Carry the Two

Mathematics and Voting

Sep 25, 2024

Ismar Volić, a mathematics professor and director at the Institute for Mathematics and Democracy, along with economics PhD student Victoria Mooers, dive into how math influences voting. They dissect the flaws of the current plurality voting system and propose preference ranking methods to reduce polarization. The conversation also touches on Liquid Democracy and the complications that arise from too much delegation in voting processes. Listen in as they illuminate the vital relationship between mathematics and effective democracy.

52:48

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Episode guests

Ismar Volić

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Quick takeaways

The podcast critiques the plurality voting system for failing to represent voter preferences accurately, often resulting in outcomes that don't reflect the electorate's true will.

Alternative voting systems like ranked choice voting can mitigate the issues of wasted votes and vote splitting, enhancing the representativeness of electoral outcomes.

Deep dives

The Importance of Voting Systems

Voting systems are essential mechanisms by which individual preferences are combined to determine collective choices, typically in elections. The discussion highlights that the common voting system used in the United States, known as plurality or first-past-the-post, claims to reflect democratic choice but often fails to do so. This system allows candidates with less than a majority to win, exemplified by recent presidential elections where winners had less than 50% of the total votes. Such shortcomings reveal that plurality voting can misrepresent the electorate's true preferences and lead to a disconnect between the election results and the will of the people.

Intro

2min

Voting Systems and Collective Decisions

9min

Mathematics of Voting Systems

20min

The Case for Instant Runoff Voting: A Mathematical Perspective

2min

Exploring Direct Democracy and Its Implications

2min

Voting Dynamics and Liquid Democracy

16min

Clarity in Voting Systems and Audience Engagement

3min

IMSI is very proud to announce that Carry the Two is back and with a new co-host, IMSI’s new Director of Communications and Engagement Sam Hansen!

We in the United States are deep in the middle of a major national election, and over half of the world’s population also have elections in 2024. This is why Carry the Two is going to focus on the intersection of mathematics and democracy for our new season.

In this episode, the first episode of our mathematics and democracy season, we speak with mathematician Ismar Volić of Wellesley College and Director of the Institute for Mathematics and Democracy and Victoria Mooers, an economics PhD student at Columbia University. We discuss what mathematics has to say about our current plurality voting system, how switching to preference ranking votings systems could limit polarization and negative campaigning, and why too much delegation causes problems for those pushing for Liquid Democracy.

Find our transcript here: Google Doc or .txt file

Curious to learn more? Check out these additional links:

Ismar Volić

Making Democracy Count: How Mathematics Improves Voting, Electoral Maps, and Representation

Institute for Mathematics and Democracy

Victoria Mooers

Liquid Democracy. Two Experiments on Delegation in Voting

Follow more of IMSI’s work: www.IMSI.institute, (twitter) @IMSI_institute, (mastodon) https://sciencemastodon.com/@IMSI, (instagram) IMSI.institute

Music by Blue Dot Sessions

The Institute for Mathematical and Statistical Innovation (IMSI) is funded by NSF grant DMS-1929348