6 Responses for "Strategic voting is anything but strategic"

1. Dave Fluri (Non-Partisan) October 8th, 2008 at 8:06 am 1

   Nicely done, Wasyl. Thanks for this cogent and illuminating posting.

2. Michael October 8th, 2008 at 8:49 am 2

   The system by which we elect MPs is fatally flawed. It works wonderfully for a two-party system, but absolutely horridly for anything else. In most ridings, 30-40% of voters speak for the whole; how undemocratic is that?

   All of your points are valid, but the simple fact is that sometimes it is more important to vote against what you dislike instead of voting for what you like. I am a life-long Liberal supporter, but I voted NDP in my former riding (Ottawa-Centre) last election, simply to avoid having a Conservative come up the middle.

   The fewer Conservatives we have in the HoC, the better. The only way to effectively acheive that is to avoid vote splitting, and the only way to avoid that is vote strategically.

3. Rich October 8th, 2008 at 10:09 am 3

   You make some valid points, but we don’t vote in a vacuum. Our electoral system matters. First-past-the-post produces electoral results that don’t accurately reflect public sentiment, especially in a system with 4 or 5 viable parties. Ideally we’d look at electoral reform, but unless that happens strategic voting makes sense in many cases.

   Your point about funding is easy to refute. For example, I am a progressive voter living in Barrie, a riding decided by less than 2000 votes in 2006. While I might prefer an NDP government, I see a Dion-led Liberal government as a vastly superior option to another Conservative one (there not being a single issue on which I agree with the Cons).

   I also believe my local Liberal candidate is a much better choice than the Conservative incumbent. For me the decision is easy – I will vote Liberal yet I have made a donation to the NDP that is much larger than the $1.75 they would get along with my vote.

   To vote strategically or not utimately depends on what you feel is the most important realistic outcome in an election. This time around this would be to turf out the Conservatives. In 2006 I felt the Martin Liberals were too conservative so I voted for the NDP, believing that Martin wasn’t a sufficiently attractive alternative to the hated Cons.

   It is fair to say that an NDP supporter voting Liberal does make it difficult to build the party up over time. My response to is that I am not enough of a partisan that I am willing to endure endless Conservative regimes in the hope that someday real progressives can govern.

   My other thought to opponents of strategic voting would be for some of the parties to look at merging. Clearly the Greens and NDP share many similar ideas and their combined strength under the Green brand might be enough to make strategic vote on the Left irrelevant.

4. Whiskey Echo (N. Van, unaffiliated Canadian nationalist) October 8th, 2008 at 1:15 pm 4

   I see the point you’re trying to make, but aside from the “strategic” considerations of parties, there’s also the more important issue of representation. Ideally, nobody should have to vote for a party other than the one they actually want. The fact that under this system, many citizens are essentially penalized if they do is an outrage.

   All the parties who reject PR are also being strategically very blind; they care about *this* election or the next one only. They figure that if one can win a majority of power with the minority of the vote, they all could. But long term? They are cutting their own throats – the level of pure hostility and cynicism out there in the electorate about them is a result of:
   A) So many people going unrepresented – their vote counts for nothing, most votes are wasted in most places.
   B) The country being illegitimately governed – we end up with phony “majorities”, that start out with something like 60% of the voting population automatically against anything they do, which in turn undermines their legimimacy. At its most extreme, people will feel “well, this isn’t MY government, it’s not even most peoples’, why should we do anything it says?”
   C) Intellectual / ideological dishonesty during campaigns, caused by the “penalty” for speaking your true beliefs during a campaign. Elections have become a battle of gaffes and gotchas, not a battle of competing ideals, largely because politicians are forced to weakly follow trends not strongly follow principles. Then people wonder why they don’t end up governing according to what they said during the election – well 4 times out of 5, it’s because they’re being more true to their actual ideology when not campaigning.

   So basically under PR, it may cause a sort-term “tactical” disadvantage for the political parties, but ultimately it would make it more possible to stake an ideological ground as one’s own and stick to it, governing would be more legitimate and representative, and citizens would be less angry and cynical towards them. That’s the better “strategic” picture for them all. (And for the country, assuming the parties *want* that.) Even if it seem like it would hurt them right nowm, they should take the hit and do it anyways.

   As far as “strategic voting”, I think it indicates at least a sophisticated bit of thinking among voters, which meands they at least see how the system works (and therefore how it doesn’t work well). These same people are likely to be the ones who would want to change it most, so they don’t have to “hold their nose” or “vote against party X” anymore instead of voting for what they want. Short term (this election) – it may hurt the Greens and such, but long-term it may also boost the ultimate cuase: builsing public pressure so we can finally change the electoral system to PR.

5. From the Shores of Lake Couch October 8th, 2008 at 1:57 pm 5

   I hope all this talk about strategic voting will launch the wave that finally sweeps away “First-Post-the-Post” voting in Canada. Australia has legitimise strategic voting with their preferential voting method. What could be simpler than ranking your choices, so that if your candidate make it, they transfer your ballot to your second choice, until someone has 50% plus of the votes cast.

   Come on Canadians! Let’s all work together and get rid of FPTP!!

6. Louise Tremblay Matchett October 8th, 2008 at 6:16 pm 6

   Wasyl,

   Yes, you make excellent points against strategic voting and in every other election, I would have echoed almost every word in your post.

   But here I am in your riding, Dion’s riding, finding that after having supported the NDP since I was voting age in the 70’s, I now find the Green Party is the party which I think best represents my views. And I cannot vote Green in this riding because of the “Dion-May Deal”.

   So maybe this is why I am being forced to rethink my former condemnation of it, under any circumstances.