Delegates’ voting behaviour: Elusive, but just for Now
Greenwell Matchaya, PhD One of the most frustrating things for any investor is being unable to know the possible returns of his/her investment with some level of certainty. Similarly, for a political investor/politician it can be frustrating to devout so much effort in a competition where the voter behaviour is unknown, because doing so would easily lead to wastage of resources or in other words, would limit gains per dollar invested. While voter behaviour is complex and often elusive, when the same or similar voters vote for candidates over a number of times, it is easier to demystify their behaviour. Using known techniques of analysis often taught in elementary statistics, econometrics and mathematics classes, it is possible to study the patterns and derive generalizations or even “theorems” around such behaviour. With advances in machine learning and AI in general, and a good understanding of physiology, sociology, one can torture data or even create some and predict fut