A social-choice perspective on authoritarianism and political polarization

Facing a spreading of polarization and authoritarianism, research from various disciplines attempted to explore the sources of this threatening development in many societies. Socio-economic factors, as well as the diffusion of social media, were identified as explaining factors. We emphasize another source for the success of polarizing politicians: The collective-decision rules. We show that several frequently used voting schemes greatly support polarizing candidates’ success while other voting rules that are often scientifically proposed but rarely in use are much more appropriate to avoid polarizing candidates’ success. The simple-majority rule and the Borda count are more suitable for preventing society from a polarizing candidate’s landslide. By comparing the two last-mentioned voting rules, we find that the Borda count has some advantage over the simple-majority rule.