Choosing an electoral rule: Values and self-interest in the lab

Bol, Damien; Blais, André; Coulombe, Maxime; Laslier, Jean‐François; Pilet, Jean‐Benoît

doi:10.1016/j.joep.2023.102602

Cited by 4 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 52 publications

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“…Although the relationship between legitimacy and voting methods is crucial for the functioning of democratic societies, there is still a significant gap in our knowledge about the implications of alternative voting methods due to the relatively small number of experimental studies in this area. For instance, Bol et al (2023) investigates two voting rules, aiming to distinguish between valuedriven and self-interest-driven choices. As a result, there is a pressing need for more research to explore how different voting methods affect the perceived legitimacy of voting outcomes and how such knowledge can inform policy-making in real-world contexts.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

How voting rules impact legitimacy

Hausladen,

Hänggli Fricker,

Helbing

et al. 2024

Humanit Soc Sci Commun

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Collective action is essential for addressing the grand challenges of our time. However, for such action to be successful, decision-making processes must be perceived as legitimate. In this study, we investigate the legitimacy of different voting methods. Using a pre-registered human subject experiment, 120 participants cast their votes using four voting methods: majority voting, combined approval voting, range voting, and the modified Borda count. These methods represent a range of preference elicitation designs, from low to high complexity and flexibility. Furthermore, we developed a legitimacy scale upon which the participants rate the voting methods. The experiment was conducted in a non-political setting (voting on color preferences) and a political context (voting on COVID-19-related questions). Our findings suggest that the perceived legitimacy of a voting method is context-dependent. Specifically, preferential voting methods are seen as more legitimate than majority voting in a political decision-making situation, but only for individuals with well-defined preferences. Furthermore, preferential voting methods are more legitimate than majority voting in a highly polarized situation.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

How voting rules impact legitimacy

Hausladen,

Hänggli Fricker,

Helbing

et al. 2024

Humanit Soc Sci Commun

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The expressive power of voting rules

Bourgeois-Gironde,

Ferreira

2023

Soc Choice Welf

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Different voting rules are commonly used to settle collective decisions. A promising way to assess voting rules, for which little is known, is to compare the expressive utility that voters derive from voting with each rule. In this paper, we first propose a simple ordinal model of expressive voting that allows us to compare voting rules in terms of the expressive utility that voters can derive from voting (their expressive power). Our model provides a novel testable implication according to which expected turnout increases with expressive power. We then ran an online experiment testing this implication in a controlled environment. We find that if voters are made aware of alternative voting rules, turnout is higher in voting rules with higher expressive power. Our results also show that higher expressive power is associated with a better representation of voters’ actual preferences and, according to our model, higher expressive utility. This suggests that the expressive power of voting rules is a relevant criterion when choosing between voting rules for economic and political decisions.

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