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Justification of the simple majority and chairman rules

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Abstract

Employing the uncertain dichotomous model, this work proves the optimality of the simple majority and the chairman rules under complete ignorance of the decision competencies of the decision makers.

The optimality of these commonly used rules is also retained under certain patterns of partial information on the characteristics of the distribution of the members' competencies.

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The author gratefully acknowledges Jacob Paroush's suggestion that I study the subject of this paper and the helpful comments of Shmuel Nitzan and two anonymous referees.

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Karotkin, D. Justification of the simple majority and chairman rules. Soc Choice Welfare 13, 479–486 (1996). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00182858

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00182858

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