IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/rtv/ceisrp/31.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

A Spatial Voting Model Where Proportional Rule Leads to Two-Party Equilibria

Author

Listed:
  • Francesco De Sinopoli

    (Universidad Carlos III de Madrid - Department of Economics)

  • Giovanna Iannantuoni

    (Universidad Carlos III de Madrid - Department of Economics)

Abstract

n this paper we show that in a simple spatial model where the government is chosen under strict proportional rule, if the outcome function is a linear combination of parties' positions, with coefficient equal to their share of votes, essentially only a two-party equilibrium exists. The two parties taking a positive number of votes are the two extremist ones. Applications of this result include an extension of the well-known Alesina and Rosenthal model of divided government as well as a modified version of Besley and Coate's model of representative democracy. Different outcome functions are then analyzed.

Suggested Citation

  • Francesco De Sinopoli & Giovanna Iannantuoni, 2003. "A Spatial Voting Model Where Proportional Rule Leads to Two-Party Equilibria," CEIS Research Paper 31, Tor Vergata University, CEIS.
    • Handle: RePEc:rtv:ceisrp:31
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ceistorvergata.it/RePEc/rpaper/No-31-DeSinopoli,Iannantuoni.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ignacio OrtuÓo-OrtÎn, 1997. "A spatial model of political competition and proportional representation," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 14(3), pages 427-438.
    2. Shugart, Matthew Soberg, 1995. "The Electoral Cycle and Institutional Sources of Divided Presidential Government," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 89(2), pages 327-343, June.
    3. Francesco De Sinopoli, 2000. "Sophisticated voting and equilibrium refinements under plurality rule," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 17(4), pages 655-672.
    4. Myerson, Roger B. & Weber, Robert J., 1993. "A Theory of Voting Equilibria," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 87(1), pages 102-114, March.
    5. Elhanan Helpman & Gene M. Grossman, 1999. "Competing for Endorsements," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 89(3), pages 501-524, June.
    6. Timothy Besley & Stephen Coate, 1997. "An Economic Model of Representative Democracy," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 112(1), pages 85-114.
    7. Alesina, Alberto & Rosenthal, Howard, 1996. "A Theory of Divided Government," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 64(6), pages 1311-1341, November.
    8. Alesina, Alberto & Rosenthal, Howard, 2000. "Polarized platforms and moderate policies with checks and balances," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(1), pages 1-20, January.
    9. Fey, Mark, 1997. "Stability and Coordination in Duverger's Law: A Formal Model of Preelection Polls and Strategic Voting," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 91(1), pages 135-147, March.
    10. Austen-Smith, David & Banks, Jeffrey, 1988. "Elections, Coalitions, and Legislative Outcomes," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 82(2), pages 405-422, June.
    11. Cox, Gary W., 1994. "Strategic Voting Equilibria under the Single Nontransferable Vote," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 88(3), pages 608-621, September.
    12. Riker, William H., 1982. "The Two-party System and Duverger's Law: An Essay on the History of Political Science," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 76(4), pages 753-766, December.
    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. Juan Carlos Berganza, 2000. "Politicians, voters and electoral processes: an overview," Investigaciones Economicas, Fundación SEPI, vol. 24(3), pages 501-543, September.
    2. Antonio Merlo, 2005. "Whither Political Economy? Theories, Facts and Issues," PIER Working Paper Archive 05-033, Penn Institute for Economic Research, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania, revised 01 Dec 2005.
    3. Ignacio Ortuño Ortín, 1999. "- A Model Of Voting With Incomplete Information And Opinion Polls," Working Papers. Serie AD 1999-25, Instituto Valenciano de Investigaciones Económicas, S.A. (Ivie).
    4. Iannantuoni, Giovanna, 2003. "Divided government and dominance solvability," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 19(4), pages 715-733, November.
    5. Siddhartha Bandyopadhyay & Mandar Oak, 2022. "Party Formation and Coalitional Bargaining in a Model of Proportional Representation," Games, MDPI, vol. 13(4), pages 1-17, June.
    6. Bol, Damien & Matakos, Konstantinos & Troumpounis, Orestis & Xefteris, Dimitrios, 2019. "Electoral rules, strategic entry and polarization," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 178(C).
    7. Spenkuch, Jörg, 2013. "On the Extent of Strategic Voting," MPRA Paper 50198, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    8. Micael Castanheira, 2003. "Why Vote For Losers?," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 1(5), pages 1207-1238, September.
    9. Andina-Díaz, Ascensión & Feri, Francesco & Meléndez-Jiménez, Miguel A., 2021. "Institutional flexibility, political alternation, and middle-of-the-road policies," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 204(C).
    10. Francesco De Sinopoli & Leo Ferraris & Giovanna Iannantuoni, 2013. "Electing a parliament," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 40(3), pages 715-737, March.
    11. Bouton, Laurent & Castanheira, Micael & Llorente-Saguer, Aniol, 2017. "Multicandidate elections: Aggregate uncertainty in the laboratory," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 132-150.
    12. Alvaro Forteza & Juan S. Pereyra, 2021. "Separation of powers with ideological parties," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 33(3), pages 333-382, July.
    13. Nikolas Tsakas & Dimitrios Xefteris & Nicholas Ziros, 2021. "Vote Trading in Power-Sharing Systems: A Laboratory Investigation," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 131(636), pages 1849-1882.
    14. César Martinelli & John Duggan, 2014. "The Political Economy of Dynamic Elections: A Survey and Some New Results," Working Papers 1403, Centro de Investigacion Economica, ITAM.
    15. Francesco Giovannoni & Daniel Seidmann, 2014. "Corruption and power in democracies," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 42(3), pages 707-734, March.
    16. Xefteris, Dimitrios, 2019. "Strategic voting when participation is costly," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 116(C), pages 122-127.
    17. Massimo Morelli, 2004. "Party Formation and Policy Outcomes under Different Electoral Systems," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 71(3), pages 829-853.
    18. Umair Khalil & Mandar Oak & Sundar Ponnusamy, 2024. "The heterogeneous role of party affiliation in the runner‐up effect," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 39(5), pages 952-959, August.
    19. Hughes, Niall, 2016. "Voting in legislative elections under plurality rule," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 166(C), pages 51-93.
    20. Dellis, Arnaud, 2009. "Would letting people vote for multiple candidates yield policy moderation?," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 144(2), pages 772-801, March.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Voting; Proportional Rule; Nash Equilibria;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C72 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Noncooperative Games
    • D72 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior

    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:rtv:ceisrp:31. 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: Barbara Piazzi (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/csrotit.html .

    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.