How to Enhance Democracy?
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A Generalization of the Minisum and Minimax Voting Methods
A Generalization of the Minisum and Minimax Voting Methods Shankar N. Sivarajan Undergraduate, Department of Physics Indian Institute of Science Bangalore 560 012, India [email protected] Faculty Advisor: Prof. Y. Narahari Deparment of Computer Science and Automation Revised Version: December 4, 2017 Abstract In this paper, we propose a family of approval voting-schemes for electing committees based on the preferences of voters. In our schemes, we calcu- late the vector of distances of the possible committees from each of the ballots and, for a given p-norm, choose the one that minimizes the magni- tude of the distance vector under that norm. The minisum and minimax methods suggested by previous authors and analyzed extensively in the literature naturally appear as special cases corresponding to p = 1 and p = 1; respectively. Supported by examples, we suggest that using a small value of p; such as 2 or 3, provides a good compromise between the minisum and minimax voting methods with regard to the weightage given to approvals and disapprovals. For large but finite p; our method reduces to finding the committee that covers the maximum number of voters, and this is far superior to the minimax method which is prone to ties. We also discuss extensions of our methods to ternary voting. 1 Introduction In this paper, we consider the problem of selecting a committee of k members out of n candidates based on preferences expressed by m voters. The most common way of conducting this election is to allow each voter to select his favorite candidate and vote for him/her, and we select the k candidates with the most number of votes. -
1 Introduction 2 Condorcet and Borda Tallies
1 Introduction General introduction goes here. 2 Condorcet and Borda Tallies 2.1 Definitions We are primarily interested in comparing the behaviors of two information aggregation methods, namely the Condorcet and Borda tallies. This interest is motivated by both historical and practical concerns: the relative merits of the two methods have been argued since the 18th century, and, although variations on the Borda tally are much more common in practice, there is a significant body of theoretical evidence that the Condorcet tally is in many cases superior. To begin, we provide formal definitions of both of these methods, and of a generalized information aggregation problem. An information aggregation problem, often referred to simply as a voting problem, is a problem which involves taking information from a number of disparate sources, and using this information to produce a single output. Problems of this type arise in numerous domains. In political science, they are common, occurring whenever voters cast votes which are used to decide 1 the outcome of some issue. Although less directly, they also occur in fields as diverse as control theory and cognitive science. Wherever there is a system which must coalesce information from its subsystems, there is potentially the need to balance conflicting information about a single topic. In any such circumstance, if there is not reason to trust any single source more than the others, the problem can be phrased as one of information aggregation. 2.1.1 Information Aggregation Problems To facilitate the formalization of these problems, we only consider cases in which a finite number of information sources (which shall henceforth be re- ferred to as voters) provide information regarding some contested issue. -
A Liquid Democracy System for Human-Computer Societies
A Liquid Democracy System for Human-Computer Societies Anton Kolonin, Ben Goertzel, Cassio Pennachin, Deborah Duong, Marco Argentieri, Matt Iklé, Nejc Znidar SingularityNET Foundation, Amsterdam, Netherlands {anton, ben, cassio}@singularitynet.io Abstract replicated in latest developments of distributed computing system based on Proof-of-Stake (PoS) in blockchain. In the Problem of reliable democratic governance is blockchain systems, including some that are now used to critical for survival of any community, and it will design ecosystems for Artificial Intelligence (AI) be critical for communities powered with Artificial applications, the mostly suggested solution called Delegated Intelligence (AI) systems upon developments of Proof-of-Stake (DPoS), which effectively means that rule on the latter. Apparently, it will be getting more and basis of financial capabilities while it is implemented more critical because of increasing speeds and indirectly, by means of manually controlled voting process scales of electronic communications and to select delegates to conduct the governance of the system. decreasing latencies in system responses. In order The latter be only limited improvement and can nor be to address this need, we present design and implemented in AI communities operating at high speeds implementation of a reputation system supporting not controllable by means of limited human capabilities. “liquid democracy” principle. The system is based on “weighted liquid rank” algorithm employing The described situation leads to the danger that consensus in different sorts of explicit and implicit ratings being any emergent AI community may be quickly took over by exchanged by members of the society as well as AI system hostile to either majority of community of AI implicit assessments of of the members based on systems or humans that are supposed to be served by given measures of their activity in the society. -
Il Sorteggio Come Metodo Di Decisione
IL SORTEGGIO COME METODO DI DECISIONE. PRINCIPI E FATTISPECIE* di Marco Mandato** SOMMARIO: 1. Premessa – 2. Il sorteggio come regola ordinaria di decisione per tutelare l’eguaglianza in 'entrata' – 3. Il sorteggio come regola decisoria residuale o eccezionale per tutelare l’eguaglianza 'sopravvenuta' – 4. Il sorteggio come regola di formazione degli organi collegiali di valutazione e controllo – 4.1. Il sorteggio come regola di formazione degli organi collegiali con funzioni giurisdizionali – 5. Conclusioni 1. Premessa l sorteggio rappresenta un metodo per assumere le decisioni nell’ambito della I giuridicità1. Il caso è considerato il metodo più democratico2 perché, in fondo, la * Contributo sottoposto a double blind peer review. ** Dottore di ricerca in Diritto pubblico, comparato e internazionale – Teoria dello Stato e Istituzioni politiche comparate, Sapienza, Università di Roma. 1 Per un inquadramento preliminare e generale sul tema, sebbene relativamente al solo Diritto pubblico, cfr. ZEI, A., L’arbitrato del caso: applicazioni del metodo del sorteggio nel Diritto pubblico, in Nomos-Le attualità nel diritto, n. 1/2017. 2 Il carattere democratico del sorteggio è stato alla base del funzionamento della democrazia ateniese nel V e nel IV secolo a. C., nella Firenze del a Venezia dal 1268 e a Firenze dal 1328. Ad Atene, l’estrazione a sorte costituiva il metodo tipico per formare la Bulé e le cariche interne alla stessa. il Presidente, competente a gestire e organizzare i lavori. Il Presidente era uno dei pritani, ossia un consigliere della tribù dirigente che veniva estratto a sorte. Terminato il turno‘, al tramonto, si procedeva nuovamente all‘estrazione di un nuovo Presidente tra i pritani delle tribù in modo che ciascuna di esse avrebbe diretto gli affari‘ secondo il turno stabilito dal caso. -
On the Distortion of Voting with Multiple Representative Candidates∗
The Thirty-Second AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI-18) On the Distortion of Voting with Multiple Representative Candidates∗ Yu Cheng Shaddin Dughmi David Kempe Duke University University of Southern California University of Southern California Abstract voters and the chosen candidate in a suitable metric space (Anshelevich 2016; Anshelevich, Bhardwaj, and Postl 2015; We study positional voting rules when candidates and voters Anshelevich and Postl 2016; Goel, Krishnaswamy, and Mu- are embedded in a common metric space, and cardinal pref- erences are naturally given by distances in the metric space. nagala 2017). The underlying assumption is that the closer In a positional voting rule, each candidate receives a score a candidate is to a voter, the more similar their positions on from each ballot based on the ballot’s rank order; the candi- key questions are. Because proximity implies that the voter date with the highest total score wins the election. The cost would benefit from the candidate’s election, voters will rank of a candidate is his sum of distances to all voters, and the candidates by increasing distance, a model known as single- distortion of an election is the ratio between the cost of the peaked preferences (Black 1948; Downs 1957; Black 1958; elected candidate and the cost of the optimum candidate. We Moulin 1980; Merrill and Grofman 1999; Barbera,` Gul, consider the case when candidates are representative of the and Stacchetti 1993; Richards, Richards, and McKay 1998; population, in the sense that they are drawn i.i.d. from the Barbera` 2001). population of the voters, and analyze the expected distortion Even in the absence of strategic voting, voting systems of positional voting rules. -
Stable Voting
Stable Voting Wesley H. Hollidayy and Eric Pacuitz y University of California, Berkeley ([email protected]) z University of Maryland ([email protected]) September 12, 2021 Abstract In this paper, we propose a new single-winner voting system using ranked ballots: Stable Voting. The motivating principle of Stable Voting is that if a candidate A would win without another candidate B in the election, and A beats B in a head-to-head majority comparison, then A should still win in the election with B included (unless there is another candidate A0 who has the same kind of claim to winning, in which case a tiebreaker may choose between A and A0). We call this principle Stability for Winners (with Tiebreaking). Stable Voting satisfies this principle while also having a remarkable ability to avoid tied outcomes in elections even with small numbers of voters. 1 Introduction Voting reform efforts in the United States have achieved significant recent successes in replacing Plurality Voting with Instant Runoff Voting (IRV) for major political elections, including the 2018 San Francisco Mayoral Election and the 2021 New York City Mayoral Election. It is striking, by contrast, that Condorcet voting methods are not currently used in any political elections.1 Condorcet methods use the same ranked ballots as IRV but replace the counting of first-place votes with head- to-head comparisons of candidates: do more voters prefer candidate A to candidate B or prefer B to A? If there is a candidate A who beats every other candidate in such a head-to-head majority comparison, this so-called Condorcet winner wins the election. -
Single-Winner Voting Method Comparison Chart
Single-winner Voting Method Comparison Chart This chart compares the most widely discussed voting methods for electing a single winner (and thus does not deal with multi-seat or proportional representation methods). There are countless possible evaluation criteria. The Criteria at the top of the list are those we believe are most important to U.S. voters. Plurality Two- Instant Approval4 Range5 Condorcet Borda (FPTP)1 Round Runoff methods6 Count7 Runoff2 (IRV)3 resistance to low9 medium high11 medium12 medium high14 low15 spoilers8 10 13 later-no-harm yes17 yes18 yes19 no20 no21 no22 no23 criterion16 resistance to low25 high26 high27 low28 low29 high30 low31 strategic voting24 majority-favorite yes33 yes34 yes35 no36 no37 yes38 no39 criterion32 mutual-majority no41 no42 yes43 no44 no45 yes/no 46 no47 criterion40 prospects for high49 high50 high51 medium52 low53 low54 low55 U.S. adoption48 Condorcet-loser no57 yes58 yes59 no60 no61 yes/no 62 yes63 criterion56 Condorcet- no65 no66 no67 no68 no69 yes70 no71 winner criterion64 independence of no73 no74 yes75 yes/no 76 yes/no 77 yes/no 78 no79 clones criterion72 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 monotonicity yes no no yes yes yes/no yes criterion80 prepared by FairVote: The Center for voting and Democracy (April 2009). References Austen-Smith, David, and Jeffrey Banks (1991). “Monotonicity in Electoral Systems”. American Political Science Review, Vol. 85, No. 2 (June): 531-537. Brewer, Albert P. (1993). “First- and Secon-Choice Votes in Alabama”. The Alabama Review, A Quarterly Review of Alabama History, Vol. ?? (April): ?? - ?? Burgin, Maggie (1931). The Direct Primary System in Alabama. -
Interactive Democracy Blue Sky Ideas Track
Session 29: Blue Sky AAMAS 2018, July 10-15, 2018, Stockholm, Sweden Interactive Democracy Blue Sky Ideas Track Markus Brill TU Berlin Berlin, Germany [email protected] ABSTRACT approached this question by developing an app, DemocracyOS [48], Interactive Democracy is an umbrella term that encompasses a va- that allows users to propose, debate, and vote on issues. Democ- riety of approaches to make collective decision making processes racyOS is only one example of a quickly growing number of ap- more engaging and responsive. A common goal of these approaches proaches that aim to reconcile established democratic processes is to utilize modern information technology—in particular, the with the desire of citizens to participate in political decision mak- 1 Internet—in order to enable more interactive decision making pro- ing. Another example is the software LiquidFeedback [6], which is 2 cesses. An integral part of many interactive democracy proposals developed by the Association for Interactive Democracy. Currently, are online decision platforms that provide much more flexibility these tools are mainly used for decision making within progressive and interaction possibilities than traditional democratic systems. political parties [9, p. 162] or in the context of community engage- This is achieved by embracing the novel paradigm of delegative ment platforms such as WeGovNow [10]. A common goal of these voting, often referred to as liquid democracy, which aims to recon- approaches, often summarized under the umbrella term Interac- 3 cile the idealistic appeal of direct democracy with the practicality tive Democracy (henceforth ID), is to utilize modern information of representative democracy. The successful design of interactive technology—in particular, the Internet—in order to enable more democracy systems presents a multidisciplinary research challenge; interactive decision making processes. -
Democracy on the Precipice Council of Europe Democracy 2011-12 Council of Europe Publishing Debates
Democracy on the Precipice Democracy Democracy is well-established and soundly practiced in most European countries. But despite unprecedented progress, there is growing dissatisfaction with the state of democracy and deepening mistrust of democratic institutions; a situation exacer- Democracy on the Precipice bated by the economic crisis. Are Europe’s democracies really under threat? Has the traditional model of European democracy exhausted its potential? A broad consensus is forming as to the urgent need to examine the origins of the crisis and to explore Council of Europe visions and strategies which could contribute to rebuilding confidence in democracy. Democracy Debates 2011-12 As Europe’s guardian of democracy, human rights and the rule of law, the Council of Europe is committed to exploring the state and practice of European democracy, as Debates of Europe Publishing 2011-12 Council Council of Europe Democracy well as identifying new challenges and anticipating future trends. In order to facilitate Preface by Thorbjørn Jagland this reflection, the Council of Europe held a series of Democracy Debates with the participation of renowned specialists working in a variety of backgrounds and disciplines. This publication presents the eight Democracy Debate lectures. Each presentation Zygmunt Bauman analyses a specific aspect of democracy today, placing the issues not only in their political context but also addressing the historical, technological and communication Ulrich Beck dimensions. The authors make proposals on ways to improve democratic governance Ayşe Kadıoğlu and offer their predictions on how democracy in Europe may evolve. Together, the presentations contribute to improving our understanding of democracy today and to John Keane recognising the ways it could be protected and strengthened. -
The Fluid Mechanics of Liquid Democracy
The Fluid Mechanics of Liquid Democracy Paul Gölz Anson Kahng Simon Mackenzie Ariel D. Procaccia Abstract Liquid democracy is the principle of making collective decisions by letting agents transitively delegate their votes. Despite its significant appeal, it has become apparent that a weakness of liquid democracy is that a small subset of agents may gain massive influence. To address this, we propose to change the current practice by allowing agents to specify multiple delegation options instead of just one. Much like in nature, where — fluid mechanics teaches us — liquid maintains an equal level in connected vessels, so do we seek to control the flow of votes in a way that balances influence as much as possible. Specifically, we analyze the problem of choosing delegations to approximately minimize the maximum number of votes entrusted to any agent, by drawing connections to the literature on confluent flow. We also introduce a random graph model for liquid democracy, and use it to demonstrate the benefits of our approach both theoretically and empirically. 1 Introduction Liquid democracy is a potentially disruptive approach to democratic decision making. As in direct democracy, agents can vote on every issue by themselves. Alternatively, however, agents may delegate their vote, i.e., entrust it to any other agent who then votes on their behalf. Delegations are transitive; for example, if agents 2 and 3 delegate their votes to 1, and agent 4 delegates her vote to 3, then agent 1 would vote with the weight of all four agents, including herself. Just like representative democracy, this system allows for separation of labor, but provides for stronger accountability: Each delegator is connected to her transitive delegate by a path of personal trust relationships, and each delegator on this path can withdraw her delegation at any time if she disagrees with her delegate’s choices. -
A Canadian Model of Proportional Representation by Robert S. Ring A
Proportional-first-past-the-post: A Canadian model of Proportional Representation by Robert S. Ring A thesis submitted to the School of Graduate Studies in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts Department of Political Science Memorial University St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador May 2014 ii Abstract For more than a decade a majority of Canadians have consistently supported the idea of proportional representation when asked, yet all attempts at electoral reform thus far have failed. Even though a majority of Canadians support proportional representation, a majority also report they are satisfied with the current electoral system (even indicating support for both in the same survey). The author seeks to reconcile these potentially conflicting desires by designing a uniquely Canadian electoral system that keeps the positive and familiar features of first-past-the- post while creating a proportional election result. The author touches on the theory of representative democracy and its relationship with proportional representation before delving into the mechanics of electoral systems. He surveys some of the major electoral system proposals and options for Canada before finally presenting his made-in-Canada solution that he believes stands a better chance at gaining approval from Canadians than past proposals. iii Acknowledgements First of foremost, I would like to express my sincerest gratitude to my brilliant supervisor, Dr. Amanda Bittner, whose continuous guidance, support, and advice over the past few years has been invaluable. I am especially grateful to you for encouraging me to pursue my Master’s and write about my electoral system idea. -
Governance in Decentralized Networks
Governance in decentralized networks Risto Karjalainen* May 21, 2020 Abstract. Effective, legitimate and transparent governance is paramount for the long-term viability of decentralized networks. If the aim is to design such a governance model, it is useful to be aware of the history of decision making paradigms and the relevant previous research. Towards such ends, this paper is a survey of different governance models, the thinking behind such models, and new tools and structures which are made possible by decentralized blockchain technology. Governance mechanisms in the wider civil society are reviewed, including structures and processes in private and non-profit governance, open-source development, and self-managed organisations. The alternative ways to aggregate preferences, resolve conflicts, and manage resources in the decentralized space are explored, including the possibility of encoding governance rules as automatically executed computer programs where humans or other entities interact via a protocol. Keywords: Blockchain technology, decentralization, decentralized autonomous organizations, distributed ledger technology, governance, peer-to-peer networks, smart contracts. 1. Introduction This paper is a survey of governance models in decentralized networks, and specifically in networks which make use of blockchain technology. There are good reasons why governance in decentralized networks is a topic of considerable interest at present. Some of these reasons are ideological. We live in an era where detailed information about private individuals is being collected and traded, in many cases without the knowledge or consent of the individuals involved. Decentralized technology is seen as a tool which can help protect people against invasions of privacy. Decentralization can also be viewed as a reaction against the overreach by state and industry.