Burr dilemma

The Burr dilemma is a term coined by Jack H. Nagel to describe the likelihood of ties between two or more candidates in the misuse of Approval voting as a multi-member method. To quote Nagel, "Problems of multicandidate races in U.S. presidential elections motivated the modern invention and advocacy of approval voting; but it has not previously been recognized that the first four presidential elections (1788–1800) were conducted using a variant of approval voting. That experiment ended disastrously in 1800 with the infamous Electoral College tie between Jefferson and Burr. The tie, ... resulted less from miscalculation than from a strategic tension built into approval voting, which forces two leaders appealing to the same voters to play a game of Chicken." [http://www.journalofpolitics.org/files/69_1/Nagel.pdf The Burr Dilemma in Approval Voting, The Journal of Politics Volume 69 Issue 1 Page 43 - February 2007]

In this election, the candidate who received the largest number of votes was elected president, and the candidate receiving the second largest number of votes was elected vice-president. As such, the election was not a true instance of approval voting, but Nagel argues that the strategic tension that voters faced is nevertheless indicative of the dilemma they would face under genuine approval voting.

References

External links

* [http://rangevoting.org/BurrDilemma.html ' "Burr's dilemma" flaw in Approval voting system' on RangeVoting.org]