Watch ranked ballots in action this weekend

This is a guest post by Desmond Cole

This weekend the federal New Democratic Party will convene at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre to elect a new leader. The loss of Jack Layton last August gives the vote special meaning for the NDP. Seven candidates will appear on the ballot, and one of them will take over as leader of the Opposition in parliament.

Along with the question of who will be chosen is how she or he will be chosen. Political party members elect their federal and provincial leaders through a different voting process than the one Canadians use in general elections. The ballot is called a “ranked ballot” because voters can rank all the candidates in the order they prefer. This is different from a general election, where voters only give feedback on one candidate.

The threshold for victory in a ranked ballot election is a majority of votes, half of all voters plus one. In our general elections, you don’t need a majority of votes to be the winner – you only need to get more votes than any other person on the ballot. In the first-past-the-post system, the winner only needs to take 34% of all votes cast, with 33% going to the second candidate, and the other 33% going to the third contestant. This kind of victory with lees than majority support is called “plurality.”

Plurality isn’t a factor when there are only two parties in an election because unless the race is a tie, one person will get a majority of votes. But once three or more candidates compete in this format, one of them can easily win without majority support. This happens all the time in our general elections.

A ranked ballot addresses the problem of majority support through a process called a “runoff.” Recall that voters can rank candidates by preference (Ella is my first choice; if she doesn’t win, Nina is my second choice; if Nina falls short I would choose Billie third, etc.). The votes for everyone’s first choice are then counted and if one candidate earns a majority of votes, she or he is declared the winner.

If no candidate gets a majority after the first round, the runoff begins. The candidate with the least votes in the first round is eliminated from the contest, and the voters’ second choices come into play. The rounds continue until one candidate secures majority support.

Voters can select all their choices at once in a process called an “instant runoff,” or they can vote for their first choice, wait for the results, and vote in each successive round as necessary. An instant runoff is less costly and time-consuming option of the two.

Naturally, a candidate who wins with majority support can claim greater authority than one who only secures a plurality. But there are many other benefits of the ranking process. Since voters give more information about their preferences than a single choice, it’s easier to interpret their general priorities and values.

Along similar lines, candidates benefit from advancing ideas and policies with broad appeal. Candidates want to secure second or third choice votes from voters, so they are more likely to highlight similarities and agreement between themselves and their opponents. This is in sharp contrast with our current general election process, where candidates must argue that they are the only choice, and where voters only get one choice.

A ranked ballot also reduces the need for “strategic voting.” Strategic voting is all about making sure a specific candidate or party is not elected, rather than focusing on a preferred candidate. It makes sense for a voter who only gets one choice to worry about the candidate she likes least, and to use her vote to select anyone most likely to defeat that candidate. With a ranked ballot, the voter can influence the outcome well beyond her first choice, and the need for strategic voting is greatly reduced.

A further benefit of a ranked ballot is that it allows all candidates to remain in the campaign until the vote occurs. Candidates often drop out of a race before the vote in an attempt to move their supporters to a stronger, ideologically compatible candidate. These candidates are often pressured by the media or their opponents to leave the race prematurely.

The idea is that if a candidate is unlikely to win, she should avoid splitting votes with a stronger, like-minded candidate. In the ranked ballot scenario, there is no fear that a majority of like-minded voters will split support between candidates and lose by plurality.

For a long time in Canada, only two main parties had a realistic chance of winning seats in elections. Today there are five parties represented in the House of Commons. This makes the likelihood of a winner by plurality much higher. Even in municipal elections, where political parties are not on the ballot, the issues in play are very often reduced to a simplistic and polarizing “hero vs. villain” narrative. Our politics can and should encourage a greater diversity of policies and priorities.

Fewer Canadians are voting in general elections. Some say this is due to the negative and often cynical nature of political campaigns. The recent transit feud at Toronto City Hall shows that too many elected officials rely on “us or them” language even where widespread consensus exists (most Torontonians want to increase the city’s public transit infrastructure).

If you plan on tuning into the NDP convention this weekend, pay attention to the impact the ranked ballot has on the outcome (with seven candidates on the ballot, it is unlikely someone will win on the first ballot). Political parties think it is important to elect a leader with a majority of support. If party members understand and benefit from the ranked ballot system, there is no reason why the general public should continue to struggle with plurality, negative campaigning, and limited electoral options.

Desmond Cole is a community outreach volunteer for the Ranked Ballot Initiative of Toronto (RaBit), a group advocating for ranked ballots in Toronto’s municipal elections.