"According to its supporters, the main reason we should adopt ranked choice voting (RCV) is that it results in more moderate politicians." But then we should conclude that the supporters of RCV are incorrect (if not duplicitous). I too oppose RCV.
By the way, polls show that in New York City, if they had used the traditional method of voting, Mamdani would still have won, because he has more support than any other single candidate. If you reject RCV because of the result, you should also reject the traditional voting method because it would have given the exact same result.
I do not endorse our current system, the plurality method or first-past-the-post (FPTP). The 2016 Republican presidential primary had 17 candidates. If support had been about equally split, any candidate could have won the election with the support of just 6% of the voters. That is hardly a resounding endorsement. Worse, the winner could be a person soundly rejected by most of the voters.
It is still helpful to know the second-place preferences, and so on, of the voters. That information should not be used in an instant runoff voting (IRV) method like RCV, which empowers the supporters of the most radical candidate. Rather, the information should be used in a single round of voting using positional voting, especially using a geometric method as discussed here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positional_voting#Geometric
Such voting can be designed to minimize the effect of vote-splitting and teaming of candidates. This is what would empower centrist candidates, not RCV.
Allow me to say a bit more about voting methods in single-winner elections.
There are two extremes for the type of support a candidate may engender. At one end is the polarizing candidate who has a core base of intense supporters, while a majority may well reject him. At the opposite end is a consensus candidate who has a broad base of moderate support, but little intensity.
The plurality system that we use most commonly, or FPTP, is designed to reward the polarizing candidate, even though a majority rejects what he stands for. That is why, even though I agree that RCV is flawed and should not be used, FPTP is still not the solution. Mamdani wins even the traditional type of election.
There is a spectrum of voting methods that reward various types of candidates. Traditional plurality or FPTP rewards polarizers without majority support. There are methods that also reward the opposite extreme, the least-hated candidate. Both extremes are vulnerable to hijacking the election, by flooding the field of candidates.
There are compromise voting methods that are able to identify candidates with enthusiastic support combined with broad appeal. One such method is discussed at the link in my original comment.
This is not just a theoretical argument. Using the traditional voting system, Mamdani is likely to become New York's next mayor, even while being rejected by a majority of voters. Both FPTP and RCV will fail the voters. There is a better way.
My only point was that RCV didn't get the moderate selected as advertised. I understand that he would have won with a traditional vote, too. In this particular case, RCV had no effect except to make the vote count much more complex.
"According to its supporters, the main reason we should adopt ranked choice voting (RCV) is that it results in more moderate politicians." But then we should conclude that the supporters of RCV are incorrect (if not duplicitous). I too oppose RCV.
By the way, polls show that in New York City, if they had used the traditional method of voting, Mamdani would still have won, because he has more support than any other single candidate. If you reject RCV because of the result, you should also reject the traditional voting method because it would have given the exact same result.
I do not endorse our current system, the plurality method or first-past-the-post (FPTP). The 2016 Republican presidential primary had 17 candidates. If support had been about equally split, any candidate could have won the election with the support of just 6% of the voters. That is hardly a resounding endorsement. Worse, the winner could be a person soundly rejected by most of the voters.
It is still helpful to know the second-place preferences, and so on, of the voters. That information should not be used in an instant runoff voting (IRV) method like RCV, which empowers the supporters of the most radical candidate. Rather, the information should be used in a single round of voting using positional voting, especially using a geometric method as discussed here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positional_voting#Geometric
Such voting can be designed to minimize the effect of vote-splitting and teaming of candidates. This is what would empower centrist candidates, not RCV.
Allow me to say a bit more about voting methods in single-winner elections.
There are two extremes for the type of support a candidate may engender. At one end is the polarizing candidate who has a core base of intense supporters, while a majority may well reject him. At the opposite end is a consensus candidate who has a broad base of moderate support, but little intensity.
The plurality system that we use most commonly, or FPTP, is designed to reward the polarizing candidate, even though a majority rejects what he stands for. That is why, even though I agree that RCV is flawed and should not be used, FPTP is still not the solution. Mamdani wins even the traditional type of election.
There is a spectrum of voting methods that reward various types of candidates. Traditional plurality or FPTP rewards polarizers without majority support. There are methods that also reward the opposite extreme, the least-hated candidate. Both extremes are vulnerable to hijacking the election, by flooding the field of candidates.
There are compromise voting methods that are able to identify candidates with enthusiastic support combined with broad appeal. One such method is discussed at the link in my original comment.
This is not just a theoretical argument. Using the traditional voting system, Mamdani is likely to become New York's next mayor, even while being rejected by a majority of voters. Both FPTP and RCV will fail the voters. There is a better way.
My only point was that RCV didn't get the moderate selected as advertised. I understand that he would have won with a traditional vote, too. In this particular case, RCV had no effect except to make the vote count much more complex.