Gaming the Vote: Why Elections Aren't Fair (and What We Can Do About It)
Author:William Poundstone
Language:English
Edition:1st
Product Description
Our Electoral System is Fundamentally Flawed, But There?s a Simple and Fair Solution
Atleast five U.S. presidential elections have been won by the second mostpopular candidate. The reason was a ?spoiler??a minor candidate whotakes enough votes away from the most popular candidate to tip theelection to someone else. The spoiler effect is more than a glitch. Itis a consequence of one of the most surprising intellectual discoveriesof the twentieth century: the ?impossibility theorem? of Nobel laureateeconomist Kenneth Arrow. The impossibility theorem asserts that votingis fundamentally unfair?a finding that has not been lost on today?spolitical consultants. Armed with polls, focus groups, and smearcampaigns, political strategists are exploiting the mathematical faultsof the simple majority vote. In recent election cycles, this has led tosuch unlikely tactics as Republicans funding ballot drives for Greenspoilers and Democrats paying for right-wing candidates? radio ads.Gaming the Vote shows that there is a solution to the spoiler problemthat will satisfy both right and left. A system called range voting,already widely used on the Internet, is the fairest voting method ofall, according to computer studies. Despite these findings, rangevoting remains controversial, and Gaming the Vote assesses theobstacles confronting any attempt to change the American electoralsystem. The latest of several books by William Poundstone on the themeof how important scientific ideas have affected the real world, Gamingthe Vote is a wry expose of how the political system really works, anda call to action.
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发表于 2009-7-14 02:36:25
