Engineering elections without bias | Brian Olson | TEDxCambridge
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0:17 - 0:22If you've ever had the suspicion
that your vote doesn't really count -
0:22 - 0:26and the deck might be stacked
against you, you might be right. -
0:26 - 0:30In many places in this country,
we don't have a functioning democracy. -
0:30 - 0:32People might go to the polls,
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0:32 - 0:35but they might not have a real choice
when they get there. -
0:36 - 0:40In 2010, the people of Florida
were trying to do something about this. -
0:40 - 0:43They passed a ballot initiative
with almost two-thirds of the vote: -
0:43 - 0:45a new state constitutional amendment
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0:45 - 0:51requiring that districts be fair
and not biased based on race or party. -
0:52 - 0:53It didn't work.
-
0:54 - 0:58The state legislature sued to try
and get out of these new requirements, -
0:58 - 1:00and in subsequent court battles,
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1:00 - 1:05the maps they made were found
to be racially and partisan biased. -
1:07 - 1:09Florida is just one example
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1:09 - 1:11of our national problem
with gerrymandering. -
1:12 - 1:15Gerrymandering is when you
take a few people from one place -
1:15 - 1:19and a few people from another place
and draw a line around them on the map -
1:20 - 1:23to create a district
with some specific demographic goal. -
1:25 - 1:27Here's an example world with 25 people:
-
1:28 - 1:3260% green people and 40% purple people.
-
1:33 - 1:37If you split that up into five simple
districts of five people each, -
1:37 - 1:39you can preserve that ratio in the outcome
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1:39 - 1:42and have three districts
won by green people -
1:42 - 1:44and two districts won by purple people.
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1:45 - 1:49But if you pack enough green people
into just two districts, -
1:49 - 1:51then you can flip that outcome
-
1:51 - 1:55and wind up with three districts
where there's a purple majority. -
1:56 - 2:01Or you can crack the purple people
and split them up just right -
2:01 - 2:03so that they don't have
a majority anywhere. -
2:04 - 2:07These strategies of packing and cracking
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2:07 - 2:11are being used in dozens of districts
throughout the country. -
2:12 - 2:15That bright blue district
in northeast Florida -
2:16 - 2:18was found to be racially biased
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2:18 - 2:22because it packs too many
black people into one district, -
2:22 - 2:24diminishing their influence elsewhere.
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2:25 - 2:28That was Florida in 2012,
-
2:28 - 2:31but gerrymandering
has been going on for a long time, -
2:31 - 2:33since at least 1812,
-
2:33 - 2:38when Massachusetts governor Elbridge Gerry
signed into law a map -
2:38 - 2:43that was drawn into a political cartoon
as a monstrous, dragonesque salamander, -
2:43 - 2:46and thus was born the gerrymander.
-
2:46 - 2:48But it's gotten a lot worse lately.
-
2:48 - 2:52The joke is that instead of voters
picking their politicians, -
2:52 - 2:54politicians are picking their voters.
-
2:56 - 2:57Why is this a problem?
-
2:58 - 2:59When you have too many seats
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2:59 - 3:03that are gerrymandered
to be safe for one party or another, -
3:03 - 3:06the political process
breaks down in some ways. -
3:06 - 3:09I have one personal example.
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3:09 - 3:11In 2006, I was a webmaster
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3:11 - 3:14for a congressional campaign
in California. -
3:14 - 3:15We were in a district
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3:15 - 3:19that was gerrymandered,
say, for the other party. -
3:19 - 3:23And the incumbent in that party
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3:23 - 3:25didn't feel the need
to take part in the campaign -
3:25 - 3:28and wouldn't agree
to show up for any debates. -
3:28 - 3:30He just felt he didn't have to.
-
3:30 - 3:35And our party wouldn't send any help;
they figured we were a lost cause. -
3:36 - 3:40Come election day, the incumbent
got the expected 60/40 result. -
3:41 - 3:43In other places, it's even worse.
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3:43 - 3:48In 2014, there were 32 congressional
districts that went unopposed - -
3:48 - 3:50no one else on the ballot.
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3:50 - 3:52That's over 20 million Americans
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3:52 - 3:56with no effective choice over
who their representative in Congress is. -
3:58 - 3:59In some places,
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4:00 - 4:04the incumbent faces a more extreme
challenger from within their own party. -
4:04 - 4:09And whether you have an extremist upstart
or a long incumbent safe seat, -
4:11 - 4:15that politician might not feel the need
to reach out across the aisle -
4:15 - 4:17and compromise on anything
because they're safe, -
4:18 - 4:21and the legislative process
grinds to a halt, -
4:21 - 4:23and voters get more cynical.
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4:24 - 4:26What if we could have impartial districts?
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4:27 - 4:30What if we defined what a good
district was mathematically -
4:30 - 4:33and didn't let anyone else's
agenda interfere? -
4:34 - 4:38Florida's map might look
something like this. -
4:39 - 4:41About 10 years ago,
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4:41 - 4:44computers got powerful enough
to solve for this kind of map -
4:44 - 4:51that follows the legal requirements
of having equal population per district, -
4:51 - 4:54contiguous districts
that are each all one piece, -
4:54 - 4:58and in this case,
solving for compact districts -
4:58 - 5:02that try to tightly represent
one location or region. -
5:04 - 5:07But I didn't know
it would work when I started. -
5:07 - 5:08Previous work in this area
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5:08 - 5:11had been on tiny toy maps
like the one I showed you earlier, -
5:11 - 5:15and they didn't think it would scale up
to a full state worth of data. -
5:15 - 5:19But I figured I was a pretty good engineer
and I'd give it a shot, -
5:19 - 5:21and I think it worked out pretty well.
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5:21 - 5:25So, when the 2010 census data
starting coming out, -
5:25 - 5:27I set my home computer to work,
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5:27 - 5:32and over the next six months,
it came up with 137 maps -
5:32 - 5:34for state legislature
and congressional districts -
5:34 - 5:36all over the country.
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5:36 - 5:38And I think the results are pretty good.
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5:38 - 5:40Let's see another one.
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5:40 - 5:41First, the old way.
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5:42 - 5:47North Carolina has also been
in almost constant legal battles -
5:47 - 5:50since their maps came out
a little over four years ago. -
5:51 - 5:52Most recently,
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5:52 - 5:57they were thrown out for racial bias
just as primary season was spinning up. -
5:57 - 5:59New maps were hastily drawn up,
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5:59 - 6:03and the primary had to be pushed back
from March until June. -
6:03 - 6:06Voters and candidates
were left in disarray. -
6:07 - 6:09That red district in the northeast
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6:09 - 6:13reaches into and around
three other districts. -
6:14 - 6:18That pink district in the middle
pinches down as narrow as possible -
6:18 - 6:20while reaching out to grab other areas.
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6:21 - 6:22This is nuts.
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6:22 - 6:25These are the visual telltales
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6:25 - 6:29of districts that have been distorted
toward some political end. -
6:30 - 6:35The opposite of a sprawling,
non-local gerrymandered map -
6:35 - 6:38is a compact map, like this.
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6:39 - 6:41I hope you can see the difference.
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6:42 - 6:43You can also measure it.
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6:44 - 6:45I measure compactness
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6:45 - 6:49as the average distance per person
to the center of their district. -
6:49 - 6:53In the old North Carolina map,
that distance was 38 miles; -
6:54 - 6:56in my map, it's 25 miles.
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6:57 - 7:01You can measure how sprawling
and non-local a gerrymandered map is -
7:01 - 7:04and how compact a compact map is.
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7:05 - 7:07So, it's technically possible.
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7:08 - 7:10How's the political situation?
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7:10 - 7:13You might expect that there would be
some resistance to this kind of change, -
7:13 - 7:16and there is, but there is
also some demand for it. -
7:18 - 7:22The republican governor of Maryland
has recently called out for national help -
7:22 - 7:25in overturning his state's
democratic gerrymander. -
7:27 - 7:29That is one of the more contorted messes
-
7:29 - 7:34of tentacled horrors of districts
I have seen in any map. -
7:34 - 7:35(Laughter)
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7:37 - 7:39I don't know if this is the best map,
-
7:40 - 7:43but I submit that it is
a legally viable map, -
7:43 - 7:47without some of the obvious runaround
and drawbacks of the old map. -
7:49 - 7:52There are a lot of states
with divided government, -
7:52 - 7:55with the two parties
fighting over redistricting. -
7:55 - 7:58But this shouldn't be
something to fight about. -
7:58 - 8:02Redistricting should be
a bureaucratic, boring process, -
8:02 - 8:05where you get in new census data,
you turn the crank, -
8:05 - 8:07and you get out new maps
for the next 10 years. -
8:10 - 8:12In the last few years,
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8:12 - 8:18California, Arizona, Ohio, and Florida
have passed reform of one kind or another. -
8:18 - 8:20That shows that it's possible.
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8:20 - 8:24Those reforms might not be perfect,
and they might still need some tinkering, -
8:24 - 8:25but we can do it.
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8:27 - 8:28This is technically possible.
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8:29 - 8:32Open-source software, free and verifiable,
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8:34 - 8:36running on home computers
that anyone can use -
8:37 - 8:39can solve for these kinds
of impartial maps, -
8:39 - 8:41and the results are pretty good.
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8:42 - 8:44This is politically possible.
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8:44 - 8:47People want reform -
even some elected officials want it. -
8:47 - 8:50And the legal mechanisms are achievable.
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8:51 - 8:53If we could have a change now,
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8:53 - 8:56we could have a big effect
on the future of our political process. -
8:57 - 9:00If reform comes to enough places,
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9:00 - 9:01enough states,
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9:01 - 9:04we might even be able
to get a national standard. -
9:05 - 9:10And a national standard might let us
really hold up our core value -
9:10 - 9:13of equal protection under the law for all.
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9:13 - 9:14(Applause)
- Title:
- Engineering elections without bias | Brian Olson | TEDxCambridge
- Description:
-
In many places in the US, elections are being tampered with by state legislatures. Gerrymandered maps improve the odds for one party or the other. Brian Olson explores how this works and some places where it is happening, and offers an alternative through impartial mathematically based maps created with open source software.
Brian Olson is currently a software engineer at PatientsLikeMe. Since learning to program at age nine, he has worked on software of all kinds at many levels, from embedded microcontrollers to server farms. He's worked at start-ups, at major companies, and independently. Brian has worked on redistricting software for over a decade, resulting in an efficient system that can solve for compact, impartial, non-gerrymandered districts on a home computer. This work has been cited in the Washington Post and scholarly journals. The software is free and open source, allowing anyone to verify its function or tinker with it to make it better. Brian earned a B.S. in Computer Science from Carnegie Mellon University.
This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx
- Video Language:
- English
- Team:
- closed TED
- Project:
- TEDxTalks
- Duration:
- 09:26
Mirjana Čutura approved English subtitles for Engineering elections without bias | Brian Olson | TEDxCambridge | ||
Mirjana Čutura accepted English subtitles for Engineering elections without bias | Brian Olson | TEDxCambridge | ||
Mirjana Čutura edited English subtitles for Engineering elections without bias | Brian Olson | TEDxCambridge | ||
Mirjana Čutura edited English subtitles for Engineering elections without bias | Brian Olson | TEDxCambridge | ||
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Lisa Thompson edited English subtitles for Engineering elections without bias | Brian Olson | TEDxCambridge | ||
Lisa Thompson edited English subtitles for Engineering elections without bias | Brian Olson | TEDxCambridge | ||
Lisa Thompson edited English subtitles for Engineering elections without bias | Brian Olson | TEDxCambridge |