New Voting System for GUSA
Presidential Election to Feature Plurality System
On Tuesday night the GUSA Senate voted to change the method of voting in the presidential election from instant runoff voting to a plurality system. This change comes in response to controversy over last year’s election, which resulted in the selection of Pat Dowd (SFS ’09) as Student Association president and James Kelly (COL ’09) as vice president.
Instant runoff voting was adopted by the Election Commission in 2006 after five years in which no GUSA ticket won the majority of student votes. IRV is a system in which voters rank candidates in order of preference. If no ticket receives a majority of the first-place votes, the ticket receiving the lowest number of votes in that round is eliminated, and these votes are redistributed to the remaining tickets based on what the voter indicated as his or her second choice. This process continues, with votes for eliminated candidates being redistributed based on the voter’s next choice, until one ticket receives a majority.
Last year, the senate rejected the results of the presidential election, citing problems with the IRV system. A second election was held with only four of the seven original tickets on the ballot. D.W. Cartier (COL ’09) and Andrew Rugg (COL ’09), who won the first election with 51.2 percent of the vote, were defeated by Dowd and Kelly in the second election.
GUSA Vice Speaker Brian Wood (COL ’09) explained the need for the bylaw change.
“I got a lot of calls [about the last election],” he said. “I have gotten a lot of resistance to instant runoff voting.” Senate Speaker Reggie Greer (COL ’09) said he supports the plurality system, where the ticket that receives the most votes wins the election, regardless of whether or not that ticket receives the majority of the votes.
“I like it,” he said. “It’ll make it easier for people to understand the election.”
“I understand the founding fathers of the senate had a different vision, and I agreed with them at the time,” Greer said. “But this way we have one vote, one person.”
Other changes included an increase in campaign spending limits, raising the limit from $200 to $300, which includes all donations and expenses incurred over the course of the campaign by anyone campaigning on behalf of a candidate. The role of the campaign staff has been written out of the bylaws, and the funding rule now applies to anyone contributing on behalf of a candidate.
Frederick Moore (COL ‘09) and Will Dreher (SFS ‘09) were also approved as the new election commissioners. They will work with the Election Commission to oversee election standards this spring.
Jan 29 2009 at 7:14 p.m.
So if 7 people run again, it's theoretically possible to be elected with 15% of the vote? How exactly will this build the credibility of GUSA? Yet another example of how the organization is completely out of touch with reality and the student body.
Jan 30 2009 at 3:11 p.m.
As the guy who originally got IRV instituted at Georgetown a few years ago, I think I should comment.
I'm certainly disappointed with the Senate's decision and hope they reconsider after this election.
I think there were three principal reasons why IRV was voted down by GUSA. I think all of them could be fixed.
#1. (Extremely) Poor Implementation
This took place in a few ways.
a. Poor ballot instructions - The Election Commissioner (who used to run the elections, independent from the student government) had given very complicated instructions as to how to vote IRV, which definitely contributed to student confusion. In addition, the EC also stated that voters had to rank every candidate, which is absolutely not the case and was a big source of confusion and anger. With as many as eight tickets running, people would just choose one or two tickets than rank the rest in order.
Possible future suggestion - provide a sample explanatory text for use on the ballot/instructions that's very clear.
b. Lack of actual IRV system - We tried to get an online IRV system, which was available free from Fairvote.com, but Georgetown's bureaucracy prevented us from doing so. I should note that schools like Harvard, Stanford, MIT, etc. use it with no problem.
So we had to hack the current 10-year-old+ system to make it work, which meant we couldn't randomize the lists, do automatic tabulation, etc. There's not much that we could do about this and it definitely hurt us.
c. Poor ballot layout - The ballots from the previous two years were very poor. Instead of presenting one neat list, with perhaps a drop-down menu or fill-in where voters could rank their choices (as is actually possible under our system), the system instead presented something like this...
PLEASE CHOOSE YOUR FIRST CHOICE.
A. Pat Dowd and James Kelly
B. Tyler Stone and David Dietz
C. D.W. Cartier and Andrew Rugg
D. Sean Hayes and Madorsky
E. Geoff Greene and Khalil Hibri
F. Twister Murchison and Salik Isthiaq
PLEASE CHOOSE YOUR SECOND CHOICE.
A. Pat Dowd and James Kelly
B. Tyler Stone and David Dietz
C. D.W. Cartier and Andrew Rugg
D. Sean Hayes and Madorsky
E. Geoff Greene and Khalil Hibri
F. Twister Murchison and Salik Isthiaq
PLEASE CHOOSE YOUR THIRD CHOICE.
A. Pat Dowd and James Kelly
B. Tyler Stone and David Dietz
C. D.W. Cartier and Andrew Rugg
D. Sean Hayes and Madorsky
E. Geoff Greene and Khalil Hibri
F. Twister Murchison and Salik Isthiaq
Etc., etc. - it scrolled down over two pages and left even knowledgeable voters like myself very confused. Again, this definitely could have been fixed, and can be in the future. Recommend adopting schools avoid ballots like this, obviously!
#2. Prior Bad Elections - GUSA has had a history of botched elections and is very sensitive about them when it happens. Even though the reasons for last year's botched IRV election had very little to do with IRV and everything to do with the poor ballot and instructions. When the election was re-held with the top four vote-getters and a much better ballot, everything went amazingly smooth. We actually had a higher turnout! I think that's the election to look to. And I think the Senators who were there last year by and large supported keeping IRV, while those who were not Senators last year or freshman were for abolishing it.
#3. Too many tickets running -- This is one actual problem with IRV at universities - or at least Georgetown. Last election there were eight tickets. Generally 2-4 strong tickets and the rest being minor candidates of varying percentages (<15%). With this many candidates, students are inundated with information and really don't get a clear grasp of the different candidates' platforms -- there's not a reliably Democrat, Green Party or Republican candidate, for example -- it's closer to voting for candidates for the local school board. At best voters get one candidate they like, sometimes two, and very rarely more. So people just vote for one or two, then vote down the line (when they don't have to)
Jan 30 2009 at 3:44 p.m.
SOLUTION
As we've seen above, IRV works best when students actually get to know the candidates in order to make meaningful choices. With more than four tickets, it gets increasingly difficult to get to know the candidates - more candidates = less newspaper space to each + more mindless inundation by the candidates.
Two easy fixes (aside from the obvious ballot fixes discussed above).
#1. Early primary
If there are more than four candidates, hold - very early on - a vote. Plurality, not IRV. So you just choose one candidate. The top four vote-getters move on, the rest are cut (unless one ticket gets >50% of the vote). This should be held within a week of the campaigns starting. This makes campaigns actually work to get face-time and recognition, but still allows for a good number of worthy candidates who can't get huge recognition yet to stay in.
Cuts the wheat from the chaff. Then, about 10 days later or so, hold the actual election with the top four candidates. That gives students enough time to know the candidates and make meaningful choices with IRV.
#2. Include Platform in email
In the voting email sent out, or in a page before voting (or a pop-up), allow the candidates 250 words to lay out their platform.
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Why the new system is flawed:
The new system is similar to the above - an early primary - but it only gets the top two candidates, who then go to a run-off (where one would obviously get over 50% of the vote)
If there are 8 candidates, as noted above, the top two candidates may very well just have a bare plurality -- perhaps only 20% of the vote or less each.
You have the possibility of selecting two people with VERY narrow bases that everyone else doesn't like, and then foisting them upon the student body as the only two choices.
An international student, for example, would get high turnout by all the international students (e.g., Khalil and Geoff in the past), but perhaps very few from the population at large. Likewise, let's say someone from College Republicans runs and gets all the members to vote for them. And then 6 other candidates. Let's say that the International and the Republican get about 15% each, which is the highest amount amongst the 8 candidates.
So the two winners for the run-off are candidates that 30% of the student body might feel very strongly in favor of, but 70% absolutely hate.
How would this affect turnout? Let's say the original primary had 40% turnout. If the voters who favored the 6 defeated candidates absolutely hate the two winners, many might choose not to vote in the final. So you'd get 30% of the 40% turnout, or 12% turnout.
Now, in practice, it's probably going to be higher, but I can definitely see a noticeable drop-off if that happens. Lower turnout = lower legitimacy, ditto with your two winners going into the final with barely double digits.
Jan 31 2009 at 7:28 a.m.
Biggest flaw: IT'S GUSA.
Feb 01 2009 at 7:40 p.m.
I couldn't agree more with Mr. Stoller. His justifications for the use of IRV as well as his proposed solutions demonstrate a lucidity and a depth of understanding that far surpass those of a vast majority of GUSA Senators. It's a shame that GUSA thinks the problem is the incompetence of Georgetown voters rather than failures of implementation on the part of the election commission. In terms of determining the "general will" of the electorate, IRV is far superior to plurality voting, especially when it's possible for more than half a dozen candidates to be on the ballot. Moreover, primary contests of some form would be a fantastic way of weeding out idiots like the ones that polluted our campaign last year with asinine Facebook groups and morally repulsive campaign pronouncements. GUSA's inability to institute a solution more creative than a simple plurality system is truly stupefying, especially at a top-notch Poli Sci school like Georgetown. I guess the students that know how to design an electoral system must have something better to do with their time, or else, like Mr. Stoller, are simply eclipsed by the voices of an ignorant majority of Senators. It's a shame there is not more of an outcry about this decision, but perhaps some ostriches will lift their heads from the sand as the election gets closer.
Feb 02 2009 at 4:01 a.m.
The best solution should really be, the top four tickets should tranfer to American. The subsequent four tickets should transfer to Catholic. The remaining tickets should join the Hoya Editorial Board.
I call this the merit system or the MS.