a ballot in which a voter only has to choose one canidate
Single Choice Ballot
a ballot in which the voter has to rank all candidates in order of preference
preference ballot
a ballot in which a voter only has to rank the top K choices rather than all the choices
truncated preference ballot
in an election an outcome that lists all the candidates in order of preference
ranking (full ranking)
in an election, an outcome where just the top k candidates are ranked
partial ranking
a table that summarizes the preference ballots of all the voters
preference schedule
a voting method that ranks candidates based on the number of first place votes they receive
insincere voting
a candidate that beats all the other candidates in pairwise comparison
Condorcet candidate
a voting method that chooses the candidate with a majority of the votes when there isn't one it eliminates the candidates with the least amount of votes and transfers those votes to the next highest candidates on those ballots, continuing until there is a majority vote for one candidate.
plurality with elimination method
a variation of the plurality with elimination method based on truncated preference ballots
instant runoff voting
a voting method based on head to head comparisons between candidates that assigns one point to the winner of each comparison, none to the loser and 1/2 point to each of the two candidates in case its a tie.
method of pairwise comparison
basic rules that define formal requirements for fairness a fair voting method should always satisfy these basic rules
fairness criteria
a fairness criterion that says that when a candidates receives a majority vote that candidate should be the winner of the election
majority criterion
a fairness criterion that says that when there is a Condorcet candidate then that candidate should be the winner of the election
condorcet criterion
a fairness criterion that says that a candidate that would other wise win an election should not lose the election merely because some voters changed their ballots in a manner that factors that candidate
monotonicity criterion
a theorem that demonstrates that a voting method that is guaranteed to always produce fair outcomes is a mathematical impossibility
Arrow's Impossibility theorem