Ranked Balloting in Ontario

Vincent J. Curtis

9 April 2016

In its never ending battle to change something that works well, progressives of the Ontario government are trying to get the ranked balloting accepted in Ontario as the means of selecting representatives to municipal council.  These busy-bodies have been here before.  In 2007, they tried to get Mixed Member Proportional Representation accepted in Ontario, and they got chased out of town with a 60 % - 40 % defeat.  Now, they're back.  They don't respect democracy because they don't take no for an answer, and are counting on the electorate being tired of saying no.

Below is an op-ed submission.

Plurality election is the principle by which she with the most votes, wins.  One man, one vote, one result.  When Ontario Minister Ted McMeekin introduced ranked balloting, he said he was making democracy as simple as one, two, three.  Democracy under plurality election is as simple as one, period.  The outcome is unambiguous.  It is simpler than an ambiguous one, two, or, maybe, three system.

Plurality election is usually referred to in the press as the, ‘first-past-the-post-system’ or the ‘winner-take-all’ system.  These expressions are pejorative.  They are intended to poke fun of the principle of our system of election.  The first expression reduces elections to a horse race, while the second makes it seem unfair in some way.

What these pejorative ways of referring to plurality election make plain is that there are different value systems at work when judging the merits of one system over another.  If you are a meddlesome, busy-body progressive, you apply one value system, while if you are an Aristotelian-Thomist scholastic realist you apply another.  Both sides may use the same terms, such as fairness and democratic, but each side means something different by them.

The side favoring plurality elections would begin their defence by referring to justice, legitimacy, and civil peace.  Which system more just?  Does the method confer legitimacy on the “winner”?  Does the method hold to its principles?

Behind these questions of justice and legitimacy is the matter of civil peace.  The importance of civil peace in society cannot be overestimated, and can best be understood by its absence, civil strife.  When civil strife prevails, you have race-riots, civil disobedience, and even civil war.  Canadian society is blessed by civil peace, the most precious thing that the Common Good can provide, and I for one am loath to put it at risk.

Civil peace is disrupted when illegitimate civil authority acts beyond the bounds of what a segment of society will tolerate.  An action of the authority is seen as unjust, and because the authority is illegitimate the injustice becomes intolerable.  Violence is not far behind.

The ranked-balloting side has to begin their case by disparaging the plurality system.  They have to say that it is unjust in some way, and that therefore the results are less than legitimate.

They must say this for otherwise there is no reason to consider the method they propose, ranked-balloting.  If the plurality election is just, democratic and confers legitimacy, then why would a wise society want to fix something that isn’t broken?  Why would a wise society want to gamble with civil peace?

Supporters of ranked balloting say that most of the time ranked balloting will produce results the same as plurality election, and therefore there is no harm in it.  When ranked balloting becomes interesting is when it produces results that differ from plurality election.  In this case, the legerdemain of the ranking formula makes a loser of the winner, and some committee names an also-ran as the one actually elected.

It is not hard to see that when ranked balloting produces a result that differs from plurality election, the legitimacy of the also-ran to hold the office can be held in disrepute.  The stench of illegitimacy that clings to the also-ran will hamper his ability to lead politically.  And that isn’t fair, either to him or to the electorate he is supposed to represent.  The winner by plurality has a greater claim to legitimacy.

If plurality election is undemocratic, the results of ranked balloting are still undemocratic.  The winner of a ranked ballot could be nobody’s first choice!  All we get with ranked balloting is the result of plurality election put through a mathematical formula.  Rank balloting simply buries the fallacy it purports to eliminate.

Ranked balloting is a solution to a non-problem.  Ranked-balloting is not simple, the ranking formula provides ample room for disagreement, and in the end it cannot follow its own principle.  In short, it is the ranked-balloting system that falls short on the question of legitimacy.

We’ve seen these busy-bodies before.  They tried to foist mixed member proportional representation in Ontario.  They don’t respect democracy because they won’t take no for an answer.  They keep coming back, hoping that this time the electorate will be tired of saying no. 

As a scientist, am not opposed to experiments.  But I am experienced enough to know that it is unwise to fix something that isn’t broken, especially when you can already see the dangerous imperfections of the substitute.

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