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Voting Systems, Honest Preferences and Pareto Optimality

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  • Zeckhauser, Richard

Abstract

The market is a decentralized system that can bring about efficient economic decisions. This paper examines whether social choice mechanisms can duplicate this success in the political arena. The famed Arrow result tells us centralized systems cannot achieve efficient, nondictatorial outcomes unless they rely on cardinal preferences. With decentralization, efficiency comes to require something more: the truthful revelation of preferences. Schemes that elicit honest preferences are derived here. By their very structure they are shown to lead to inefficient outcomes. This negative result leads to the question whether the validity of the initial analogy continues. Market-based standards of performance may be innappropriate for investigations of political phenomena.

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  • Zeckhauser, Richard, 1973. "Voting Systems, Honest Preferences and Pareto Optimality," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 67(3), pages 934-946, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:cup:apsrev:v:67:y:1973:i:03:p:934-946_14
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    Cited by:

    1. Barbera, Salvador & Bogomolnaia, Anna & van der Stel, Hans, 1998. "Strategy-proof probabilistic rules for expected utility maximizers," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 35(2), pages 89-103, March.
    2. Jean-Marie Blin & Mark A. Satterthwaite, 1975. "An Impossibility Theorem for Deterministic Organizations," Discussion Papers 129, Northwestern University, Center for Mathematical Studies in Economics and Management Science.
    3. William Keech & Michael Munger, 2015. "The anatomy of government failure," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 164(1), pages 1-42, July.
    4. Peter Fishburn & Steven Brams, 1984. "Manipulability of voting by sincere truncation of preferences," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 44(3), pages 397-410, January.
    5. Yasunori Okumura, 2019. "What proportion of sincere voters guarantees efficiency?," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 53(2), pages 299-311, August.
    6. Jac C. Heckelman, 2015. "Properties and paradoxes of common voting rules," Chapters, in: Jac C. Heckelman & Nicholas R. Miller (ed.), Handbook of Social Choice and Voting, chapter 15, pages 263-283, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    7. Yasunori Okumura, 2021. "Rank-dominant strategy and sincere voting," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 90(1), pages 117-145, February.
    8. Michael Farmer & Clifford Lipscomb, 2008. "Conservative dichotomous choice responses in the active policy setting: DC rejections below WTP," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 39(3), pages 223-246, March.
    9. , & Smith, Doug, 2014. "Robust mechanism design and dominant strategy voting rules," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 9(2), May.
    10. Hengjin Dong & Bocar Kouyate & John Cairns & Frederick Mugisha & Rainer Sauerborn, 2003. "Willingness‐to‐pay for community‐based insurance in Burkina Faso," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 12(10), pages 849-862, October.
    11. Joe Oppenheimer, 1979. "A Reassessment," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 23(3), pages 387-407, September.
    12. Salvador Barberà, 2010. "Strategy-proof social choice," UFAE and IAE Working Papers 828.10, Unitat de Fonaments de l'Anàlisi Econòmica (UAB) and Institut d'Anàlisi Econòmica (CSIC).

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