Voting Rules in Context

Abstract

All societies have rules. Some are explicitly based on them, but in general rules take on many forms. They can strict and formal or ambiguous and informal or something between these extremes. Many rules have a clear-cut motivation. Some pertain to coordination such as the traffic rules. Some have the aim of avoiding collectively irrational or harmful outcomes. The rules prohibiting cartel formation are examples of these. This book deals with the problems of choosing rules. More specifically, our focus is on rules of collective decision making. We study the most common collective decision making rules singling out the advantages and disadvantages using well-defined criteria.