Philosophy Dictionary of ArgumentsHome
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| Democracy: Democracy is a system of government in which the people have the power to choose their leaders and make decisions about how they are governed. It is based on the principles of equality, freedom, and participation._____________Annotation: The above characterizations of concepts are neither definitions nor exhausting presentations of problems related to them. Instead, they are intended to give a short introduction to the contributions below. – Lexicon of Arguments. | |||
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Social Choice Theory on Democracy - Dictionary of Arguments
Gaus I 146 Democracy/social choice theory/Dryzek: The social choice account of democracy takes its bearings from Kenneth Arrow's (1951)(1) demonstration of the impossibility of any collective choice mechanism, such as a voting system, simultaneously achieving an innocuous set of conditions (unanimity, non-dictatorship, transitivity, unrestricted domain of preferences, and independence of irrelevant alternatives). (VsDemocray). William Riker (1982)(2) radicalized the social choice critique of democracy by observing that different voting systems and rules avoid the Arrow problem only by introducing an element of arbitrariness into collective choice. Given that different mechanisms will produce different results from identical distributions of preferences, there is no such thing as a popular will independent of the mechanism that ascertains it. This is especially true if, as Riker believes, there is no particular reason to prefer any mechanism (e.g. majority rule, or approval voting, or consensus) over any other. Democracy is then emptied of meamng. >Deliberative democracy/Dryzek. (...)public choice theorists have argued that: - In political systems of any size, voting is irrational. - Majority rule entails the Pareto-suboptimal exploitation of minorities. - Self-interested elected representatives at best create programmes that benefit their own constituents at the expense of the public interest, at worst deliberately design programmes badly such that their own intercession is required to deliver benefits. - Public spending levels are mostly a consequence of self-interested bureaucrats maximizing budgets. Bureaucrats can conspire with special interest groups and their supportive politicians to divert public resources for their own benefit. - More generally, 'distributional coalitions' such as labour unions and employers secure laws and policies to protect their own privileges at the expense of economic efficiency. Gaus I 147 - Democratic politics is intrinsically irresponsible because all actors seek benefits for themselves while imposing costs upon others; the result is a negative-sum game where total costs outweigh total benefits. 1. Arrow, Kenneth J. (1951) Social Choice and Individual Values. New York: Wiley. 2. Riker, William H. (1982) Liberalism against Populism: A Confrontation between the Theory of Democracy and the Theory of Social Choice. San Francisco: Freeman. Dryzek, John S. 2004. „Democratic Political Theory“. In: Gaus, Gerald F. & Kukathas, Chandran 2004. Handbook of Political Theory. SAGE Publications_____________Explanation of symbols: Roman numerals indicate the source, arabic numerals indicate the page number. The corresponding books are indicated on the right hand side. ((s)…): Comment by the sender of the contribution. Translations: Dictionary of Arguments The note [Concept/Author], [Author1]Vs[Author2] or [Author]Vs[term] resp. "problem:"/"solution:", "old:"/"new:" and "thesis:" is an addition from the Dictionary of Arguments. If a German edition is specified, the page numbers refer to this edition. |
Social Choice Theory Gaus I Gerald F. Gaus Chandran Kukathas Handbook of Political Theory London 2004 |
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> Counter arguments against Social Choice Theory
> Counter arguments in relation to Democracy
Ed. Martin Schulz, access date 2024-04-28