IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/wsi/apjorx/v23y2006i03ns0217595906000942.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Stochastic Dynamic Programming For Election Timing: A Game Theory Approach

Author

Listed:
  • DHARMA LESMONO

    (Department of Mathematics and, Advanced Computational Modelling Centre (ACMC), The University of Queensland, Brisbane Qld 4072, Australia;
    Department of Mathematics, Parahyangan Catholic University, Bandung 40141, Indonesia)

  • ELLIOT TONKES

    (CS Energy Ltd., GPO Box 769, Brisbane Qld 4001, Australia)

Abstract

In this paper, we consider dynamic programming for the election timing in the majoritarian parliamentary system such as in Australia, where the government has a constitutional right to call an early election. This right can give the government an advantage to remain in power for as long as possible by calling an election, when its popularity is high. On the other hand, the opposition's natural objective is to gain power, and it will apply controls termed as "boosts" to reduce the chance of the government being re-elected by introducing policy and economic responses. In this paper, we explore equilibrium solutions to the government, and the opposition strategies in a political game using stochastic dynamic programming. Results are given in terms of the expected remaining life in power, call and boost probabilities at each time at any level of popularity.

Suggested Citation

  • Dharma Lesmono & Elliot Tonkes, 2006. "Stochastic Dynamic Programming For Election Timing: A Game Theory Approach," Asia-Pacific Journal of Operational Research (APJOR), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 23(03), pages 287-309.
    • Handle: RePEc:wsi:apjorx:v:23:y:2006:i:03:n:s0217595906000942
    DOI: 10.1142/S0217595906000942
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.worldscientific.com/doi/abs/10.1142/S0217595906000942
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1142/S0217595906000942?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Enelow,James M. & Hinich,Melvin J., 1984. "The Spatial Theory of Voting," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521275156.
    2. Smith,Alastair, 2004. "Election Timing," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521833639.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Lesmono, Dharma & Tonkes, Elliot & Burrage, Kevin, 2009. "Opportunistic timing and manipulation in Australian Federal Elections," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 192(2), pages 677-691, January.
    2. Luigi Curini & Paolo Martelli, 2009. "Electoral Systems and Government Stability: A Simulation of 2006 Italian Policy Space," Czech Economic Review, Charles University Prague, Faculty of Social Sciences, Institute of Economic Studies, vol. 3(3), pages 305-322, October.
    3. Alan E. Wiseman, 2006. "A Theory of Partisan Support and Entry Deterrence in Electoral Competition," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 18(2), pages 123-158, April.
    4. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/eu4vqp9ompqllr09iepsg269m is not listed on IDEAS
    5. Jonathan Pool, 1992. "The Multilingual Election Problem," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 4(1), pages 31-52, January.
    6. Joseph Gershtenson, 2004. "Ideological Centrism and the Electoral Fortunes of U.S. Senate Candidates," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 85(2), pages 497-508, June.
    7. Mikael Gilljam, 1997. "Symposium. The Directional Theory of Issue Voting: I," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 9(1), pages 5-12, January.
    8. Kirchgassner, Gebhard, 2000. "Probabilistic Voting and Equilibrium: An Impossibility Result," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 103(1-2), pages 35-48, April.
    9. Daniela Giannetti & Itai Sened, 2004. "Party Competition and Coalition Formation," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 16(4), pages 483-515, October.
    10. Partha Gangopadhyay & Shyam Nath, 2001. "Bargaining, Coalitions and Local Expenditure," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 38(13), pages 2379-2391, December.
    11. Konstantinos Matakos & Orestis Troumpounis & Dimitrios Xefteris, 2015. "Turnout and Polarization Under Alternative Electoral Systems," Studies in Political Economy, in: Norman Schofield & Gonzalo Caballero (ed.), The Political Economy of Governance, edition 127, pages 335-362, Springer.
    12. Arianna Degan & Antonio Merlo, 2011. "A Structural Model Of Turnout And Voting In Multiple Elections," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 9(2), pages 209-245, April.
    13. Charles H. Stewart III, 1991. "The Politics of Tax Reform in the 1980s," NBER Chapters, in: Politics and Economics in the Eighties, pages 143-174, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Hervé Crès & M. Utku Ünver, 2010. "Ideology and Existence of 50%-Majority Equilibria in Multidimensional Spatial Voting Models," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 22(4), pages 431-444, October.
    15. Ladha, Krishna K., 1995. "Information pooling through majority-rule voting: Condorcet's jury theorem with correlated votes," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 26(3), pages 353-372, May.
    16. Witterblad, Mikael, 2008. "Essays on Redistribution and Local Public Expenditures," Umeå Economic Studies 731, Umeå University, Department of Economics.
    17. Torsten J. Selck, 2005. "Improving the Explanatory Power of Bargaining Models," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 17(3), pages 371-375, July.
    18. Sadiraj, V. & Tuinstra, J. & Winden, F. van, 2005. "On the size of the winning set in the presence of interest groups," CeNDEF Working Papers 05-08, Universiteit van Amsterdam, Center for Nonlinear Dynamics in Economics and Finance.
    19. Midori Hirokawa, 2003. "The Possibility of Issue‐Specific Decisions on Multiple Social Choice Issues," The Japanese Economic Review, Japanese Economic Association, vol. 54(1), pages 86-100, March.
    20. Eijffinger, Sylvester & Mahieu, Ronald & Raes, Louis, 2018. "Inferring hawks and doves from voting records," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 107-120.
    21. Bernard Steunenberg, 2010. "Is big brother watching? Commission oversight of the national implementation of EU directives," European Union Politics, , vol. 11(3), pages 359-380, September.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wsi:apjorx:v:23:y:2006:i:03:n:s0217595906000942. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Tai Tone Lim (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.worldscinet.com/apjor/apjor.shtml .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.