I very narrowly leaned yes on this (rather than a clear yes), because the Top Four Ranked Choice as proposed, would have only allowed political moderates to even make it to the ranked choice election.
I still generally support RCV and there’s definitely other reasons why these initiatives failed (like being anti-endorsed by incumbent/establishment politics) but wanted to point out that specific implementations of RCV aren’t always in favor of increasing democracy and this may be part of why many initiatives failed.
I think it’s similar to the FPP dynamics you’re referencing. Essentially, it’s most advantageous to vote for candidates with broader appeal in the hopes they actually make it to the general election.
RCV wasn’t always proposed as a way to improve democracies. Take for instance this ballot initiative in my home state of Colorado https://ballotpedia.org/Colorado_Proposition_131,_Top-Four_Ranked-Choice_Voting_Initiative_(2024)
I very narrowly leaned yes on this (rather than a clear yes), because the Top Four Ranked Choice as proposed, would have only allowed political moderates to even make it to the ranked choice election.
I still generally support RCV and there’s definitely other reasons why these initiatives failed (like being anti-endorsed by incumbent/establishment politics) but wanted to point out that specific implementations of RCV aren’t always in favor of increasing democracy and this may be part of why many initiatives failed.
I don’t think I follow: why can only political moderates make it to the final four?
(It does seem like there are better ways to implement RCV than this though, because it still has many First past the post dynamics)
I think it’s similar to the FPP dynamics you’re referencing. Essentially, it’s most advantageous to vote for candidates with broader appeal in the hopes they actually make it to the general election.