Stephen Hume, The Vancouver Sun

Democratic? Anything but

Here is a column and sidebar by Stephen Hume that appeared in The Vancouver Sun on November 6, 2004, and, beneath it, letters to the editor submitted in response by two Assembly members.

Democratic? Anything but

The Citizens' Assembly on Electoral Reform, while doubtless sincere and committed, has presented us with a dubious proposal born out of a patently non-democratic process

By Stephen Hume

The Vancouver Sun , Saturday, November 06, 2004

Now that the Citizens' Assembly on Electoral Reform has enjoyed its extended honeymoon, grant this curmudgeon a few persnickety second thoughts about the so-called exercise in democracy and its apparent conclusions thus far.

I say it is a "so-called" exercise in democracy because, wise and benevolent as the 161 members of the assembly undoubtedly are, being selected rather than elected makes the process rather less than democratic, whatever else it might be.

There's a self-evident irony in delegating responsibility for proposing profound changes to our current system of elected representation -- a system that has flaws but which was born of trial and error over a centuries-long struggle -- to a selected group.

To be sure, those selected were randomly chosen from each provincial constituency -- that selection being carefully controlled, of course, to satisfy a prior requirement that they must represent various demographic segments of society. Gender, ethnicity, geography, urban or rural lifestyle, etc., all had to have their pre-ordained quotas met.

Nothing wrong with striving for an assembly that resembled the makeup of B.C. However, in my admittedly conservative view of democracy, a selection process that is structured to ensure outcomes may be many things -- efficient, accurate, consistent, comforting -- but it can't be described as democratic. By definition, democracy as I understand it requires us to accept some degree of uncertainty while agreeing to abide by the unexpected outcome.

Do I doubt the good faith of the assembly? Nope.

Question the personal sincerity or collective integrity of its members? Nope.

Begrudge them their opportunity to offer advice? Nope.

Challenge their commitment, intelligence or earnestness? Not a whit.

But that doesn't mean I feel that they can democratically represent me or my desires regarding any future reform to our electoral system. I had no say in their selection. I have no idea who any of them are save for a brief thumbnail perused on a website. Not one of the delegates is really accountable politically for the decisions ultimately taken.

I didn't vote them in and so I can't vote them out if I don't like what they're doing. Thus, the process functions more like a visit from the cuckoo than the participatory democracy it purports to be. The assembly will deposit its egg for us to hatch, then fly away, never to be seen again.

If I don't like the egg the assembly left, if I think it should have left some other egg, what's my alternative? None.

It's take-it-or-leave-it. Accept the reductionist vision of change or stick with the status quo.

Reductionism is an important issue here. The assembly was mustered to assess possible alternatives to the first-past-the-post system. Read what's on the assembly's website and the sub-text is an assumption that the present system is dysfunctional and needs replacing.

Maybe that's true, maybe it's not. What is clear, however, is that the assembly then went through a process in which all the possibilities for changing the status quo were reduced to one alternative, the single transferable vote system.

So despite all the high-flown rhetoric about choices, what we're really talking about is a process for shrinking the range of possible choices to one -- deciding between the status quo or the one alternative that's being presented by the assembly.

Call me obtuse if you like, but when a selected group tells me that there is going to be only one take-it-or-leave-it alternative to something that was achieved at great cost and which nurtured everything that we have so far treasured about Canada, I don't find that particularly democratic.

Why are my options being narrowed -- is it because having more than one choice would be too intellectually overwhelming for me? That seems an elitist assumption.

I know how I'd feel if these kinds of rules were used to govern the next election to the legislature. Would anybody consider it legitimate if electoral challenges to the incumbent were restricted to one? Would anybody tolerate the idea that other candidates should be left off the ballot because they didn't meet with the prior approval of some body which wasn't accountable to anybody?

Okay, there's my quibble with the process. Now let's consider the one alternative being bruited about thus far -- some kind of single transferable vote.

For me, political democracy demands two things. First, clear and indisputable outcomes. Second, a voting process that is straightforward, transparent and instantly verifiable.

But with the single transferable vote, the assigning of the votes seems anything but straightforward. Instead, we're told, it will require a mathematical computation so complex that computers will have to be used to properly weight the distribution of the transferable votes.

I'm no Luddite. I use computers every day. Neither am I seduced by technology. My general principle is, the simpler the better unless proven otherwise.

So forgive my lack of enthusiasm for submitting my single transferable vote to a computer for distribution among other candidates according to some algorithm that's beyond my basic math skills.

Then there's the transparency problem. As I understand it, what's being proposed promises to disconnect me from my vote. If a computer is assigning the transferable ballots according to mathematical formulae, how do I know that my vote is actually going to the person to whom I want it to go, or that it's not being used to advance the fortunes of somebody whose platform I voted against?

I'm not a computer programmer -- how do I evaluate what's going on inside the machine? And how is an electronic transaction going to be made easily transparent to voters?

Will there be a paper trail that each of us can consult to ensure that our votes were properly assigned specifically as we wished them to be assigned?

Having had plenty of experience with news stories about computer weirdness in my time and observing the most recent controversy over computerized voting machines in the United States that didn't record votes properly, assigned votes to the wrong candidates and couldn't provide a verifiable record of what had gone on, my alarm bells are ringing already.

Defenders of the assembly's proposal will doubtless chastise me as a political dunce who should get with the agenda and trust the high tech. They may be right.

But I also believe that when we are considering major structural changes to an electoral system that has served us well for so long, any referendum on alternatives should be expansive, not reductionist, transparent rather than opaque.

So far, the opposite seems to be taking shape.

The following is a sidebar that accompanied the column

WHAT'S WRONG WITH IT? HUME'S VIEWS:

When a selected group tells me that there is going to be only one take-it-or-leave-it alternative to something that was achieved at great cost and which nurtured everything that we have so far treasured about Canada, I don't find that particularly democratic.

Why are my options being narrowed -- is it because having more than one choice would be too intellectually overwhelming for me? That seems an elitist assumption.

With the single transferable vote, the assigning of the votes will require a mathematical computation so complex that computers will have to be used to properly weight the distribution of the transferable votes.

So how do I know that my vote is actually going to the person to whom I want it to go, or that it's not being used to advance the fortunes of somebody whose platform I voted against?

shume@islandnet.com

[© Copyright 2004 The Vancouver Sun. Reproduced here by permission of The Vancouver Sun.

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Response from Assembly member Wendy Bergerud, in a letter to the editor submitted to The Vancouver Sun:

I can only assume that Stephen Hume decided that his inbox was too empty. So, maybe an inaccurate article on the Citizens' Assembly would fix that . . . The Assembly not democratic??

Well, let's review some history. Who decided to constitute the Citizens' Assembly? Why, it was our duly elected provincial MLAs who, by the way, did so with not one dissenting voice (even the two opposition members voted for the Assembly!). The random selection of the assembly members assures us that we represent the different voices within BC, likely much better than any set of elected MLAs (even were they to be elected with our new proportional preferential balloting method instead of the present holdover from the horse and buggy days).

He is concerned that he didn't vote us in - well, indirectly, he did. After all, it is our duly elected government which set the assembly in place. As far as voting us out, well, we only get to do that for the provincial government once every four years anyway. Since we don't have effective recall legislation we can't turf out even one MLA, much less the government, part-way through their term either. There's nothing new here.

Then Stephen complains that the Assembly hasn't provided him with enough choices - only one alternative have been proposed. Who restricted the Assembly's options here? Was it Assembly members? No. We agreed that voters want more choice. That is why we chose an electoral system that maximizes voters' choices. But our mandate from the government was clear: If we thought that an alternative electoral system should be recommended, we were allowed to propose only one alternative, not two, not three.

But now that I have learned about electoral systems, I also recognize that there would be a practical problem with a referendum having more than two choices: how would we decide which one was the winner? Using our current plurality system, two or more alternatives could 'split the vote' so that although most people voted for change, the old system could end up with the most votes!

Further, with three choices there would really be two questions: 1) Do we want change? and 2) If so, which of the two new proposed systems do we want? In fact, this is the way in which the assembly voted. Oh, Stephen says we're not democratic! Actually, Stephen, all of our decision-making was done the old-fashioned democratic way - by voting. Further all of our plenary sessions were open to the public and are being re-broadcast on the Hansard Channel. This sounds pretty transparent to me.

Stephen complains that he is being treated as a simpleton because he is being given only one alternative to vote for. But isn't that how our current electoral system works? Sure, there may be many names on the ballot but, only if you are lucky, will at least two of them have a decent chance of winning. If you're unlucky, only one of them is likely to win. Sounds like the current electoral system treats us all as simpletons.

For a guy who wants some intellectual challenge Stephen hasn't donehis research. Or he wouldn't ask "How do I know that my vote is . . . not being used to advance the fortunes of somebody whose platform I voted against?"  The Assembly's website (www.citizensassembly.bc.ca) is only one site with information on this. But I'll answer anyway: With a preferential ballot, your ballot can only be transferred to those for whom you expressed preferences. If you really don't want your vote to be transferable to some candidates, then don't rank them. This means that you would rather have your ballot end up in the "exhausted" pile after all of your preferences have had a chance to get your vote than to have it used for someone you don't like. (Our recommended electoral system will still have 'wasted' ballots but there will be far fewer of them).

As for computers, well, that's also not in our mandate, not that we won't have some comments to make! Our report, due on December 15th, will discuss a list of "Other Considerations" that weren't within our mandate. Still, there is a big difference between electronic voting that has no paper trail (as we've seen recently with the US elections), and paper ballots whose results are compiled by computer. In any case, it will be up to Elections BC to figure out how to set up the voting and counting. And rest assured, they will have many knowledgeable people looking over their shoulders to see that they get it right!

Stephen Hume should be pleased with the alternate electoral system we have proposed. If the people of BC vote for it in next May's referendum it will be implemented for the following election. Then in 2009, when he looks at his ballot he will have many more choices than when he stared at his referendum ballot in 2005.

Sincerely,

Wendy Bergerud

Assembly member for Victoria-Hillside

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Response from Assembly member Brooke Bannister, in a letter to the editor submitted to The Vancouver Sun:

As a member of the Citizen’s Assembly on Electoral Reform, I read with great interest Stephen Hume’s op-ed in Saturday’s edition of the Vancouver Sun, questioning our work on three counts … because we weren’t elected we have less credibility; we should have given the electorate more than one choice; and that we shouldn’t have blind faith in computers for the job of counting and transferring peoples’ votes.

I would take issue with Mr. Hume on all three.

First of all, my fellow Assembly members are an outstanding group of hard-working, dedicated people from all walks of life.

"No academics, no windbags, no political advisors — just 80 men and 80 women chosen randomly from around the province", was how one editor described us.

If that’s a bad thing, then Mr. Hume’s argument has merit.

But I would say, because we volunteered to serve an entire year for this process — to learn, listen and discuss everything about electoral reform; and that we have a real, vested interest in everything we decide — our credibility shouldn’t be taken lightly.

Secondly, Mr. Hume’s "just one choice" argument is also interesting, because organizations, companies and governments do what we did all the time.

We looked at electoral systems from all over the world and chose the one that we thought was best for British Columbia, based on many values, the top three being Voter Choice, Local Representation and Proportionality.

Why does it become less credible if a group of ordinary citizens takes on that responsibility?

And, lastly, he makes the argument the Assembly’s trust in computers doesn’t match his.

Unless Mr. Hume continues to write his columns with a manual typewriter, he knows full well that computers play an integral part in most things in our lives today, and for the most part, do an outstanding job of making things easier and more productive.

May I also remind him that the trained and neutral people from Elections BC do the counting, and will ensure that Mr. Hume’s vote, and everyone else’s, go where they want it to go, and that their votes will be counted and transferred, both manually, and with the use of computers.

The change to STV can promise us benefits like fairer results based on all of our voting preferences; a more diverse, consensual legislature; and less power to political parties - major changes in the way British Columbia politics works today – changes which I’m sure even Mr. Hume will embrace, once he comes on board.


Brooke Bannister

Member of the Citizen’s Assembly on Electoral Reform from Richmond-Steveston.