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The de Borda Institute

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A BLOG

A blog: " De Borda abroad." From Belfast to Beijing and beyond... and back. Starting in Vienna with the TEDx talk, I go by bus and/or train for more debates in Belgrade, Sarajevo, Istanbul, Tbilisi, Yerevan and Tehran, before flying - sorry about that - to Urumqi in Xīnjiāng, followed by more debates in Beijing, Tianjin, Hong Kong and Taiwan... but not in Pyongyang. Then back via Mongolia (where I was an election observer last year) and Moscow (where I worked in the '80s).

I have my little fold-up Brompton with me - surely the best way of exploring any new city! So I fly hardly at all; I go by train, boat or bus if possible, and then cycle wherever in each new venue; and all with just one plastic water bottle... or that was the intention!

The story is on: https://debordaabroad.wordpress.com/2017/09/07/de-borda-abroad/

38 DEGREES PETITION

Mulit-option and Preferential Referendums

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DECISION-MAKER
Inclusive voting app

www.decision-maker.org

JUST OUT - THE APP TO BEAT ALL APPS, APPSOLUTELY!

(Currently under re-construction.)

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The Hospital for Incurable Protestants

The Mémoire of a Collapsed Catholic

This is the story of a pacifist in a conflict zone, in Northern Ireland and the Balkans. Only in e-format, but only £5.15. Available from Amazon.

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The de Borda Institute aims to promote the use of inclusive voting procedures on all contentious questions of social choice.

This applies specifically to decision-making, be it for the electorate in regional/national polls, for their elected representatives in councils and parliaments, for members of a local community group, for members of a company board, for members of a co-operative, and so on.

The director alongside the statue of Jean-Charles de Borda, capitaine et savant, in l’École Navale in Brest, 24.9.2010. Photo by Gwenaelle Bichelot.

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WELCOME

Welcome to the home page of the de Borda Institute, a Northern Ireland-based international organisation (an NGO) which aims to promote the use of inclusive voting procedures on all contentious questions of social choice. For more information use the menu options above or feel free to contact the organisation's headquarters. If you want to check the meaning of any of the terms used, then by all means have a look at this glossary.

As shown in these attachments, there are many voting procedures for use in decision-making and even more electoral systems. This is because, in decision-making, there is usually only one outcome; but with some electoral systems, as in any proportional ones, there can be several winners. Sometimes, for any one voters' profile - that is, the set of all their preferences - the outcome of any count may well depend on the voting procedure used. In this very simple example of a few voters voting on just four options, and in these two hypothetical examples on five, (word document) or (power-point) in which a few cast their preferences on five options, the profiles are analysed according to different methodologies, and the winner could be any one of all the options. Yet all of these methodologies are called democratic! Extraordinary!

Monday

Mar182019

2019-4 Today

Monday, March 18, 2019

The BBC Radio 4 Today programme, 18th, at 06.53: an interview on multi-option decision-making.

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Sunday

Mar172019

Coming shortly...

Sunday, March 17, 2019

The next book - Majority Voting as a Catalyst of Populism - is due to be published by Springer later this year. It is based on my overland journey from Belfast to Beijing and back, Sept. 2017 to Sept '18, and it talks of how majority voting and binary majority rule have been part of the problem, pretty well everywhere: in conflict zones like Belfast and the Balkans; in 'stable democracies' like the UK, as in Brexit; in communist countries like Russia - the very word 'bolshevik' means 'member of the majority'; and even in China where Máo Zédōng was also a majoritarian: “we must win over the majority, oppose and smash the minority…”

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Monday

Mar042019

2019-3 Majority voting - a sacred cow?

Monday, March 4, 2019

Phil Kearney adds this article to a debate which still hasn't started.

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Thursday

Feb212019

2019-2 Brexit: if it ain't binary, don't binary vote

Thursday, February 21, 2019

Letter in today's Irish News. See 2019-1, 2018-17, etc.

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Monday

Jan212019

2019-1 Brexit - the bind of binary voting

Monday, January 21, 2019

Unfortunately, all too few people question binary voting; but it's part of the problem! Political Science Association of Ireland, PSAI, has just published:

https://politicalreform.ie/2019/01/21/does-brexit-demand-non-binary-decision-making/

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Monday

Dec242018

2018-18 Paddy Ashdown, 1941-2018

Monday, December 24, 2018

Paddy was probably the bravest, most committed, most linguistically gifted of all post-war UK politicians.

Here he is at our 2012 book launch in the House of Lords, (2011-9 and 2012-4), along with the late Elizabeth Meehan (2018-1) and his fellow lord, Mike Boyce. I first met Paddy back in the 70s at a Liberal Party function: we were both ex-military, both of Northern Ireland, and both of Belfast. So he took me to Yeovil, and I was highly impressed by his energetic campaigning. Our paths crossed again in Bosnia, where he was the much-loved High Representative, 2002-6. A Serbian friend of mine sat next to him, flying to London one year. "Sarajevo?" "Oh yes, I've been there," said Paddy, never one to boast. We were often in touch, so I signed my next letter to him, boastfully, Srdačan Pozdrav, (Serbo-Croat for 'yours sincerely'); to which his secretary replied, Dear Srdačan Pozdrav.

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Tuesday

Nov272018