they may not vote for that candidate (but they will rank the other candidates)

This is a highly problematic stipulation. A voter could be accused of tactically voting for the "weakest" candidate, so that the "strongest" competitor of his/her candidate of interest has less chance of succeeding.

A system that tries to tackle that allegation, used for example in German academia, is single elimination in an exhaustive ballot (which ultimately also produces a ranked list if you exclude instant winning by overall majority). As long as the candidate of interest is still in the race, the person that declared a conflict of interest may not take part in a voting round. Only after his/her elimination, the member may return to the table.

All in all, having a committee member with a conflict of interest is always a perilous situation. Currently, there is a prominent case involving the district mayor of Berlin Mitte. For a senior position in the district administration, the mayor took part in the selection committee, despite one of the candidates being a close affiliate, and the mayor himself declaring a conflict of interest. The mayor did not issue any opinion about his friend, but otherwise took part in the proceedings. In the end, said friend was selected for the position. Promptly, a competitor sued the district, accusing the mayor to have worked against him.

(The press articles originally detailing the case are unfortunately behind a pay wall.)

The whole case came to prominence because of what happened afterwards, and which is not strictly related: The mayor tried to placate the competitor with a compensation payment in exchange for withdrawing the legal complaint. While this is a common occurrence in German labor law when private companies are involved, a public administration might not be able to act this way (at least the district lawyers ruled it out in this case, citing budgetary restrictions). Then allegedly the mayor offered to pay the compensation from his private money (he denies this, but accepts that a message could be misunderstood). He lost the political support by most parties in the district council, including his own, and is expected to be voted out of office tomorrow.

I have some friends who are members of the mayor's party district organisation. Asked about the affair, what annoyed them most was that, after declaring the conflict, he did not make it his top priority to avoid any impression of nepotism. They would have expected him to withdraw completely from the committee.

From a public point of view, a formally "fair" process might not be enough. As long as the accusation of favoritism can be made, true or not, proceedings remain vulnerable.

they may not vote for that candidate (but they will rank the other candidates)

This is a highly problematic stipulation. A voter could be accused of tactically voting for the "weakest" candidate, so that the "strongest" competitor of his/her candidate of interest has less chance of succeeding.

A system that tries to tackle that allegation, used for example in German academia, is single elimination in an exhaustive ballot (which ultimately also produces a ranked list if you exclude instant winning by overall majority). As long as the candidate of interest is still in the race, the person that declared a conflict of interest may not take part in a voting round. Only after his/her elimination, the member may return to the table.

All in all, having a committee member with a conflict of interest is always a perilous situation. Currently, there is a prominent case involving the district mayor of Berlin Mitte. For a senior position in the district administration, the mayor took part in the selection committee, despite one of the candidates being a close affiliate, and the mayor himself declaring a conflict of interest. The mayor did not issue any opinion about his friend, but otherwise took part in the proceedings. In the end, said friend was selected for the position. Promptly, a competitor sued the district, accusing the mayor to have worked against him.

(The press articles originally detailing the case are unfortunately behind a pay wall.)

The whole case came to prominence because of what happened afterwards, and which is not strictly related: The mayor tried to placate the competitor with a compensation payment in exchange for withdrawing the legal complaint. While this is a common occurrence in German labor law when private companies are involved, a public administration might not be able to act this way (at least the district lawyers ruled it out in this case, citing budgetary restrictions). Then allegedly the mayor offered to pay the compensation from his private money (he denies this, but accepts that a message could be misunderstood). He lost the political support by most parties in the district council, including his own, and was voted out of office.

I have some friends who are members of the mayor's party district organisation. Asked about the affair, what annoyed them most was that, after declaring the conflict, he did not make it his top priority to avoid any impression of nepotism. They would have expected him to withdraw completely from the committee.

From a public point of view, a formally "fair" process might not be enough. As long as the accusation of favoritism can be made, true or not, proceedings remain vulnerable.

they may not vote for that candidate (but they will rank the other candidates)

This is a highly problematic stipulation. A voter could be accused of tactically voting for the "weakest" candididate, so that the "strongest" competitor of of his/her candidate of interest has less chance of succceeding.

A system that tries to tackle that allegation, used for example in German academia, is single elimination in an exhaustive ballot (which ultimately also produces a ranked list if you exclude instant winning by overall majority). As long as the candidate of interest is still in the race, the person that declared a conflict of interest may not take part in a voting round. Only after his/her elimination, the member may return to the table.

All in all, having a committee member with a conflict of interest is always a perilous situation. Currently, there is a prominent case involving the district mayor of Berlin Mitte. For a senior position in the district administration, the mayor took part in the selection committee, despite one of the candidates being a close affiliate, and the mayor himself declaring a conflict of interest. The mayor did not issue any opinion about his friend, but otherwise took part in the proceedings. In the end, said friend was selected for the position. Promptly, a competitor sued the district, accusing the mayor to have worked against him.

(The press articles originally detailing the case are unfortunately behind a pay wall.)

The whole case came to prominence because of what happened afterwards, and which is not strictly related: The mayor tried to placate the competitor with a compensation payment in exchange for withdrawing the legal complaint. While this is a common occurence in German labor law when private companies are involved, a public administration might not be able to act this way (at least the district lawyers ruled it out in this case, citing budgetary restrictions). Then allegedly the mayor offered to pay the compensation from his private money (he denies this, but accepts that a message could be misunderstood). He lost the political support by most parties in the district council, including his own, and is expected to be voted out of office tomorrow.

I have some friends who are members of the mayor's party district organisation. Asked about the affair, what annoyed them most was that, after declaring the conflict, he did not make it his top priority to avoid any impression of nepotism. They would have expected him to withdraw completely from the committee.

From a public point of view, a formally "fair" process might not be enough. As long as the accusation of favoritism can be made, true or not, proceedings remain vulnerable.

they may not vote for that candidate (but they will rank the other candidates)

This is a highly problematic stipulation. A voter could be accused of tactically voting for the "weakest" candidate, so that the "strongest" competitor of his/her candidate of interest has less chance of succeeding.

A system that tries to tackle that allegation, used for example in German academia, is single elimination in an exhaustive ballot (which ultimately also produces a ranked list if you exclude instant winning by overall majority). As long as the candidate of interest is still in the race, the person that declared a conflict of interest may not take part in a voting round. Only after his/her elimination, the member may return to the table.

All in all, having a committee member with a conflict of interest is always a perilous situation. Currently, there is a prominent case involving the district mayor of Berlin Mitte. For a senior position in the district administration, the mayor took part in the selection committee, despite one of the candidates being a close affiliate, and the mayor himself declaring a conflict of interest. The mayor did not issue any opinion about his friend, but otherwise took part in the proceedings. In the end, said friend was selected for the position. Promptly, a competitor sued the district, accusing the mayor to have worked against him.

(The press articles originally detailing the case are unfortunately behind a pay wall.)

The whole case came to prominence because of what happened afterwards, and which is not strictly related: The mayor tried to placate the competitor with a compensation payment in exchange for withdrawing the legal complaint. While this is a common occurrence in German labor law when private companies are involved, a public administration might not be able to act this way (at least the district lawyers ruled it out in this case, citing budgetary restrictions). Then allegedly the mayor offered to pay the compensation from his private money (he denies this, but accepts that a message could be misunderstood). He lost the political support by most parties in the district council, including his own, and is expected to be voted out of office tomorrow.

I have some friends who are members of the mayor's party district organisation. Asked about the affair, what annoyed them most was that, after declaring the conflict, he did not make it his top priority to avoid any impression of nepotism. They would have expected him to withdraw completely from the committee.

From a public point of view, a formally "fair" process might not be enough. As long as the accusation of favoritism can be made, true or not, proceedings remain vulnerable.