IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/atlecj/v26y1998i3p238-251.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

A theory of gridlock: Strategic behavior in legislative deliberations

Author

Listed:
  • Evan Osborne

Abstract

This paper studies compromise and inflexibility in political negotiations. It provides the first analysis of gridlock, a result in which politicians fail to agree on an ideal compromise but which most voters find preferable to the status quo. A multistage game is developed in which contending political blocs choose from hardline or compromise strategies. The outcomes—compromise, gridlock, or one party's ideal legislation—are a function of the incentives of political actors to cooperate or fight. The model illustrates problems in political markets that may occur when consumers are poorly informed. Copyright International Atlantic Economic Society 1998

Suggested Citation

  • Evan Osborne, 1998. "A theory of gridlock: Strategic behavior in legislative deliberations," Atlantic Economic Journal, Springer;International Atlantic Economic Society, vol. 26(3), pages 238-251, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:atlecj:v:26:y:1998:i:3:p:238-251
    DOI: 10.1007/BF02299342
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/BF02299342
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/BF02299342?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hirshleifer, Jack, 1991. "The Technology of Conflict as an Economic Activity," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 81(2), pages 130-134, May.
    2. Caplin, Andrew & Nalebuff, Barry, 1991. "Aggregation and Social Choice: A Mean Voter Theorem," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 59(1), pages 1-23, January.
    3. Rothstein, Paul, 1991. "Representative Voter Theorems," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 72(2-3), pages 193-212, December.
    4. Skaperdas, Stergios & Grofman, Bernard, 1995. "Modeling Negative Campaigning," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 89(1), pages 49-61, March.
    5. Thomas R. Palfrey, 1984. "Spatial Equilibrium with Entry," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 51(1), pages 139-156.
    6. Edward J. Mathis & Charles E. Zech, 1986. "An Examination into the Relevance of the Median Voter Model: Empirical Evidence Offers Support for the Model and Certain Uses," American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 45(4), pages 403-412, October.
    7. Morton, Rebecca B., 1993. "Incomplete Information and Ideological Explanations of Platform Divergence," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 87(2), pages 382-392, June.
    8. Ingemar Hansson & Charles Stuart, 1984. "Voting competitions with interested politicians: Platforms do not converge to the preferences of the median voter," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 44(3), pages 431-441, January.
    9. Paul Milgrom & John Roberts, 1986. "Relying on the Information of Interested Parties," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 17(1), pages 18-32, Spring.
    10. Goodin, Robert E., 1996. "Institutionalizing the Public Interest: The Defense of Deadlock and Beyond," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 90(2), pages 331-343, June.
    11. Thomas Romer & Howard Rosenthal, 1979. "Bureaucrats Versus Voters: On the Political Economy of Resource Allocation by Direct Democracy," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 93(4), pages 563-587.
    12. Wittman, Donald, 1977. "Candidates with policy preferences: A dynamic model," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 14(1), pages 180-189, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Kristin Kanthak, 2002. "Top-Down Divergence," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 14(3), pages 301-323, July.
    2. Zakharov Alexei, 2005. "Candidate location and endogenous valence," EERC Working Paper Series 05-17e, EERC Research Network, Russia and CIS.
    3. Persson, Torsten & Tabellini, Guido, 2002. "Political economics and public finance," Handbook of Public Economics, in: A. J. Auerbach & M. Feldstein (ed.), Handbook of Public Economics, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 24, pages 1549-1659, Elsevier.
    4. Micael Castanheira, 2003. "Why Vote For Losers?," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 1(5), pages 1207-1238, September.
    5. Gersbach, Hans & Jackson, Matthew O. & Muller, Philippe & Tejada, Oriol, 2023. "Electoral competition with costly policy changes: A dynamic perspective," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 214(C).
    6. Benoît Le Maux, 2009. "Governmental behavior in representative democracy: a synthesis of the theoretical literature," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 141(3), pages 447-465, December.
    7. Martínez-Mora, Francisco & Puy, M. Socorro, 2014. "The determinants and electoral consequences of asymmetric preferences," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 33(C), pages 85-97.
    8. Stergios Skaperdas & Samarth Vaidya, 2012. "Persuasion as a contest," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 51(2), pages 465-486, October.
    9. Sandro Brusco & Jaideep Roy, 2011. "Aggregate uncertainty in the citizen candidate model yields extremist parties," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 36(1), pages 83-104, January.
    10. Martin J. Osborne & Al Slivinski, 1996. "A Model of Political Competition with Citizen-Candidates," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 111(1), pages 65-96.
    11. Xefteris, Dimitrios, 2016. "Stability in electoral competition: A case for multiple votes," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 161(C), pages 76-102.
    12. John Cadigan, 2005. "The Citizen Candidate Model: An Experimental Analysis," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 123(1), pages 197-216, April.
    13. Zudenkova, Galina, 2011. "Political competition in hard times," MPRA Paper 30943, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    14. Tangerås, Thomas, 1998. "On the Role of Public Opinion Polls in Political Competition," Seminar Papers 655, Stockholm University, Institute for International Economic Studies.
    15. Alberto Alesina & Howard Rosenthal, 1989. "Moderating Elections," NBER Working Papers 3072, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    16. Rhee, Se-Koo, 1996. "The impact of intergovernmental grants-in-aid on public school expenditure under the segregated school system," ISU General Staff Papers 1996010108000012396, Iowa State University, Department of Economics.
    17. Günther, Laurenz & Günther, Laurenz, 2022. "Lack of Substantive Representation in Europe: Causes and Consequences," VfS Annual Conference 2022 (Basel): Big Data in Economics 264114, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    18. Mechtel, Mario & Potrafke, Niklas, 2009. "Political Cycles in Active Labor Market Policies," MPRA Paper 14270, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    19. Ignacio Ortuño Ortín, 1998. "- Ideological Versus Downsian Political Competition," Working Papers. Serie AD 1998-22, Instituto Valenciano de Investigaciones Económicas, S.A. (Ivie).
    20. Daniel Cardona & Jenny De Freitas & Antoni Rubí-Barceló, 2018. "Polarization or Moderation? Intra-group heterogeneity in endogenous-policy contest," DEA Working Papers 87, Universitat de les Illes Balears, Departament d'Economía Aplicada.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kap:atlecj:v:26:y:1998:i:3:p:238-251. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.