Katherine Gehl is a former corporate CEO, founder of the Institute for Political Innovation, and the co-author, with Harvard Business School professor Michael E. Porter, of “The Politics Industry: How Political Innovation Can Break Partisan Gridlock and Save Our Democracy” (2020). Gehl argues that if Americans want results, innovation, and accountability from our elected officials, then we need to first restructure House and Senate elections to change the incentives that elected officials face.

Kosar: Partisan primaries and first-past-the-post elections are commonplace in America. What is wrong with them?

Gehl: I think as most of us know, just because something is
commonplace doesn’t mean it is the best that we can do. We have come to expect
too little from our election system, which is to say that partisan primaries
and first-past-the-post elections do determine who wins. [T]he key problem with
these systems is the effect they have on what the winners have the freedom (or
not) to do once they are elected. And our election systems send our winners to
Washington DC with their hands tied behind their backs

[P]arty primary voters are more politically extreme on both sides
than voters who participate in the general election, that means our elected
officials have to, if they’re Republican, be concerned with being further to
the right, and if they’re Democrat, be concerned with being further to the left.
. . . [I]t is very hard in a country to legislate when the one thing that those
primary voters on both sides agree on is: “Whatever you do, don’t compromise
with the other half. Do not reach a consensus. Do not work with them. Do not
negotiate. Do not deal with these complex trade-offs to our complex problems.”

What’s so bad
about a system that produces two candidates who represent partisan extremes — a
“choice not an echo” to crib a phrase
from Phyllis Schlafly?

Choice is good. Two choices is not as good as more choices. . . . [In]
America, we have been champions of free market economy and representative
democracy. And we have seen the benefits of these twin systems over our history
and the leadership that we have had in the world as a result of how well these
systems complement each other. Right now, one half of this — our free market
system — continues to deliver innovation, results, and accountability. We don’t
have much of that in our political system because one way of looking at it is
that we have an anti-competitive market and unhealthy competition in our
political system.

Our problem is not “the Democrats” or “the Republicans.” Our
problem is not that we have only two choices, only two parties. Our problem is
that the current two choices are guaranteed to be the only two choices we have
ongoingly, regardless of what they do or don’t get done on behalf of the
country.

What is better than two is what we call in business the threat of
new entrants, this mechanism that pushes marketplaces to do better for
customers. We need this in our political system.

You advocate
adopting Final Five Voting to improve governance. How does it work?

Final Five Voting is the umbrella name for two simple changes to
our election system. The first change is: Let’s get rid of party primaries that
push people so far to these sides and that forbid them from working together.
Instead, we will have a single ballot primary, where all candidates, regardless
of party — Democrats, Republicans, Greens, Libertarians, Independents — run on
the same ballot, and all registered voters are eligible to participate whether
or not they’re registered with a party. You go to the polls on voting day, and
you see all your choices and you pick your favorite.

Now, the polls close, we count the votes, and in this system the
top five finishers will advance to the general election. There we have instant
runoff voting. So now when you go to the polls, you will see five candidates,
and you will indicate your preferences, and rank them one through five.

All the first choice votes are counted, and if one of these five
candidates has over 50% (a true majority), great. Election over. That person
won. But if the vote has been split and we don’t know who the majority of
people could agree on, then we begin a series of instant runoffs. The candidate
in last place is dropped, and voters who had selected that candidate, who is
out of the race, have their single vote transferred to their next choice who is
still in the race. And we do that until a candidate has a majority.

[The] purpose of Final Five Voting, which is this combination
between top five primaries and instant runoff general elections is not to
necessarily change who wins — although sometimes it will. The purpose is to
change what the winners have the freedom to do and are incentivized to do and
on whose behalf they are doing it.

Are any
cities or states trying Final Five or something close to it?

The state of Alaska has made Final Five not just a theory. It’s
real. In November 2020 when everyone else was paying attention to the other
elections that night, the Alaskan voters passed Final Four Voting. They passed
it for state elections and federal elections. Their first elections under Final
Four Voting will be held in November 2022.

Thank you, Katherine.

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