Tishaura Jones

April 7, 2021 11:47 AM

The city of St. Louis elected a new mayor via non-partisan voting. This article says that voters "residents can vote for as many candidates as they want in municipal primaries". So is this also a form of ranked voting?

The first female black mayor for the city was elected, so that's a step in the right direction.
What are the implications of this system?

posted by falsedmitri to Law & Government (3 answers total)

Best answer: If there's no ranking, that's called approval voting. Like all voting schemes, it has its pros and cons. This is actually my preferred method, but in my opinion it is extremely vulnerable to ballot tampering because fraudulently adding votes to a cast ballot doesn't invalidate it.
posted by stopgap at 11:57 AM on April 7, 2021 [2 favorites]

It's a primary with a top-two runoff. (The primary results give a sense of how it works.) It's closer to an at-large nonpartisan city council primary where you can vote for as many candidates as there are seats to be filled; the top X number of candidates proceed to the general election where you can again vote for as many candidates are there are seats. It's not ranked voting as the term is commonly understood because votes aren't distributed from eliminated candidates to decide the winner in a single election.

The main implication is that primary voting becomes more about who you choose not to vote for. That's a double-edged sword since it creates incentives for negative campaigning.
posted by holgate at 12:04 PM on April 7, 2021 [1 favorite]

FWIW, this is an interactive simulator of different voting methods: To Build a Better Ballot. I find it really interesting.
posted by adamrice at 12:25 PM on April 7, 2021 [3 favorites]