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Published September 1979 | Submitted version
Working Paper Open

Committee Decisions under Majority Rule: Dynamic Theories and Experimental Results

  • 1. ROR icon California Institute of Technology

Abstract

[Introduction] For committees operating under majority rule and certain other reasonably well-defined conditions, the Majority Rule Equilibrium (MRE) is a very good predictor of the committee's choice (Berl et al., 1976; Florina and Plott, 1978; Isaac and Plott, 1978). The dynamics of the committee decision process which underlie this outcome have never been adequately explained. This might not be so serious a problem if an accessible MRE tended to exist for most possible configurations of committee members' preferences. However, the MRE usually does not exist (Rubenstein, 1979) and, furthermore, generalizations of the MRE are the subject of considerable theoretical speculation.

Acknowledgement

The authors are listed alphabetically. We would like to thank Morris P. Florina, John Ferejohn, Richard McKelvey, Kenneth McCue, and David Ritchie for helpful discussions. The financial support of the National Science Foundation is gratefully acknowledged.

Additional Information

Submitted August 1979. Revised September 1979.

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Created:
August 19, 2023
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January 13, 2024