Partisan gerrymandering with geographically compact districts

DOI10.1017/JPR.2018.70MaRDI QIDQ4611268zbMATH OpenOpenAlexWikidataFDO

Authors Boris Alexeev, Dustin G. Mixon

Publication date 17 January 2019

Published in Journal of Applied Probability (Search for Journal in Brave)

Full work available at URL https://arxiv.org/abs/1712.05390

zbMATH Keywords

gerrymanderingBrownian motion

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Sums of independent random variables; random walks (60G50) Brownian motion (60J65)

Abstract: Bizarrely shaped voting districts are frequently lambasted as likely instances of gerrymandering. In order to systematically identify such instances, researchers have devised several tests for so-called geographic compactness (i.e., shape niceness). We demonstrate that under certain conditions, a party can gerrymander a competitive state into geographically compact districts to win an average of over 70% of the districts. Our results suggest that geometric features alone may fail to adequately combat partisan gerrymandering.

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Cites work

• scientific article; zbMATH DE number 3863589 (Why is no real title available?)
• scientific article; zbMATH DE number 942202 (Why is no real title available?)
• A formula goes to court: partisan gerrymandering and the efficiency gap
• Gerrymandering, sandwiches, and topology
• On the trivariate joint distribution of Brownian motion and its maximum and minimum

Cited in

(11)

• Explainer: compactness, by the numbers
• A formula goes to court: partisan gerrymandering and the efficiency gap
• Gerrymandering in a hierarchical legislature
• Redistricting and district compactness
• The self-limiting partisan gerrymander: an optimization approach
• Measuring legislative boundaries
• An impossibility theorem for gerrymandering
• Fair redistricting is hard
• Gerrymandering, sandwiches, and topology
• Gerrymandering and Convexity
• ELECTORAL MALDISTRICTING

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