societies. i. As a math major, the law of large numbers asserts that as we add more and more political parties into the mix, we will be able to more greatly encapsulate everyones specific views. ii. Specifically stated the law of large numbers asserts that as we add more data into the mix, we are more likely to reach the actual average. iii. Applying that to political parties, if we have a greater number of political parties, then we are more likely to encapsulate everyones view and thus accurately represent the average view of society in politics.

Conclusion I. Ultimately, due to its tendency to move toward a two-party system, current voting system is inherently flawed and we need to abandon it in the United States for the Instant-Runoff voting system. Whenever you vote, think about whether or not it matters.

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Seth Henry

CAS 100A

Cohen, Tom, CNNMoney's Jeanne Sahadi, Rich Barbieri, Ted Barrett, Jim Acosta, Ashley Killough, Paul Steinhauser, and Deirdre Walsh. "Parties Still Talking past Each Other on Taxes and Spending." CNN. Cable News Network, 01 Jan. 1970. Web. 16 Mar. 2013. Raue, Ben. "FairVote.org | Instant Runoff Voting in Australia: Guest Blogger Ben Raue."FairVote. Ed. Rob Richie. FairVote.org, 16 June 2009. Web. 19 Mar. 2013.Grey, C. G. P. "The Alternative Vote Explained." YouTube. YouTube, 06 Apr. 2011. Web. 16 Mar. 2013. Mitchell, Kathy. "Australian Electoral Commission - Frequently Asked Questions." Australian Electoral Commission. Australian Electoral Commission, 2012. Web. 16 Mar. 2013. Kabul, Afghanistan., Michael R. Gordon And Mark Landler; Alissa J. Rubin Contributed Reporting From. "Decision on Afghan Troop Levels Calculates Political and Military Interests." The New York Times. The New York Times, 13 Feb. 2013. Web. 20 Mar. 2013. "Tactical Voting - The Center for Election Science." The Center for Election Science RSS. N.p., 2013. Web. 20 Mar. 2013. CNN. Cable News Network, n.d. Web. 20 Mar. 2013. <http://www.cnn.com/election/2012/results/main>. Gray, C. G. P. "The Alternative Vote Explained." YouTube. YouTube, 06 Apr. 2011. Web. 20 Mar. 2013.