A conditional defense of plurality rule: generalizing May's theorem in a restricted informational environment
| Abstract | May's theorem famously shows that, in social decisions between two options, simple majority rule uniquely satisfies four appealing conditions. Although this result is often cited in support of majority rule, it has never been extended beyond decisions based on pairwise comparisons of options. We generalize May's theorem to many-option decisions where voters each cast one vote. Surprisingly, plurality rule uniquely satisfies May's conditions. This suggests a conditional defense of plurality rule: If a society's balloting procedure collects only a single vote from each voter, then plurality rule is the uniquely compelling electoral procedure. To illustrate the conditional nature of this claim, we also identify a richer informational environment in which approval voting, not plurality rule, is supported by a May-style argument. | |||||||||
| Keywords | No keywords specified (fix it) | |||||||||
| Categories | No categories specified (fix it) | |||||||||
| Options |
|
|||||||||
Download options| PhilPapers Archive |
Upload a copy of this paper Check publisher's policy on self-archival Papers currently archived: 5,709 |
| External links |
  Try with proxy. Try with proxy. |
| Through your library | Only published papers are available at libraries |
Similar books and articlesCesaltina Pacheco Pires (2002). A Rule For Updating Ambiguous Beliefs. Theory and Decision 53 (2):137-152.
Wes Sharrock & Graham Button (1999). Do the Right Thing! Rule Finitism, Rule Scepticism and Rule Following. Human Studies 22 (2-4):193-210.
Carl G. Wagner (2003). Commuting Probability Revisions: The Uniformity Rule. Erkenntnis 59 (3).
Aleksandar Kron (1981). Gentzen Formulations of Two Positive Relevance Logics. Studia Logica 40 (3):381 - 403.
Robert K. Meyer (1998). ⊃E is Admissible in “True” Relevant Arithmetic. Journal of Philosophical Logic 27 (4):327 - 351.
Robert K. Meyer (1998). ÂE is Admissible in ÂTrueâ Relevant Arithmetic. Journal of Philosophical Logic 27 (4):327-351.
Mathias Risse (2009). On the Philosophy of Group Decision Methods I: The Nonobviousness of Majority Rule. Philosophy Compass 4 (5):793-802.
Mathias Risse (2004). Arguing for Majority Rule. Journal of Political Philosophy 12 (1):41–64.
Analytics
Monthly downloads |
Added to index2010-07-25Total downloads10 ( #106,438 of 549,638 )Recent downloads (6 months)1 ( #63,397 of 549,638 )How can I increase my downloads? |
My notes
Discussion
