Editing Vote pairing (section)

{{short description |When two people commit to voting in a mutually agreed way}}
{{about |the strategic voting practice |the procedure by which legislators allow votes to "cancel out" |Pair (parliamentary convention) |the trading of votes on bills between legislators |Vote trading |the category of electoral systems that operate by pairwise comparison |Round-robin voting}}
{{voting}}
'''Vote swapping''', also called '''co-voting''' or '''vote pairing''' or '''vote trading''', is an informal strategic agreement between two voters to "exchange" their votes, in order to [[Tactical voting|vote tactically]] and maximize the chances that their preferred candidates will win election. Vote swapping avoids [[Wasted vote|wasted votes]] (and the "[[spoiler effect]]") by shifting votes from uncompetitive districts to competitive districts.

In a vote swapping agreement, Voter 1 in District A commits to vote for Voter 2's preferred candidate in District A, and Voter 2 in District B commits to vote for Voter 1's preferred candidate in District B.

For example, consider [[elections in the United Kingdom]]: In constituency A, the race is tight between a [[Labour Party (UK)|Labour]] and a [[Conservative Party (UK)|Conservative]] candidate. In constituency B, the race is tight between a [[Liberal Democrats (UK)|Liberal Democrat]] and a Conservative candidate. A Liberal Democrat voter in constituency A would agree to vote Labour, and in exchange, a Labour voter in constituency B would agree to vote Liberal Democrat. This makes it more likely for either Labour or the Liberal Democrats to win that seat from the Conservatives.

In the [[United States]], [[United Kingdom]], and [[Canada]], the process has been subjected to legal challenge and been deemed legal.