The Two Party System
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I watched the party congress in China today and thought what a difference to the US election. In the US there was a year long multi billion dollar campaign for each party, in China none at all. In the US we have a simple two party system, in China a single party system. What do you think? Is China's model the future? -J. Sent from Android ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org |
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The 1 & 2 party systems are the only ones avoiding the pitfalls of Arrow's Impossibility Theorem.
But what about 2.5 parties? By this I mean guys running but with no possibility of winning .. the so called third party candidates in the US?
They are often seen as spoilers, by taking away votes from the two possible candidates in a 2 party system.
But to the point, No I don't think China's system is the future. The world appears to like multiparty systems, increasingly with "fair voting" tossed in with some sort of recursive run-off schemes.
So I wonder what's it like in a true multi-party system like most of Europe has? Is it effective? interesting? confusing? fun? Are the populations aware of Arrow? Does it avoid grid-lock?
-- Owen
On Thu, Nov 8, 2012 at 1:54 AM, Jochen Fromm <[hidden email]> wrote:
============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org |
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Most European countries do quite well with a multi-party system, e.g. Germany, England, France, Poland). And a parliamentary or semi-parliamentary system is much more responsive to public opinion than a purely presidential system.
cheers, Paul
-----Original Message-----
From: Owen Densmore <[hidden email]> To: Jochen Fromm <[hidden email]>; The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]> Sent: Thu, Nov 8, 2012 9:37 am Subject: Re: [FRIAM] The Two Party System
The 1 & 2 party systems are the only ones avoiding the pitfalls of Arrow's Impossibility Theorem.
But what about 2.5 parties? By this I mean guys running but with no possibility of winning .. the so called third party candidates in the US?
They are often seen as spoilers, by taking away votes from the two possible candidates in a 2 party system.
But to the point, No I don't think China's system is the future. The world appears to like multiparty systems, increasingly with "fair voting" tossed in with some sort of recursive run-off schemes.
So I wonder what's it like in a true multi-party system like most of Europe has? Is it effective? interesting? confusing? fun? Are the populations aware of Arrow? Does it avoid grid-lock?
-- Owen
On Thu, Nov 8, 2012 at 1:54 AM, Jochen Fromm <[hidden email]> wrote:
============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org |
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In reply to this post by Owen Densmore
I'll comment again that in 1960 in Italy I was at first intrigued that parties actually stood for something, whereas Republicans and Democrats seemed Tweedledum and Tweedledee. However, at least at that time, Italian politics was pretty dysfunctional in part because the hard ideological positions of the many parties prevented compromise, and compromise is at the heart of functional politics.
Given our current situation in the US, gridlock would seem to be a property of hard positions, independent of how many parties there are. And Italian politics is still dysfunctional.....
Bruce
On Thu, Nov 8, 2012 at 9:36 AM, Owen Densmore <[hidden email]> wrote:
============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org |
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In reply to this post by Owen Densmore
Owen Densmore wrote at 11/08/2012 08:36 AM:
> The 1 & 2 party systems are the only ones avoiding the pitfalls of Arrow's > Impossibility Theorem. > > http://www.udel.edu/johnmack/frec444/444voting.html > 1. If and individual or group prefers A to B and B to C, then A is preferred to C (transitivity). > 2. The preferences must be restricted to the complete set of options. > 3. If each individual prefers A to B, then the group must also. > 4. No individual's preferences can necessarily dictate group preferences. > 5. The group's pairwise preference ordering is independent of irrelevant alternatives, i.e. determined solely by individual's pairwise preference orderings. I'm sure I'm being dense. But I don't see any need for rules 2, 3, or 5. And 1 is suspect, as well. So, I wouldn't accept this as an argument against >3 viable parties. Can each of these rules be defended? ... with any kind of evidence (as opposed to ideology)? > So I wonder what's it like in a true multi-party system like most of Europe > has? Is it effective? interesting? confusing? fun? Are the populations > aware of Arrow? Does it avoid grid-lock? I've been told (sans evidence) that multi-party systems risk a situation where each party represents a geographical region. I can also _imagine_ that parties would form around single (or clusters of) issues. That sort of thing makes me think that there should be an upper limit on the number of parties. But what's the limit? And what's the limit a function of? Perhaps the limit could be a function of (clusters of) land area, population diversity, and issue diversity? For example, I'd love to have two axes, in the US: fiscal (conservative vs. liberal) and social (conservative vs. liberal). I can imagine this would nicely lead to a party limit of 9: 1. Fiscal Conservative (FC), Social Conservative (SC) 2. Fiscal Moderate (FM), SC 3. Fiscal Liberal (FL), SC 4. FC, Social Moderate (SM) 5. FM, SM 6. FL, SM 7. FC, Social Liberal (SL) 8. FM, SL 9. FL, SL If there's an upper limit, then there should probably be a lower limit. If the limits are based on clusters of region, demographic, and issue, then there can never really be a single party. Perhaps a utopian ideology would allow it, but no reality would. I can, however, imagine a large distance between the most important issue (say emergency preparedness or WAR!) and the rest of the issues. That scenario would allow a single axis with a party on each side and perhaps in the middle. That implies that 2 or 3 is the lower limit. Frankly, if someone started a "moderate" party, I might actually register as a member, something I've never done and will never do as long as there are only 2 nationally viable parties. One thing that would be interesting is if I were allowed to affiliate locally with 1 party but state-wide with another, and nationally with yet another. -- glen ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org |
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In reply to this post by Jochen Fromm-5
Owen,
A math prof here gives good "election year" math club talk and covers Arrow's work. While Arrow is quite correct that: "democracy is mathematically arbitrary." It is also pretty easy to demonstrate that "vote for one person and the plurality wins everything" is the worst option. If you take any of the other systems, you can create scenarios in which someone wins who seems like they shouldn't, but those problems occur in a small and specifiable set of possible outcomes. The example on the website is well-crafted to make each system pick a different candidate, but usually there would be good agreement between the methods. (Hey, that sounds like a simulation project!) Eric P.S. Having watched from afar, I really like some of the effects of the British multi-party system. I like that coalitions must be formed between different sides, which requires finding common ground, and allowing multiple sets of priorities to influence legislation. Of course, it still usually seems like some party is getting screwed and treated unfairly, but at least it is a smaller percentage of the people. On Thu, Nov 8, 2012 11:36 AM, Owen Densmore <[hidden email]> wrote: The 1 & 2 party systems are the only ones avoiding the pitfalls of Arrow's Impossibility Theorem. ------------ Eric Charles Assistant Professor of Psychology Penn State University Altoona, PA 16601 ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org |
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In reply to this post by Owen Densmore
As the guy that just voted indipendendant I'm sick and tired of rebublicans v democrats-
Sereosly? Issues seem indipendant of weather someone red, blue orange green purple indigo- It's one countery. From what I gather of german polotics (for example) when there's a issue it's just adressed without to much debate as to what party (or the equivilant there of) could be blamed. Would it be hard to impliment that type of system here? I doubt i'm unique in sofar as polotics is concerned I can see almost nothing but benifit from going to a parilimentarian type of system (as a start)- just get the issues adressed is my feeling. On Thu, Nov 8, 2012 at 9:36 AM, Owen Densmore <[hidden email]> wrote: The 1 & 2 party systems are the only ones avoiding the pitfalls of Arrow's Impossibility Theorem. ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org |
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In reply to this post by Jochen Fromm-5
Yes, most European countries use a multi-party system and find it acceptable. We have too much bureaucracy in Brussels (i.e. in the EU), though. The amount of advertising and marketing is also on a tolerable level. In the US the money spent for political ads and campaigns is extreme. In China there are no campaigns at all. In this sense, Europe may has found a good compromise between both extremes. -J. Sent from Android Paul Paryski <[hidden email]> wrote: Most European countries do quite well with a multi-party system, e.g. Germany, England, France, Poland). And a parliamentary or semi-parliamentary system is much more responsive to public opinion than a purely presidential system. cheers, Paul
-----Original Message-----
From: Owen Densmore <[hidden email]> To: Jochen Fromm <[hidden email]>; The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]> Sent: Thu, Nov 8, 2012 9:37 am Subject: Re: [FRIAM] The Two Party System
The 1 & 2 party systems are the only ones avoiding the pitfalls of Arrow's Impossibility Theorem.
But what about 2.5 parties? By this I mean guys running but with no possibility of winning .. the so called third party candidates in the US?
They are often seen as spoilers, by taking away votes from the two possible candidates in a 2 party system.
But to the point, No I don't think China's system is the future. The world appears to like multiparty systems, increasingly with "fair voting" tossed in with some sort of recursive run-off schemes.
So I wonder what's it like in a true multi-party system like most of Europe has? Is it effective? interesting? confusing? fun? Are the populations aware of Arrow? Does it avoid grid-lock?
-- Owen
On Thu, Nov 8, 2012 at 1:54 AM, Jochen Fromm <[hidden email]> wrote:
============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org |
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