Strategic voting advocates go door to door in key ridings

There's always talk of strategic voting before an election.

And with Oct. 19quickly approaching,websites such asStrategicVoting.ca and VoteTogether.ca are encouraging Canadians in key ridings to vote not for their preferred candidate but for whoever stands the best chance of defeating the Tories.

Both sites say their online traffic is spiking.

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However, traffic is only part of the plan forVoteTogether.ca.

Whereas most strategicvotingwebsitesonlyprovide information, generallyabout which ridings may be close enough for strategic voting to matter,VoteTogether.ca is taking things a stepfurther this electionby going door to door,informing othershow to vote strategically.

"This is the first time we've hadfieldorganizers,"saidAmaraPossian, a Toronto resident and organizerwithLeadNow, the activist group behind the site. During previous elections the group has organized one-off events, but nothing ongoing.

I didn't vote for a winning MP,ever.HishamAbdel-Rahman

"There's anywhere from 10 to 250 people out knocking on doors during a shift. They're happening in11 targeted ridings," across Canada, she said.

"We have2,682 people whichare part of our virtual phone bank. They make phone calls from home into our target swing ridings."

Possiansaid the group hascrowdfundedmore than $100,000 which has been used tocommission polls throughEnvironics. Its operating costs are covered by more than 2,000 monthly donors.

Along with many otherstrategic voting sites,VoteTogether.cawould like to see electoral reform, shifting Canada froma first-past-the-post system to one incorporatingproportional representation.

The Liberal Party, the NDPand the Green Party have all made some sort of commitmentto change the current electoral system, which seesthe governing party chosen by how many ridings it wins, not by the overall percentage of votes it receives.

"We've put in a countless amount of time into the site," saidPossian."I hope we haveelectoral reform so that we don't have to do this again."

StrategicVoting.castarted in 2008but did not participate in the 2011 vote. Itre-launched in late August to cover thiselection.

It's the brainchild of Calgary resident and information technology engineer, Hisham Abdel-Rahman, who lives in the riding of Calgary Rocky Ridge.

Over the years, Abdel-Rahman,42, has dutifully shown up at the polls and voted for every shadeof party other than blue. So far, he's had no luck.

"I didn't vote for a winning MP,ever," he told CBC News.

'Sketchy and non-scientific'

Not everyone agrees with the concept of strategic voting.

"It concerns me because it brings voters not to vote with their conviction, but rather with a calculation,"saidAntoniaMaioni, a professor of political science atMcGillUniversity, on CBC Radio'sAs It Happens. "I think that's a very sketchy and non-scientific way of thinking about voting."

"I can't imagine that voting with conviction is a wasted vote, even if it doesn't translate into your exact preference outside the ballot box."

Jean-FranoisDaoust, a researcher atthe University of Montreal's department of political science who has studied strategic voting as part of his doctoral work, told CBC that"ifyou identify with a political party, you're twice less likely to vote strategically.

"Also, if people take a clear stance on an issue, like theniqab, they're also less likely to vote strategically."