Witnesses have these jobs:
- Create blocks
- Don't attack the network
- Set some variables eg. HBD interest rate
A 51% attack is not the only way to disrupt the network. It is the most damaging and widely understood attack, but not the only one that a witness or multiple witnesses can do. Other attacks could be, for example, to produce empty blocks thus damaging network performance, or to produce bloated, complex blocks thus increasing the cost of running a node for other witnesses.
Fewer votes per stakeholder reduces the threshold for a malicious actor or a group of malicious actors to be able to elect a minority of malicious witnesses, who could engage in attacks like mentioned above.
There is no malicious stakeholder in an anti-fragile system. And you don't need a 51% attack you just need an effective amount of stake, which is currently rather ~5-10%. How many of the Top20 witnesses are not voted for by Blocktrades: Zero.
At fist I thought you're joking, but it seems you don't. So let me put this straight. "Don't attack the network" has to be excluded from this list logically, because it's too vague. Those attacks, if cost effective, are mostly attacks on Apps directly or SPOCs in the nodes.
As soon as you fight back against what you call "malicious actor", you have made two mistakes already:
Maybe tune into Community Token Talk from time to time. Dan is the best person to explain things like this. He's a decentralization wizard.
I don't even get the logic behind this, the system needs to penetrable and anti-fragile to not get captured from the inside.
We have some wonderful witnesses here on chain for sure, but let me tell you, even if I mostly do, not everyone does agree with them.