Mathematics and Democracy: Recent Advances in Voting Systems and Collective Choice (Studies in Choice and Welfare) - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 3540356037 ISBN 13: 9783540356035

Publisher: Springer, 2006

Synopsis

In this book, different quantitative approaches to the study of electoral systems have been developed: game-theoretic, decision-theoretic, statistical, probabilistic, combinatorial, geometric, and optimization ones. All the authors are prominent scholars from these disciplines. Quantitative approaches offer a powerful tool to detect inconsistencies or poor performance in actual systems. Applications to concrete settings such as EU, American Congress, regional, and committee voting are discussed.

About this title

Review

From the reviews:

"The ... book is an edited volume, and exhibits both the flaws and virtues of that genre. ... I found the book interesting and important. ... the book is well worth having on your shelf. ... It would be useful, in fact, as a classroom exercise for students in a variety of disciplines, because it both illustrates the unnatural power of mathematics to illuminate hard questions and unites several apparently unrelated problems in a single analytic rubric. ... this is a valuable and important book." (Michael Munger, Public Choice, Vol. 132, 2007)

"This is a fine collection of 17 papers chosen from contributions to the International Workshop on Mathematics and Democracy: Voting Systems and Collective Choice that took place in Erice, Sicily in 2005. ... one will walk away from this volume with the sense that one has been exposed to the research frontier of the electoral system theory." (Ugur Ozdemir, Social Choice and Welfare, Vol. 31, 2008)

Synopsis

The study of Voting Systems and Collective Choice lies at the crossroad of social and exact sciences. The former ones focus on the development of electoral systems in the context of the changing needs of societies; the latter ones deal with the formal study of electoral mechanisms, whose underlying axioms reflect universal principles such as equity, representation, stability, and consistency. Different quantitative approaches to the study of electoral systems have been developed: game-theoretic, decision-theoretic, statistical, probabilistic, combinatorial, geometric, and optimization ones. All the authors are prominent scholars from these disciplines. Quantitative approaches offer a powerful tool to detect inconsistencies or poor performance in actual systems. Applications to concrete settings such as EU, American Congress, regional, and committee voting are discussed.

Edition details

• Publisher: Springer
• Publication date: 2006
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 3540356037
• ISBN 13: 9783540356035
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 268
• Editor: Simeone Bruno, Pukelsheim Friedrich