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Get out the vote!

Adapted from Contemporary Mathematics in Context Youve probably voted beforeclass elections, or maybe votes among your friends about what game to play. There are many ways to decide the winner of an election, and they dont always produce the same winner! Mr. Jacobs gave his English class a choice of which book to read next: The Chocolate War, by Robert Cormier; Emma, by Jane Austen, and Lord of the Flies, by William Golding. Everyone ranked the books by the order in which they wanted to read them. The rst choice was ranked 1, and the last was ranked 3. Heres how the voting went: Three students ranked The Chocolate War rst and Emma second. Seven students ranked The Chocolate War rst and Lord of the Flies second. Five students ranked Lord of the Flies rst and Emma second. The remaining eight students ranked Emma rst and Lord of the Flies second. 1. Complete the chart below to summarize the students votes. Ranking The Chocolate War Emma Lord of the Flies Number of votes 2. 1 2 3 3 7 5 8
All of these books have been made into movies. In fact, Emma has given us two: Emma and Clueless.

Probably the most common way to decide a winner is to nd the plurality winner. This is the candidate with the most rst-preference votes. Which book is the plurality winner in this case? In some elections, the winner must be a majority winner that is, one candidate must get at least half of all the rstpreference votes. Is there a majority winner in this case? If so, which book?

3.

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Get out the vote!: Problem

4.

Is it possible to have a plurality winner but no majority winner? Is it possible to have a majority winner but no plurality winner? When there are more than two candidates, some people feel its better to look at the two candidates getting the most rst-preference votes. Then you can run o the two against each other. (a) Which are the top two candidates in this election? (b) In the following table, write the top two candidates in the rst column (like in the table above). Use the table above to decide how a run-o election would go and complete the table. For example, which of the two books would the block of 3 voters choose rst? Which would they choose second? Put those numbers in the appropriate places in the table. Ranking

5.

Assume that voters dont change their minds about their preferences for the second election.

Number of votes 3 7 5 8 (c) 6. Which book wins under this method?

This method is also called the Condorcet (con-dor-say) method, after the Marquis de Condorcet (17421794), a philosopher and social scientist.

Another method is the pairwise-comparison method, similar to the run-o method. With this method, choose every pair of candidates possible. Then run the candidates against each other in pairs. If any candidate beats all of its competitors, that candidate wins. (a) List all the possible pairs of the three books. (b) Find the winners of each pair, as you did in problem 5b. Use the tables below and on the next page to help. Ranking

Number of votes 3 7 5 8

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Get out the vote!: Problem

Ranking

Number of votes 3 7 5 8 Ranking

Number of votes 3 7 5 8 (c) 7. Did any candidate win against each of the others? If so, which one?
This method is sometimes called the Borda count method, after a French military ocer who rst proposed it in the 18th century.

The points-for-preferences method assigns points for each preference rank. The winner is the candidate with the most points. For example, you might assign 3 points for rst preference, 2 for second, and 1 point for third preference. (a) Find the number of points each candidate receives using this method and the point assignment example. Which candidate wins? (b) Suppose a dierent point system were used, such as 4 points for rst, 1 points for second, and 0 point for last. Does the winner change, in this case? (c) Can you nd a point assignment that makes Emma the winner? If so, give an example. (Of course, rst preference must get the most points, and last preference must get the fewest.) Of course, the system for choosing the winner should be decided before any votes are castand in the case of the points-for-preferences method, the point assignment must also be decided before votes are cast. (a) Why is it important to make those decisions rst? (b) Which method do you like best? Why?

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Get out the vote!: Hints

Hints
Hint to problem 5. To determine the new preference ranking, remember that rst preferences will stay the same, so copy the rst preferences in the same places they were in the original table. The other book will get second preference for those voters. If neither book was rst preference for some voters, which book was higher in the voters preferences? Hint to problem 6. For part a, you can get a clue about how many pairs there are from the tables in part b. For part b, you dont actually need to complete one of the tablesyouve already run o The Chocolate War and Emma. Hint to problem 7. For part c, you may have to try several dierent point systems. But consider this: The Chocolate War has more preference 1 votes than Emma has, but not by much. Lord of the Flies has quite a few more second preference votes than Emma. You dont want the second preference votes to count too much, or Lord of the Flies will win, but they need to count enough to overcome the advantage The Chocolate War has in rst preference votes.

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Get out the vote!: Answers

Answers
1. Heres the completed table: Ranking The Chocolate War 1 1 3 3 Emma 2 3 2 1 Lord of the Flies 3 2 1 2 Number of votes 3 7 5 8 The Chocolate War (10 votes) There is no majority winner. There are 23 total votes, and the most rst-preference votes that a single candidate received was 10, which is less than half. Its possible to have a plurality winner but no majority winnerthis situation is an example. However, its not possible to have a majority winner but no plurality winner. If one candidate receives more than half of the votes, then that candidate must have more than any other candidate. The majority winner is also the plurality winner.

2. 3.

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5. (a) The top two are The Chocolate War and Emma. (b) The table is as follows: Ranking The Chocolate War 1 1 2 2 Emma 2 2 1 1 Number of votes 3 7 5 8 (c) Emma (13 votes) 6. (a) There are three pairs: The Chocolate War and Emma, The Chocolate War and Lord of the Flies, and Emma and Lord of the Flies. (b) Emma beats The Chocolate War (13 to 10), Lord of the Flies beats The Chocolate War (13 to 10), and Lord of the Flies beats Emma (12 to 11). Ranking The Chocolate War 1 1 2 2 Lord of the Flies 2 2 1 1 Number of votes 3 7 5 8

See the table above for The Chocolate War versus Emma.

Ranking Emma 1 2 2 1 Lord of the Flies 2 1 1 2 Number of votes 3 7 5 8

(c) Lord of the Flies beat both the other candidates. 7. (a) The Chocolate War gets 43 points, Emma gets 47 points,
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Get out the vote!: Answers

and Lord of the Flies gets 48 points. So Lord of the Flies is the winner. (b) Under the new system, The Chocolate War and Emma tie as the winner with 40 points each. (Lord of the Flies gets 35 points. (c) One possibility is 4 for rst, 2 for second, and 1 for third. This gives The Chocolate War and Lord of the Flies 53 points each, and it gives Emma 55 points. 8. (a) If you know the votes already, you can choose the method that make a particular candidate the winner. (b) Answers will vary.

Teachers Note: This question may prompt a good class discussion about perceptions of fairness.

Problems with a Point: November 15, 2001

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