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A liberal paradox for judgment aggregation

Author

Listed:
  • Franz Dietrich

    (University of Konstanz)

  • Christian List

    (Dept. of Government, London School of Economics)

Abstract

In the emerging literature on judgment (as opposed to preference) aggregation, expert rights or liberal rights have not been investigated yet. When a group forms collective beliefs, it may assign experts with special knowledge on certain propositions the right to determine the collective judgment on those propositions; and, when a group forms collective goals or desires, it may assign individuals specially affected by certain propositions similar rights on those propositions. We identify a problem similar to, but more general than, Sen's `liberal paradox': Under plausible conditions, the assignment of such rights to two or more individuals (or subgroups) is inconsistent with the unanimity principle, whereby propositions accepted by all individuals must be collectively accepted. So a group respecting expert or liberal rights on certain propositions must sometimes overrule its unanimous judgments on others. The inconsistency does not arise if either different individuals' rights are `disconnected' or individuals are `agnostic/tolerant' or `deferring/empathetic' towards other individuals' rights. Our findings have implications for the design of mechanisms by which groups (societies, committees, expert panels, organizations) can reach decisions on systems of interconnected propositions.

Suggested Citation

  • Franz Dietrich & Christian List, 2004. "A liberal paradox for judgment aggregation," Public Economics 0405003, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    • Handle: RePEc:wpa:wuwppe:0405003
    Note: Type of Document - pdf; pages: 20
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    Cited by:

    1. Kretz, Claudio, 2021. "Consistent rights on property spaces," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 197(C).
    2. List, Christian & Polak, Ben, 2010. "Introduction to judgment aggregation," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 145(2), pages 441-466, March.
    3. Philippe Mongin, 2012. "The doctrinal paradox, the discursive dilemma, and logical aggregation theory," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 73(3), pages 315-355, September.
    4. Nan Li, 2018. "A paradox of expert rights in abstract argumentation," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 51(4), pages 737-752, December.
    5. Herzberg, Frederik, 2017. "Respect for experts vs. respect for unanimity: The liberal paradox in probabilistic opinion pooling," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 151(C), pages 44-47.
    6. Franz Dietrich, 2007. "A generalised model of judgment aggregation," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 28(4), pages 529-565, June.
    7. Piggins, Ashley & Salerno, Gillian, 2016. "Sen cycles and externalities," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 149(C), pages 25-27.
    8. List, Christian, 2010. "The theory of judgment aggregation: an introductory review," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 27596, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    9. Baharad, Eyal & Neeman, Zvika & Rubinchik, Anna, 2020. "The rarity of consistent aggregators," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 146-149.
    10. Richard Bradley, 2007. "Reaching a consensus," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 29(4), pages 609-632, December.
    11. Valeria Ottonelli, 2010. "What Does the Discursive Paradox Really Mean for Democracy?," Political Studies, Political Studies Association, vol. 58(4), pages 666-687, October.
    12. Masaki Miyashita, 2017. "Binary Collective Choice with Multiple Premises," Discussion Paper Series DP2017-27, Research Institute for Economics & Business Administration, Kobe University.
    13. Jérôme Lang & Gabriella Pigozzi & Marija Slavkovik & Leendert Torre & Srdjan Vesic, 2017. "A partial taxonomy of judgment aggregation rules and their properties," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 48(2), pages 327-356, February.
    14. Itai Sher, 2020. "How perspective-based aggregation undermines the Pareto principle," Politics, Philosophy & Economics, , vol. 19(2), pages 182-205, May.
    15. Klaus Nehring, 2005. "The (Im)Possibility of a Paretian Rational," Economics Working Papers 0068, Institute for Advanced Study, School of Social Science.

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    JEL classification:

    • D70 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - General
    • D71 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Social Choice; Clubs; Committees; Associations

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