American Review | Global Perspectives on US Affairs

Voting in Australia: Mulholland Drive or Twin Peaks?

By Jonathan Bradley in Seattle, WA
6 March 2010

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That's the question I have for USA Today reporter Scott Bowles, who's utterly baffled by a system of voting that millions of Australians seem to cope with every time an election rolls around. 

Our number-the-boxes system came up today because it's being used by the Academy Awards. And although we seem to use it just fine, Bowles seems to think his readers will be baffled. Australian voters will be pleased to know they have the smarts of a “statistics major”:

Explaining Oscar's new voting system for best picture is a little like watching a David Lynch movie: Sometimes you have to nod your head and pretend you understand.

As byzantine as the Academy Awards' new preferential voting format is, there's good reason to change from the one-vote, one-movie system of the past. With 10 nominees, a movie could ostensibly win with 11% of the overall vote.

The new system ensures that won't happen, but Oscar could probably use a statistics major by his side when counting ballots.

Ever since Ralph Nader helped George Bush win the 2000 election, I've thought the U.S. could benefit from a look at, as they call it, instant run-off voting. And were it used in the mid-terms this year, I have no doubt we'd see a plethora of candidates running under the Tea Party banner, assured they would not be robbing votes from more electable Republicans.

Incidentally, voters in Minneapolis-St. Paul, San Francisco, and Cambridge, Massachusetts must have those maths degree smarts, too; they've adopted the Aussie voting system for some races. With something as influential as the Oscars adding their ballot to the list, perhaps it's time the Australian Electoral Commission sent a delegation over here to the States.

Tags: Film

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