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Information design for weighted voting

Author

Listed:
  • Toygar T. Kerman

    (Corvinus University of Budapest)

  • Anastas P. Tenev

    (Corvinus University of Budapest)

Abstract

We consider a sender who wishes to persuade multiple receivers to vote in favor of a proposal and sends them private correlated messages that are conditional on the true state of the world. The receivers share a common prior, wish to implement the outcome that matches the true state, and have homogeneous preferences. However, they are heterogeneous in their voting weights. We consider both behavioral and sophisticated voters. When voters are behavioral, public communication is optimal if and only if there is a veto player. For sophisticated voters, we establish lower bounds on the sender’s gain from persuasion for general voting quotas and show that the sender can often improve upon public communication. Finally, in an extension, we show that even when behavioral voters have heterogeneous prior beliefs, public communication is optimal if and only if there is a veto player.

Suggested Citation

  • Toygar T. Kerman & Anastas P. Tenev, 2025. "Information design for weighted voting," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 79(3), pages 809-852, May.
  • Handle: RePEc:spr:joecth:v:79:y:2025:i:3:d:10.1007_s00199-024-01599-0
    DOI: 10.1007/s00199-024-01599-0
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Information design; Bayesian persuasion; Strategic voting; Shareholder voting; Private communication;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C72 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Noncooperative Games
    • D72 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • D83 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Search; Learning; Information and Knowledge; Communication; Belief; Unawareness

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