I have written a few blog posts arguing that we need to strengthen democracy. One of my key takeaways from the current US Presidential election is that the primary election system must be reformed. I am surprised by how many people don’t know this today but the nationwide adoption of a binding primary system for the presidential election happened only after the 1968 Democratic Convention. So it is a relatively new thing and an example that not all innovations are good.

What would be a better way of doing it? There is a variety of proposals that have been debated. Personally I would like to see an open system where primary voting participation is not restricted by party affiliation. The goal of the primary should be to surface the two best candidates independent of party affiliation with the general election being a runoff between the two. This system would also make it easier for independents to run for president.

No voting system is perfect of course. And thanks to Arrow’s impossibility theorem we know that no perfect system can exist. So all voting systems make trade-offs. That alone is an argument for shaking things up because over time the benefits of any one system tend to attenuate and be overwhelmed by the downsides. 

I have written a few blog posts arguing that we need to strengthen democracy. One of my key takeaways from the current US Presidential election is that the primary election system must be reformed. I am surprised by how many people don’t know this today but the nationwide adoption of a binding primary system for the presidential election happened only after the 1968 Democratic Convention. So it is a relatively new thing and an example that not all innovations are good.

What would be a better way of doing it? There is a variety of proposals that have been debated. Personally I would like to see an open system where primary voting participation is not restricted by party affiliation. The goal of the primary should be to surface the two best candidates independent of party affiliation with the general election being a runoff between the two. This system would also make it easier for independents to run for president.

No voting system is perfect of course. And thanks to Arrow’s impossibility theorem we know that no perfect system can exist. So all voting systems make trade-offs. That alone is an argument for shaking things up because over time the benefits of any one system tend to attenuate and be overwhelmed by the downsides.