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(Don’t) Make My Vote Count

Author

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  • Marco Faravelli

    (School of Economics, University of Queensland, Australia)

  • Santiago Sanchez-Pages

    (Department of Economic Theory, University of Barcelona, Spain
    School of Economics, University of Edinburgh, UK)

Abstract

Proponents of proportional electoral rules often argue that majority rule depresses turnout and may lower welfare due to the ‘tyranny of the majority’ problem. The present paper studies the impact of electoral rules on turnout and social welfare. We analyze a model of instrumental voting where citizens have private information over their individual cost of voting and over the alternative they prefer. The electoral rule used to select the winning alternative is a combination of majority rule and proportional rule. Results show that the above arguments against majority rule do not hold in this set up. Social welfare and turnout increase with the weight that the electoral rule gives to majority rule in a close election, while they are independent of the electoral rule when the expected size of the minority tends to zero. However, more proportional rules can increase turnout within the minority group; this effect is stronger the smaller the minority group. We provide a general version of the competition effect, i.e. that turnout in close elections is higher than in biased elections, independently of the systems adopted in the two cases.

Suggested Citation

  • Marco Faravelli & Santiago Sanchez-Pages, 2015. "(Don’t) Make My Vote Count," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 27(4), pages 544-569, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:jothpo:v:27:y:2015:i:4:p:544-569
    DOI: 10.1177/0951629814556174
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    Cited by:

    1. Marco Faravelli & Priscilla Man & Bang Dinh Nguyen, 2016. "Welfare comparison of electoral systems under power sharing," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 47(2), pages 413-429, August.
    2. Alejandro Saporiti, 2014. "Power sharing and electoral equilibrium," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 55(3), pages 705-729, April.
    3. Faravelli, Marco & Man, Priscilla & Walsh, Randall, 2015. "Mandate and paternalism: A theory of large elections," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 93(C), pages 1-23.
    4. Herrera, Helios & Llorente-Saguer, Aniol & McMurray, Joseph C., 2019. "Information aggregation and turnout in proportional representation: A laboratory experiment," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 179(C).

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