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Round-robin political tournaments: Abstention, truthful equilibria, and effective power

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  • Pongou, Roland
  • Tchantcho, Bertrand

Abstract

A round-robin political tournament is an election format where multiple candidates contest in pairs, and votes are aggregated using a general rule to form a social ranking. We formalize this tournament as a strategic form game and provide a necessary and sufficient condition under which truthful voting is a Nash equilibrium. Building on this analysis, we study the concept of effective power, defined as a voter's ability to bring about a social ranking that maximizes his preferences. We show that the classical theories of political power do not translate into effective power in general. We then provide a full characterization of the classes of political tournaments and utility metrics for which these theories capture effective power. We offer both structural and behavioral interpretations of the findings, and derive practical implications for the design of political tournaments that are compatible with truth-telling.

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  • Pongou, Roland & Tchantcho, Bertrand, 2021. "Round-robin political tournaments: Abstention, truthful equilibria, and effective power," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 130(C), pages 331-351.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:gamebe:v:130:y:2021:i:c:p:331-351
    DOI: 10.1016/j.geb.2021.07.013
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    Cited by:

    1. Mahajan, Aseem & Pongou, Roland & Tondji, Jean-Baptiste, 2023. "Supermajority politics: Equilibrium range, policy diversity, utilitarian welfare, and political compromise," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 307(2), pages 963-974.
    2. Zéphirin Nganmeni & Roland Pongou & Bertrand Tchantcho & Jean‐Baptiste Tondji, 2022. "Vaccine and inclusion," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 24(5), pages 1101-1123, October.
      • Zéphirin Nganmeni & Roland Pongou & Bertrand Tchantcho & Jean‐baptiste Tondji, 2022. "Vaccine and inclusion," Post-Print hal-04257703, HAL.
      • Zéphirin Nganmeni & Roland Pongou & Bertrand Tchantcho & Jean-Baptiste Tondji, 2022. "Vaccine and Inclusion," Working Papers 2202E Classification-C62,, University of Ottawa, Department of Economics.
    3. Pongou, Roland & Tondji, Jean-Baptiste, 2024. "The reciprocity set," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 112(C).

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Round-robin political tournaments; Ranked voting; Hyper-preferences; Truthful equilibria; Effective power; Psychology; Political design;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D72 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
    • C72 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Noncooperative Games
    • D02 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Institutions: Design, Formation, Operations, and Impact
    • D90 - Microeconomics - - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics - - - General
    • P16 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Capitalist Economies - - - Capitalist Institutions; Welfare State

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