it sounds scary, but it’s actually pretty cool!

https://eigentaylor.github.io/blog/leader-rule/

if “vote for everyone you like” is not good enough for you, Laslier’s leader rule is a simple heuristic to help you determine where to draw your “line of acceptability” in approval voting efficiently:

approve of everyone you prefer to the expected winner. approve the expected winner if you prefer them to the expected runner-up. approve no one else.

this cuts right through the strategic calculus of what to do with your second choice and lesser evil, and even shows that shrewd bullet voting is optimal when your favorite is ahead. but if your favorite is nonviable, the rule tells you to be prudently generous and approve of more than one. earth-shattering stuff, i know.

the kicker? at equilibrium, this strategy elects the Condorcet winner! widespread strategic self-interest becomes a mechanism through which Approval delivers its most majoritarian outcomes.

thanks to Rob LeGrand who introduced me to his “Strategy A” which was an independent discovery of this same leader rule strategy in 2002 that Laslier later proved in 2009 is optimal in a “trembling ballot” model.

stay bodacious,

taylor