It’s not exactly as bad, because it does present opportunities for breaking the deadlocked two party system. It does not go far enough to improve on plurality, and I agree that the logistical issues make implementation a fools errand. The spoiler effect is still an edge case that has much less effect than a simple plurality vote between 3 candidates.
I’m not advocating for ranked choice. I’m on board with STAR voting, and I also like almost any other voting system better than both plurality and ranked choice.
It does not, in fact, break the two party system. Full stop.
RCV still has the spoiler effect, and is in fact worse for third parties.
If the third party is small, then RCV will sideline them harder than FPtP, if they get big enough to matter, then RCV will break and the worst candidate will be elected.
See any RCV election with three or more viable candidates, but particularly Burlington 2009.
So RCV fails to do the one thing that people say it’s good for. It does not break the two party system. Something we’ve known for a long time, seeming as how it’s used in one category of Australian elections, and that particular category is dominated by two parties. (other areas of Australian politics use proportional elections, but one section of their government is single winner RCV)
It’s not exactly as bad, because it does present opportunities for breaking the deadlocked two party system. It does not go far enough to improve on plurality, and I agree that the logistical issues make implementation a fools errand. The spoiler effect is still an edge case that has much less effect than a simple plurality vote between 3 candidates.
I’m not advocating for ranked choice. I’m on board with STAR voting, and I also like almost any other voting system better than both plurality and ranked choice.
It does not, in fact, break the two party system. Full stop.
RCV still has the spoiler effect, and is in fact worse for third parties.
If the third party is small, then RCV will sideline them harder than FPtP, if they get big enough to matter, then RCV will break and the worst candidate will be elected.
See any RCV election with three or more viable candidates, but particularly Burlington 2009.
So RCV fails to do the one thing that people say it’s good for. It does not break the two party system. Something we’ve known for a long time, seeming as how it’s used in one category of Australian elections, and that particular category is dominated by two parties. (other areas of Australian politics use proportional elections, but one section of their government is single winner RCV)