Single transferable vote

STV systems can be thought of as a variation on the largest remainders method that uses candidate-based solid coalitions, rather than party lists.

Using FPTP, it could happen that under any three-district single-winner system, none of the groups elect Pears, if the 7 votes for it are split and in each "district" there is another food that beats it (e.g. Oranges, Hamburgers and Chicken).

Even if they held two rounds of voting (as in the two-round system), the bare majority that prefers some other kind of fruit (Oranges, Pears, Strawberries) would have dominated all other choices.

In an extreme example, where no faction can command an absolute majority, the largest of the minority groups can force a one-outcome result by running clone candidates.

If there is no reason to establish relative popularity of the elected members, the count ends there when the last seats are declared filled.

STV election results are roughly proportional (as much as the number of seats allows) and take into account more than the first preferences of voters.

However, it could happen that the independent candidate is eliminated in an early round and so is unable to receive transfers from party voters.

Voters do not mark their ballots with rankings, but votes are transferred, as needed, based on the eliminated or elected candidate's pre-set instructions.

[10][11] In 1884, Charles L. Dodgson (Lewis Caroll) argued for a proportional representation system based on multi-member districts similar to indirect STV, with each voter casting only a single vote, quotas as minimum requirements to take seats, and votes transferable by candidates through what is now called liquid democracy.

The Gregory method (also known as Newland–Britain or Senatorial rules) eliminates randomness by examining all the preferences marked on the last parcel of ballots received by the elected candidate.

Meek, in 1969,[31] was the first to realize that computers make it possible to count votes in a way that is conceptually simpler and closer to the original concept of STV.

[41] Although he was not the first to propose transferable votes, the British barrister Thomas Hare is generally credited with the conception of STV, and he may have independently developed the idea in 1857.

Hare's view was that STV should be a means of "making the exercise of the suffrage a step in the elevation of the individual character, whether it be found in the majority or the minority."

In the 1890s in Australia, Catherine Helen Spence amended Hare's proposal by adding multi-member districts instead of at-large voting.

The political essayist John Stuart Mill was a friend of Hare's and an early proponent of STV, praising it at length in his essay Considerations on Representative Government, in which he writes: "Of all modes in which a national representation can possibly be constituted, this one affords the best security for the intellectual qualifications desirable in the representatives.

In 1896, Andrew Inglis Clark was successful in persuading the Tasmanian House of Assembly to be the first parliament in the world to be at least partially elected by a form of STV, specifically the Hare-Clark electoral system, named after himself and Thomas Hare.

[46] STV in large constituencies and multiple-member districts permits an approach to the Hare-Mill-Wells ideal of mirror representation.

In 1979, the UK National Health Service used STV to proportionally elect women and immigrant GPs, and specialists, to the General Medical Council.

Beginning in the 1970s, Australian states began to reform their upper houses to introduce proportional representation in line with the Federal Senate.

[52] The single transferable vote was also introduced for the elections to the Australian Capital Territory Legislative Assembly after a 1992 referendum.

[53] The term STV in Australia refers to the Senate electoral system, a variant of Hare-Clark characterized by the "above the line" group voting ticket, a party list option.

[58][59] Concerning the development of STV in Australia researchers have observed: "... we see real evidence of the extent to which Australian politicians, particularly at national levels, are prone to fiddle with the electoral system".

[60]: 86 As a result of a parliamentary commission investigating the 2013 election, from 2016 the system has been considerably reformed, with group voting tickets (GVTs) abolished and voters no longer required to fill all boxes.

In 2023, the single transferable vote was also chosen as the electoral method in South Australia for the state's First Nation's Voice to Parliament as part of Schedule 1 of the Act.

In the United States, the Proportional Representation League was founded in 1893 to promote STV, and their efforts resulted in its adoption by many city councils in the first half of the 20th century.

The Fair Representation Act, introduced in the US Congress in June 2017, would have established STV for US House elections starting in 2022.

In practice, the majority of voters express preference for candidates from the same party in order,[citation needed] which minimizes the impact of this potential effect of STV.

This happened in Cavan-Monaghan in the 2020 Irish general election, where Labour, PBP, Green and Aontu parties were the least popular.

STV ensures that each substantial group gets at least one seat, allowing candidates to focus campaign spending primarily on supportive voters.

[112] The relative performance of political parties in STV systems is sometimes analysed in a different fashion from that used in other electoral schemes.