Applying Math in the Political Sphere

Proper voter representation has been a hotly debated topic since the birth of our country. This is largely due to the historic difficulties in quantifying improper representation. Recently, however, a new approach has been able to perform such an analysis successfully. The efficiency gap is a revolutionary mechanism for detecting the unconstitutional act of partisan gerrymandering through a simple mathematical calculation.

In order to understand the efficiency gap, one must first understand what it helps combat. Partisan gerrymandering is defined by the NCSL (National Conference of State Legislatures) as “The drawing of electoral district lines in a manner that discriminates against a political party.” Manipulating a district in favor of one party can sway a state one way or the other. This is achieved through one of two techniques: “packing” or “cracking.” In the former, districts that tend to vote strongly one way are redrawn by the opposing party to include even more votes in favor of the single side. This seems counterintuitive. However, by doing so, the opposing party is actually “wasting” the votes of their rivals because the newly included votes are not able to influence the outcome of other districts. The second technique, cracking, also wastes votes. It does the opposite of packing and divides voters of a party to prevent them from fully influencing the electoral outcome.

The common denominator between the use of these gerrymandering techniques is the number of wasted votes. This is exactly what determines the efficiency gap. Wasted votes are any non contributing votes in a win, as produced in packing, or any votes for a losing candidate, as produced in cracking. For example, if there is a district in which 150 people vote for Party A and 100 people vote for Party B, the 24 “extra” votes for Party A not necessary for the victory would be considered wasted. Similarly, since Party B did not win this district, all of the votes for Party B would also be considered wasted. To find the efficiency gap measurement, all of the wasted votes in a state for each party are added up. The difference of the wasted vote totals between the two parties is then divided by the total number of votes. If this percentage exceeds 8 percent, then it is evidence of partisan gerrymandering. The flaw with this system is the grey area between the illegal act of gerrymandering and legitimate policies.

The Supreme Court deemed the practice of gerrymandering to be unconstitutional in a 1986 case when Indiana’s 1981 apportionment plan was challenged on the grounds of diluting Democratic votes. Although this David vs. Bandemer case is thirty years behind us, gerrymandering has and will continue to be employed. The advent of the efficiency gap, however, offers a quantification of the practice and thus a tool to combat it. Although the Supreme Court has not yet adopted the implementation of the efficiency gap, this measurement has the potential to prevent gerrymandering down the road and to make the election process more fair.