Author: Thomas Schwartz
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1316853233
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 176
Book Description
The centuries-old paradox of voting is that majorities sometimes prefer x to y, y to z, and z to x - a cycle. The discovery of the sources and consequences of such cycles, under majority rule and countless other regimes, constitutes much of the mathematical theory of voting and social choice. This book explores the big questions posed by the paradox of voting: positive questions about how to predict outcomes and explain observed stability, and normative questions about how to hold elections, how to take account of preference intensities, the relevance of social welfare to social choice, and challenges to formal 'rationality', individual and social. The overall lesson is that cycles are facts, ubiquitous, and consequential in non-obvious ways, not puzzles to be solved, much less maladies or misfortunes to be avoided or regretted.
Cycles and Social Choice
Author: Thomas Schwartz
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1316853233
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 176
Book Description
The centuries-old paradox of voting is that majorities sometimes prefer x to y, y to z, and z to x - a cycle. The discovery of the sources and consequences of such cycles, under majority rule and countless other regimes, constitutes much of the mathematical theory of voting and social choice. This book explores the big questions posed by the paradox of voting: positive questions about how to predict outcomes and explain observed stability, and normative questions about how to hold elections, how to take account of preference intensities, the relevance of social welfare to social choice, and challenges to formal 'rationality', individual and social. The overall lesson is that cycles are facts, ubiquitous, and consequential in non-obvious ways, not puzzles to be solved, much less maladies or misfortunes to be avoided or regretted.
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1316853233
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 176
Book Description
The centuries-old paradox of voting is that majorities sometimes prefer x to y, y to z, and z to x - a cycle. The discovery of the sources and consequences of such cycles, under majority rule and countless other regimes, constitutes much of the mathematical theory of voting and social choice. This book explores the big questions posed by the paradox of voting: positive questions about how to predict outcomes and explain observed stability, and normative questions about how to hold elections, how to take account of preference intensities, the relevance of social welfare to social choice, and challenges to formal 'rationality', individual and social. The overall lesson is that cycles are facts, ubiquitous, and consequential in non-obvious ways, not puzzles to be solved, much less maladies or misfortunes to be avoided or regretted.
Social Choice and Democracy
Author: Norman J. Schofield
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 9783642705984
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 0
Book Description
The mathematical theory of voting has intellectual roots extending back two centuries to the writings of Borda and Condorcet. Yet it has only been in the last forty years that general theorems have begun to emerge. With the publication of this volume, Norman Schofield brings the results together in a ,common framework. SOCIAL CHOICE AND DEMOCRACY, however, is not merely a synthetic exercise, for Schofield's own work over the last decade has constituted a major initiative in deepening and' broadening our general understanding of voting arrangements. At last the results of his research, bits and pieces of which have been reported in a number of journals of international standing and in various collections, are coherently and systematically presented as an entirety. For students of democracy -- chiefly philosophers and political scientists, but increasingly economists as well -- the insights of this volume are profound. From it I infer the following.
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 9783642705984
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 0
Book Description
The mathematical theory of voting has intellectual roots extending back two centuries to the writings of Borda and Condorcet. Yet it has only been in the last forty years that general theorems have begun to emerge. With the publication of this volume, Norman Schofield brings the results together in a ,common framework. SOCIAL CHOICE AND DEMOCRACY, however, is not merely a synthetic exercise, for Schofield's own work over the last decade has constituted a major initiative in deepening and' broadening our general understanding of voting arrangements. At last the results of his research, bits and pieces of which have been reported in a number of journals of international standing and in various collections, are coherently and systematically presented as an entirety. For students of democracy -- chiefly philosophers and political scientists, but increasingly economists as well -- the insights of this volume are profound. From it I infer the following.
Welfare Economics and Social Choice Theory
Author: Allan M. Feldman
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 038729368X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 401
Book Description
This book covers the main topics of welfare economics — general equilibrium models of exchange and production, Pareto optimality, un certainty, externalities and public goods — and some of the major topics of social choice theory — compensation criteria, fairness, voting. Arrow's Theorem, and the theory of implementation. The underlying question is this: "Is a particular economic or voting mechanism good or bad for society?" Welfare economics is mainly about whether the market mechanism is good or bad; social choice is largely about whether voting mechanisms, or other more abstract mechanisms, can improve upon the results of the market. This second edition updates the material of the first, written by Allan Feldman. It incorporates new sections to existing first-edition chapters, and it includes several new ones. Chapters 4, 6, 11, 15 and 16 are new, added in this edition. The first edition of the book grew out of an undergraduate welfare economics course at Brown University. The book is intended for the undergraduate student who has some prior familiarity with microeconomics. However, the book is also useful for graduate students and professionals, economists and non-economists, who want an overview of welfare and social choice results unburdened by detail and mathematical complexity. Welfare economics and social choice both probably suffer from ex cessively technical treatments in professional journals and monographs.
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 038729368X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 401
Book Description
This book covers the main topics of welfare economics — general equilibrium models of exchange and production, Pareto optimality, un certainty, externalities and public goods — and some of the major topics of social choice theory — compensation criteria, fairness, voting. Arrow's Theorem, and the theory of implementation. The underlying question is this: "Is a particular economic or voting mechanism good or bad for society?" Welfare economics is mainly about whether the market mechanism is good or bad; social choice is largely about whether voting mechanisms, or other more abstract mechanisms, can improve upon the results of the market. This second edition updates the material of the first, written by Allan Feldman. It incorporates new sections to existing first-edition chapters, and it includes several new ones. Chapters 4, 6, 11, 15 and 16 are new, added in this edition. The first edition of the book grew out of an undergraduate welfare economics course at Brown University. The book is intended for the undergraduate student who has some prior familiarity with microeconomics. However, the book is also useful for graduate students and professionals, economists and non-economists, who want an overview of welfare and social choice results unburdened by detail and mathematical complexity. Welfare economics and social choice both probably suffer from ex cessively technical treatments in professional journals and monographs.
Behavioral Social Choice
Author: Michel Regenwetter
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 0521829682
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 21
Book Description
Behavioral Social Choice looks at the probabilistic foundations of collective decision-making rules. The authors challenge much of the existing theoretical wisdom about social choice processes, and seek to restore faith in the possibility of democratic decision-making. In particular, they argue that worries about the supposed prevalence of majority rule cycles that would preclude groups from reaching a final decision about what alternative they prefer have been greatly overstated. In practice, majority rule can be expected to work well in most real-world settings. They provide new insights into how alternative model specifications can change our estimates of social orderings.
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 0521829682
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 21
Book Description
Behavioral Social Choice looks at the probabilistic foundations of collective decision-making rules. The authors challenge much of the existing theoretical wisdom about social choice processes, and seek to restore faith in the possibility of democratic decision-making. In particular, they argue that worries about the supposed prevalence of majority rule cycles that would preclude groups from reaching a final decision about what alternative they prefer have been greatly overstated. In practice, majority rule can be expected to work well in most real-world settings. They provide new insights into how alternative model specifications can change our estimates of social orderings.
Majority Decisions
Author: Stéphanie Novak
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1107054095
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 271
Book Description
This book presents the most complete set of analytical, normative, and historical discussions of majority decision making to date. One chapter critically addresses the social-choice approach to majority decisions, whereas another presents an alternative to that approach. Extensive case studies discuss majority voting in the choice of religion in early modern Switzerland, majority voting in nested assemblies such as the French Estates-General and the Federal Convention, majority voting in federally organized countries, qualified majority voting in the European Union Council of Ministers, and majority voting on juries. Other chapters address the relation between majority decisions and cognitive diversity, the causal origin of majority decisions, and the pathologies of majority decision making. Two chapters, finally, discuss the counter-majoritarian role of courts that exercise judicial review. The editorial Introduction surveys conceptual, causal, and normative issues that arise in the theory and practice of majority decisions.
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1107054095
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 271
Book Description
This book presents the most complete set of analytical, normative, and historical discussions of majority decision making to date. One chapter critically addresses the social-choice approach to majority decisions, whereas another presents an alternative to that approach. Extensive case studies discuss majority voting in the choice of religion in early modern Switzerland, majority voting in nested assemblies such as the French Estates-General and the Federal Convention, majority voting in federally organized countries, qualified majority voting in the European Union Council of Ministers, and majority voting on juries. Other chapters address the relation between majority decisions and cognitive diversity, the causal origin of majority decisions, and the pathologies of majority decision making. Two chapters, finally, discuss the counter-majoritarian role of courts that exercise judicial review. The editorial Introduction surveys conceptual, causal, and normative issues that arise in the theory and practice of majority decisions.
Trends in Computational Social Choice
Author: Ulle Endriss
Publisher: Lulu.com
ISBN: 1326912097
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 424
Book Description
Computational social choice is concerned with the design and analysis of methods for collective decision making. It is a research area that is located at the interface of computer science and economics. The central question studied in computational social choice is that of how best to aggregate the individual points of view of several agents, so as to arrive at a reasonable compromise. Examples include tallying the votes cast in an election, aggregating the professional opinions of several experts, and finding a fair manner of dividing a set of resources amongst the members of a group -- Back cover.
Publisher: Lulu.com
ISBN: 1326912097
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 424
Book Description
Computational social choice is concerned with the design and analysis of methods for collective decision making. It is a research area that is located at the interface of computer science and economics. The central question studied in computational social choice is that of how best to aggregate the individual points of view of several agents, so as to arrive at a reasonable compromise. Examples include tallying the votes cast in an election, aggregating the professional opinions of several experts, and finding a fair manner of dividing a set of resources amongst the members of a group -- Back cover.
Political Economy, Growth, and Business Cycles
Author: Alex Cukierman
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 9780262031943
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 430
Book Description
These original contributions by some of today's leading macroeconomists and political economists explore a broad spectrum of social, political, and technological variables that encourage or impede economic growth. What political and economic factors stimulate growth and make an economy expand? These original contributions by some of today's leading macroeconomists and political economists explore a broad spectrum of social, political, and technological variables that encourage or impede economic growth. Topics range from economic reform and price flexibility to the economic effects of political coups and include both theoretical analysis and empirical results.During the past decade, economists have seen important new developments linking growth and business cycles to government policy. These contributions provide a clear understanding of these processes and their effect in shaping economic policy. They look at the welfare side of economics and offer strong economic models to explain the connection between social policies and economic growth. For example, John Londregan and Keith Poole address the economic effects of political coups, Torsten Persson and Guido Tabellini explore the question of whether inequality is harmful for growth, and Stephen Parente and Edward Prescott look at the role of technology adoption in stimulating growth.The essays cover a wide range of approaches. Several focus on the interaction between growth and the choice of policy, where policy reacts to economic and distributional considerations through a majority rule process. Others take the policy as given and focus on the empirical estimation of the speed of convergence of rates of growth across states and regions and the importance of externalities and knowledge spillovers for rates of growth. Essays about the business cycle fall into two broad categories. One, arising from the new political economy tradition, examines the effects of elections and price decontrols on the business cycle. The other explores the implications of optimal economic policies in a representative agent framework for the cyclical behavior of the economy.
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 9780262031943
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 430
Book Description
These original contributions by some of today's leading macroeconomists and political economists explore a broad spectrum of social, political, and technological variables that encourage or impede economic growth. What political and economic factors stimulate growth and make an economy expand? These original contributions by some of today's leading macroeconomists and political economists explore a broad spectrum of social, political, and technological variables that encourage or impede economic growth. Topics range from economic reform and price flexibility to the economic effects of political coups and include both theoretical analysis and empirical results.During the past decade, economists have seen important new developments linking growth and business cycles to government policy. These contributions provide a clear understanding of these processes and their effect in shaping economic policy. They look at the welfare side of economics and offer strong economic models to explain the connection between social policies and economic growth. For example, John Londregan and Keith Poole address the economic effects of political coups, Torsten Persson and Guido Tabellini explore the question of whether inequality is harmful for growth, and Stephen Parente and Edward Prescott look at the role of technology adoption in stimulating growth.The essays cover a wide range of approaches. Several focus on the interaction between growth and the choice of policy, where policy reacts to economic and distributional considerations through a majority rule process. Others take the policy as given and focus on the empirical estimation of the speed of convergence of rates of growth across states and regions and the importance of externalities and knowledge spillovers for rates of growth. Essays about the business cycle fall into two broad categories. One, arising from the new political economy tradition, examines the effects of elections and price decontrols on the business cycle. The other explores the implications of optimal economic policies in a representative agent framework for the cyclical behavior of the economy.
Political Cycles and the Macroeconomy
Author: Alberto Alesina
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 9780262510943
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 322
Book Description
This book examines how electoral laws, the timing of election, the ideological orientation of governments, and the nature of competition between political parties influence unemployment, economic growth, inflation, and monetary and fiscal policy. The book presents both a thorough overview of the theoretical literature and a vast amount of empirical evidence.
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 9780262510943
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 322
Book Description
This book examines how electoral laws, the timing of election, the ideological orientation of governments, and the nature of competition between political parties influence unemployment, economic growth, inflation, and monetary and fiscal policy. The book presents both a thorough overview of the theoretical literature and a vast amount of empirical evidence.
The Theory of Social Choice
Author: Peter C. Fishburn
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 1400868335
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 277
Book Description
One fundamental premise of democratic theory is that social policy, group choice, or collective action should be based on the preferences of the individuals in the society, group, or collective. Using the tools of formal mathematical analysis, Peter C. Fishburn explores and defines the conditions for social choice and methods for synthesizing individuals' preferences. This study is unique in its emphasis on social choice functions, the general position that individual indifference may not be transitive, and the use of certain mathematics such as linear algebra. The text is divided into three main parts: social choice between two alternatives, which examines a variety of majority-like functions; simple majority social choice, which focuses on social choice among many alternatives when two-element feasible subset choices are based on simple majority; and a general study of aspects and types of social choice functions for many alternatives. Originally published in 1973. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 1400868335
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 277
Book Description
One fundamental premise of democratic theory is that social policy, group choice, or collective action should be based on the preferences of the individuals in the society, group, or collective. Using the tools of formal mathematical analysis, Peter C. Fishburn explores and defines the conditions for social choice and methods for synthesizing individuals' preferences. This study is unique in its emphasis on social choice functions, the general position that individual indifference may not be transitive, and the use of certain mathematics such as linear algebra. The text is divided into three main parts: social choice between two alternatives, which examines a variety of majority-like functions; simple majority social choice, which focuses on social choice among many alternatives when two-element feasible subset choices are based on simple majority; and a general study of aspects and types of social choice functions for many alternatives. Originally published in 1973. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.
Pathologies of Rational Choice Theory
Author: Donald Green
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 0300187084
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 415
Book Description
This is the first comprehensive critical evaluation of the use of rational choice theory in political science. Writing in an accessible and nontechnical style, Donald P. Green and Ian Shapiro assess rational choice theory where it is reputed to be most successful: the study of collective action, the behavior of political parties and politicians, and such phenomena as voting cycles and Prisoner's Dilemmas. In their hard-hitting critique, Green and Shapiro demonstrate that the much heralded achievements of rational choice theory are in fact deeply suspect and that fundamental rethinking is needed if rational choice theorists are to contribute to the understanding of politics. In their final chapters, they anticipate and respond to a variety of possible rational choice responses to their arguments, thereby initiating a dialogue that is bound to continue for some time.
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 0300187084
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 415
Book Description
This is the first comprehensive critical evaluation of the use of rational choice theory in political science. Writing in an accessible and nontechnical style, Donald P. Green and Ian Shapiro assess rational choice theory where it is reputed to be most successful: the study of collective action, the behavior of political parties and politicians, and such phenomena as voting cycles and Prisoner's Dilemmas. In their hard-hitting critique, Green and Shapiro demonstrate that the much heralded achievements of rational choice theory are in fact deeply suspect and that fundamental rethinking is needed if rational choice theorists are to contribute to the understanding of politics. In their final chapters, they anticipate and respond to a variety of possible rational choice responses to their arguments, thereby initiating a dialogue that is bound to continue for some time.