Epistemic democracy: Generalizing the Condorcet jury theorem

C List, RE Goodin - 2001 - philpapers.org
2001philpapers.org
This paper generalises the classical Condorcet jury theorem from majority voting over two
options to plurality voting over multiple options. The paper further discusses the debate
between epistemic and procedural democracy and situates its formal results in that debate.
The paper finally compares a number of different social choice procedures for many-option
choices in terms of their epistemic merits. An appendix explores the implications of some of
the present mathematical results for the question of how probable majority cycles (as in …
Abstract
This paper generalises the classical Condorcet jury theorem from majority voting over two options to plurality voting over multiple options. The paper further discusses the debate between epistemic and procedural democracy and situates its formal results in that debate. The paper finally compares a number of different social choice procedures for many-option choices in terms of their epistemic merits. An appendix explores the implications of some of the present mathematical results for the question of how probable majority cycles (as in Condorcet's paradox) are in large electorates.
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