News You Can Bruise for 2003 February 21 (entry 1)

Fri Feb 21 2003 21:16: Because I live in a fantasy world, I like making up political systems. Here's one I call the "single transferable vote" system[0]. This is a direct democracy in which, for any electoral decision, you can either vote or designate another person as your proxy. A proxy gives up their right to a secret ballot in exchange for having their vote multiplied by the number of people who chose them as their proxy. If you want the participation of direct democracy you can vote on all decisions yourself, or you can designate as a proxy a politician whose stances approximate yours, and just keep an eye on that politician.

I know many noted political theorists read NYCB, and I'm interested in hearing what these people think of this system. Is it interesting at all? How vulnerable is it to attack (assuming it's implemented well)? The main problem I can see is coercion to designate someone as your proxy.

[0] Ha ha.