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Consensus-building in Electoral Competitions: Evidence from Papal Elections

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  • Maxime Menuet

    (LEO UMR 7322)

Abstract

Papal elections are outstanding grounds to study consensus-building in an electoral competition. In contrast to standard two-round elections, the conclave lasts until a candidate receives the two-thirds of votes. In this paper, we argue that this election process can be viewed as a "war of attrition" between two fractions: the "conservatives" and the "progressives". We show that the duration of conclaves positively depends on the political polarization of the College of Cardinals. This result is consistent with empirical evidences. Through an original data set, we show that the duration of conclaves show an upward trend with respect to a polarization parameter.

Suggested Citation

  • Maxime Menuet, 2017. "Consensus-building in Electoral Competitions: Evidence from Papal Elections," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 37(4), pages 2826-2834.
    • Handle: RePEc:ebl:ecbull:eb-17-00816
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    References listed on IDEAS

    as
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Pope; Papal Conclave; Election; War of attrition;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D7 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making
    • C7 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory

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