   Should party primaries be combined into one?
  How would you feel about a system in which all party primaries are combined into one? For example, we could have a system where you can vote for a candidate and then each candidate would have the option of donate his votes to another candidate if he is not in a viable position to win. After this process is over, the top four candidates would be the only candidates in the general election. They would all be entitled to join in the televised debates and the winner of the race would be determined through the condorcet method. How does this system sound?   
  Why bother with parties or primaries then? And why give candidates the power to choose what to do with your vote for them? If I vote for X because I detest Y and then X turns around and gives my vote to Y, I'm not going to be happy about it. I prefer Instant Runoff Voting.   ;  I’d actually rather do away with the parties and get away from tribal politics. The reason for the primary though would be to narrow it down enough so that candidates can debate and publicly interact in a reasonable fashion.  Voters would then be able to better reflect on who would be the best choice for the office.The reason I wouldn’t make the primary in IRV format is just for simplicity. A hand recount would be more tedious and it would take up too much ballot space.;  I don't see how IRV would use more ballot space. Either way you are typically provided with a list of all the viable candidates. The difference with IRV is you put a number against every name instead of just ticking one.The Australian Senate votes are somewhat of a combination between the method you've suggested and standard IRV. The ballot paper provides us with two ways to vote. There's a list of columns sorted by party with a big line drawn through it near the top. Above the line is a single box per party, and below the line there's a list of all the candidates for each party. Voting "above the line" you put a single 1 in the party of your choice, which indicates you want to vote according to their wishes. Voting "below the line" you need to number every single candidate, but you get the option of numbering them however you wish.   ;Quote:Original post by ManaStoneI’d actually rather do away with the parties and get away from tribal politics. The reason for the primary though would be to narrow it down enough so that candidates can debate and publicly interact in a reasonable fashion.  Voters would then be able to better reflect on who would be the best choice for the office.The reason I wouldn’t make the primary in IRV format is just for simplicity. A hand recount would be more tedious and it would take up too much ballot space.I don't think it's possible to get away from parties or tribal politics, so I think it's better to take them into account and co-opt them, that is channel them, so that they serve the public interest. Using a primary to limit the number of candidates allowed into the debate favors candidates who are already known. I think that requiring candidates to gather signatures is a better approach than a primary. And requiring candidates to gather some specified number of small donations is better still. For example, if a candidate can't get 100 people to give him or her $25, they probably shouldn't be on the ballot. I'm not saying they should have to raise $2500 dollars, because they could pay that themselves or get a single wealthy donor to cover that. I'm saying they should demonstrate some modicum of support among the people they seek to represent.  And requiring candidates to do this for each debate might be worth looking into as well. That way a candidate who does poorly in a debate won't necessarily be automatically invited to the next debate. I don't think IRV is all that complicated. It's as simple as picking your top 3 candidates from the list in your order of preference. Count the "ones" as old fashioned votes. If there is no winner (ie, no one gets 50%+1), then start with votes for the third place candidate and count the "twos" and add the "two votes" for the top two "one" vote getters to their tallies. Repeat for each candidate in the losing field.   ;  Hmm, so a voting system much like the score keeping for Mario Kart would be most optimal.After summing up all of the vote rankings for each candidate, the candidate with the lowest number wins the election.Of course, there are two problems with this:1. People are stupid and some percentage of voters will inevitably be confused by the ranking system. 1% confusion could make all the difference in a close election.2. If five candidates exist but the voter only ranks the top 3, how do the two non-ranked candidates get fairly placed?   ;Quote:Original post by slayemin2. If five candidates exist but the voter only ranks the top 3, how do the two non-ranked candidates get fairly placed?They get placed by how many "first choice" votes they get. Just because they aren't the first choice of one particular voter doesn't mean they aren't the first choice of other voters. The "second choice" votes are only counted if there is no clear winner with the "first choice" votes. The "third choice" votes are only counted if there is no clear winner after the "first choice" and "second choice" votes are counted. It's an instant runoff. Unlike a real runoff, you don't have the option of switching your vote in the runoff to the other candidate. With an actual run off, if you vote for X in June and he gets into a run off with Y to be held in July, you could vote for Y in July if you wanted to. With instant runoff, you could not switch your vote like that. In fact, in instant runoff, if your first choice was one of the top two vote getters, your second choice would not matter. Your second choice would only matter if your first choice didn't get into the runoff. Interestingly enough, this turns third party voters into swing voters, the voters with the decisive votes. 