I just saw a post on Alaska and ranked choice voting. I thought I understood it. Now I don’t.
Help please.
In: 2
“Ranked choice” refers to the *ballot*. On a ranked choice ballot, you can mark several candidates in order (1=your favorite, 2=your second favorite, 3=your third favorite, and so on.)
Alaska counts its ranked choice ballots by a method called “instant runoff.” Basically this means you count the ballots; if nobody has a majority, you eliminate the candidate with the least votes and recount.
– On the first count, every ballot counts for the candidate marked #1.
– On the recounts, every ballot counts for the highest candidate that hasn’t been eliminated yet.
So if 40 people D-#1, 45 people vote R-#1, 13 people vote G-#1 D-#2, and 2 people vote G-#1 R-#2, on the first round the totals are D-40 R-45 G-15. So the G candidate is eliminated. On the second round the totals are D-52 R-47, meaning D has a majority and is elected.
(Numbers made up, but the overall scenario is loosely based on the 2000 US Presidential election.)
[1] Instant runoff eliminates the *worst* performing candidate(s) and re-shuffles the *losers’* votes. There’s another counting method called [Single Transferable Vote](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counting_single_transferable_votes) that elects the *best* performing candidates and re-shuffles the *winners’* extra votes, it’s sort of like ranked choice voting “in reverse.”
IRV tends to be used more for elections with a single winner (like most American elections), while STV is used more for elections of a large body with a goal of proportional representation (like most European parliamentary elections).
STV and IRV are both ranked choice, the ballots and voter experience are identical, but the counting methods are different.
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