2025 Edmonton is site of demonstration PR event - Candies were the candidates - Stickies worked

Many Edmontonians interested in electoral reform gathered on September 7 to enact and discuss a mock election.

The gathering, organized by repeat Independent Electoral Reform candidate Graham Lettner, included teachers, young activists, members of the FVC Edmonton chapter, and others.

the election was on what sort of candy.

first, all voted as in FPTP. 

voting was done by each voter putting his/her stickie under name of preferred type of candy (representing "party label") on posters on wall

Chocolate, the choice of less than half, won 

and then all including chocolate lovers, were disappointed when tootsie roll, not better tasting kisses, turned out to be the chocolate candidate.

(later discussion determined for the FPTP segment, the group should have been split into three "districts", each with just one winner. 

the same number of seats (three seats is good) then being used for the later PR segment)

(PR science tells us an odd-number District Magnitude is best to capture majority choice )

==

PR segment

more candy-candidate names were put on wall 

(showing wider field of candidates when PR and multi-member district is used) 

(and voters could vote for specific candy candidates, not just candy types.)

and we voted again, this time electing four choices. 

with 16 voters, 4 choices was thought the right amount.

quota of 4 

(at that DM and the number of total votes cast, Hare and Droop quota are the same)

peppermint patties, put in as an also-ran, scored surprisingly high, being elected by its supporters at the end. showing the unexpected results that should be expected when voters have power

no candy had quota in first round, 

those who voted for the least-popular choice walked over and moved their stickie to new candy-candidate.

eventually some candies achieved the quota 

and had their  surplus votes transferred - a couple of the voters went over and moved their stickie to another candy-candidate. 

(no exhausted votes in this mock election -

in later discussion it was suggested that we should have marked our ballots with backup preferences to echo mechanism of STV elections, then some might have been exhausted - but of course in some cases when a vote is exhausted  in a real STV election, they might be exhausted because all their marked choices have been elected, just not by that vote. so the voter is satisfied even if the vote itself is not used.)

finally after just a few moments, four were elected who were the actual choice of about 13 or 14 of the 16 voters, a very high level of satisfaction.

stickies on wall posters is good way to do elections - visual and the votes physically move from candidate to candidate.

an idea of how to show the difference between FPTP and PR perhaps more effectively is to have a full field of candidates, 

have voter write on the front of the stickie the name of their first choice out of the full field,

and their choices for back-up preferences on the back.

but then first, show how their will is foiled by FPTP 

split the voters into three or whatever groups (the same number as the number of members/candies elected later in the PR segment) 

(using different colour stickies (given out to voters randomly) is easy way to divide them and leaves them not knowing who else is in their district and not knowing how votes will go, so making it hard to strategically vote),

then randomly allocate a candidate to each district from each slate or type of candy.

have voter write on front of slip  "district" and name of their best-preferred candidate that is running in their district, leaving their first full-field choice also on the front of the stickie. 

(in some lucky cases the district choice name will be same as the full-field choice 

but for many (most?), the voter will not be be able to vote for his/her true choice but only the approximate close choice running in the district.)

FPTP election

votes (stickies) are put in right place on wall posters based on the written district name and then displayed

(any vote with district name bearing the name of a candidate running in a different district is spoiled)

district winners by simple plurality announced

disappointment measured and expressed!

then at-large PR,

(perhaps explanation made that under PR, each member will be elected by an unanimous constituency, not some geographical district. of mixed sentiment, where one member is given impossible job of representing all)

stickies are moved to voters' actual full-field choice as previously marked on stickie

(the need for these transfers shows how district boundaries sometimes separate a voter from his preferred candidate)

quota determined.

winners announced if have quota.

surplus votes moved.

votes from eliminated candidate moved when no surplus needs to be moved,

(transfers indicated with "T" next to name on stickie.)

until seats are filled though quota winners or when field of candidate is thinned to number of remaining open seats.

the only wasted votes are: 

-exhausted votes, 

-votes belonging to last eliminated candidate if not transferred (if any), 

-votes belonging to any candidate not elected nor eliminated (if any - such are not usual in elections using Droop and optional-preferential systems.)

the different colour of the various stickies under each member elected through PR show how district boundaries had split voting blocks, likely causing dissatisfaction and dis-proportional misrepresentation.

===

regarding Sept. 7 event,

uncertainty was expressed about whether a mock election would work happily for classes where pupils are forced to participate. 

but teachers at the Sept. 7 event voiced no fears about children rebelling that such an event being part of regular classes.

and many teachers and parents (and former children) know there are things kids don't want to do; and things they DON'T want to do...

IMO, likely a mock election is more interesting than many lessons they are forced to absorb in regular classes.

===

plan is afoot to do it again in an adult setting with the choice of alcoholic beverage being voted on.

those who like beer, wine, cider, hard drink, etc. voting for their own choice 

without PR, many drinker/voters will be forced to drink someone else's choice.

with PR, most would be happy because they had their vote used to select their preferred drink, or one very close to it, which they had marked as a back-up choice.

(perhaps we can advertize it as a social scene experience, or a chance to mingle,

and/or university students studying political science or political junkies would be natural attendees.)