Power IRV - Intro: How to Escape the Two-Party Political Doom Loop
This is the intro post to a series on voting reform:
- Power IRV (intro) - How to Escape the Two-Party Political Doom Loop (you are here)
- Power IRV (part 1) - Power IRV, or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Ranked Choice Voting
- Power IRV (part 2) - Why Power IRV beats out all other voting systems
- Power IRV (appendix) - Appendix: FAQs and Followups / Full Walkthrough
If you already know about First Past the Post (aka Plurality) voting and why dropping it is the best thing we can do to escape the Two-Party Doom Loop and fix politics & government, jump ahead to Power IRV (part 1).
So, what’s the problem?
Isn’t this getting a little old?
Seriously?!?! Politics today has devolved into an interminable cesspool. People are shouting past each other rather than reaching for common ground and commonsense solutions.
And the thing that drives it all is the “First Past the Post” (FPTP) voting system (aka Plurality Voting).
Quick review - what is FPTP / Plurality voting? It’s just how our Presidential (and most other US elections’) voting system works today:
- You vote for only one candidate
- All votes are totalled up
- The person with the most votes wins
OK, that sounds great, right? YOLO - one man one vote!
Umm, no.
No? OK, so what’s the problem then?
Lee Drutman, a political scientist and senior fellow at New America puts it most succinctly:
John Adams worried that “a division of the republic into two great parties … is to be dreaded as the great political evil.”
However, the framers erred was in failing to realize that simple plurality [aka “First Past the Post”] elections — used for most state and national contests — would foster the exact two-party system they wanted to avoid.
If you don’t know about the many problems with FPTP, here’s a quick video that breaks it all down:
The lesser of two evils effect results in toxic politics
…but it all boils down to: The Spoiler Effect.
What is the Spoiler Effect?
With two candidates, you can just pick your favorite of the two - no problem. But once a third-party enters the race, they will take more votes from one side or the other - thereby “Spoiling” that candidate’s chances.
By only allowing a single choice on our ballots, the spoiler effect will always be a problem in our elections - and keep us trapped in a two-party system duopoly with only two real choices.
The video also introduced the clear solution to this problem - Ranked Choice Voting! We go into more depth there in the next post, Power IRV (part 1)
Other reasons to dump FPTP
It also turns out that dumping FPTP also leads to more positive campaigns and less mudslinging and attacks. This has been proven again and again in real elections around the country.
FPTP also incentivizes manipulation and gaming the system. For example:
- Republicans (and foreign nations!) helping Greens, and
- Democrats helping Tea Partiers
…and “stealing” votes from their opponents.
Aren’t we sick of this yet?
Ugh. 😖 No thank you!
FPTP and the Spoiler Effect creates strange bedfellows - and makes focusing on trickery pay off more for candidates than just focusing on the issues and making a better world for us all.
Why force candidates to run highly negative campaigns and sneakily support competitors in order to win?
Snoop Dogg also wants to dump FPTP
Dump FPTP!
So a quick recap on why we should dump the FPTP system:
- We escape the two-party doom loop and have real choices as voters
- You can vote for your actual favorite (not just the lesser of two evils)
- Campaigns are more positive - no more mudslinging
- Candidates can focus on issues, not trickery
What’s not to love?
So now that we’re ready to dump FPTP, what should we do instead? I’m glad you asked - let’s learn more about Ranked Choice Voting in: