Democracy and Decision
The Pure Theory of Electoral Preference

This important book offers a compelling challenge to the central premises of the prevailing theories of voting behaviour.

Geoffrey Brennan (Edited by), Loren Lomasky (Edited by)

9780521330404, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 26 March 1993

252 pages, 5 b/w illus.
24.2 x 16.1 x 2.2 cm, 0.611 kg

"Few topics are more important to maintaining a liberal social order than is the democratic political process, and few recent books are likely to do more to motivate fresh thinking on this process than Democracy and Decision." Public Choice

Do voters in large scale democracies reliably vote for the electoral outcomes most in their interest? Much of the literature on voting predicts that they do, but this book argues that fully rational voters will not, in fact, consistently vote for the political outcomes they prefer. The authors offer a theory of voting which they term an 'expressive' theory of electoral politics. This theory is shown to be more coherent and more consistent with actual observed voting behaviour. This important book offers a compelling challenge to the central premises of the prevailing theories of voting behaviour.

1. Ethics, politics and public choice
2. The logic of electoral choice
3. The nature of expressive returns
4. The analytics of decisiveness
5. The theory of electoral outcome: implications for public choice theory
6. From anecdote to analysis
7. Interpreting the numbers
8. Consensus, efficiency and contractarian justification
9. Paternalism, self-paternalism and the state
10. Towards a democratic morality
11. Constitutional implications
Bibliography.

Subject Areas: Political science & theory [JPA]