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An Economic Theory of Democracy

 

 
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An Economic Theory of Democracy
 
 
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An Economic Theory of Democracy is a political science
Political science

Political science is a social science concerned with the theory and practice of politics and the description and analysis of political systems and political behavior....
 treatise written by Anthony Downs
Anthony Downs

Anthony Downs is a noted scholar in public policy and public administration, and since 1977 is a Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington D.C.....
, published in 1957. The book set forth a model
Model (abstract)

In mathematical logic, the formal languages, formal systems, and theory which are studied have no meaningful content until they are given an interpretation within some other system....
 with precise conditions under which economic theory could be applied to non-market
Market

A market is any one of a variety of different systems, institutions, procedures, social relations and infrastructures whereby persons trade, and goods and services are exchanged, forming part of the economy....
 political decision-making. It also suggested areas of empirical
Empirical

The word empirical denotes information gained by means of observation, experience, or experiment, as opposed to theory. A central concept in science and the scientific method is that all evidence must be empirical, or empirically based, that is, dependent on evidence or Logical consequence that are observable by the senses....
 research that could be tested to confirm the validity of his conclusions in the model. Much of this off-shoot research eventually became integrated into the Public Choice School.






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An Economic Theory of Democracy is a political science
Political science

Political science is a social science concerned with the theory and practice of politics and the description and analysis of political systems and political behavior....
 treatise written by Anthony Downs
Anthony Downs

Anthony Downs is a noted scholar in public policy and public administration, and since 1977 is a Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington D.C.....
, published in 1957. The book set forth a model
Model (abstract)

In mathematical logic, the formal languages, formal systems, and theory which are studied have no meaningful content until they are given an interpretation within some other system....
 with precise conditions under which economic theory could be applied to non-market
Market

A market is any one of a variety of different systems, institutions, procedures, social relations and infrastructures whereby persons trade, and goods and services are exchanged, forming part of the economy....
 political decision-making. It also suggested areas of empirical
Empirical

The word empirical denotes information gained by means of observation, experience, or experiment, as opposed to theory. A central concept in science and the scientific method is that all evidence must be empirical, or empirically based, that is, dependent on evidence or Logical consequence that are observable by the senses....
 research that could be tested to confirm the validity of his conclusions in the model. Much of this off-shoot research eventually became integrated into the Public Choice School. Downs' theory abstains from making normative
Normative economics

Normative economics is the branch of economics that incorporates Value theory judgments about what the economy ought to be like or what particular policy actions ought to be recommended to achieve a desirable goal....
 statements about public policy
Public policy

Public policy can be generally defined as the course of action or inaction taken by government entities with regard to a particular issue or set of issues....
 choices and instead focuses on what is rational
Rational

Rational may refer to:* Rationality, a concept of reason* Rational number, a number that can be expressed as a ratio of two integers* Rational function, a mathematical function which can be written as the ratio of two polynomial functions...
, given the relevant incentives, for government
Government

Government is the body within any organization that has the authority to make and the power to enforce laws, regulations, or rules. Typically, the government refers to a civil government -- local, provincial, or national -- but commercial, academic, religious, or other formal organizations are also administered by governing bodies....
 to do.

Contents

In chapter eight of the book, Downs explains how the concept of ideology
Ideology

An ideology is a set of aims and ideas, especially in politics. An ideology can be thought of as a comprehensive vision, as a way of looking at things , as in common sense and several philosophical tendencies , or a set of ideas proposed by the dominant class of a society to all members of this society....
 is central to his theory. Depending on the ideological distribution of voters in a given political community
Community

In biological terms, a community is a group of interacting organisms sharing an environment .In human communities, intention, belief, Natural resource, preferences, Need assessment, risks, and a number of other conditions may be present and common, affecting the Identity of the participants and their degree of cohesiveness....
, electoral
Election

An election is a decision-making process by which a population chooses an individual to hold formal office. This is the usual mechanism by which modern Representative democracy fills offices in the legislature, sometimes in the executive and judiciary, and for regional government and local government....
 outcomes can be stable and peaceful or wildly varied and even result in violent revolution
Revolution

A revolution is a fundamental social change in power or organizational structures that takes place in a relatively short period of time....
. The likely number of political parties
Political party

A political party is a political organization that seeks to attain and maintain politics power within government, usually by participating in electoral campaigns....
 can also be identified if one also considers the electoral structure. If the ideological positions of voters are displayed in the form of a graph
Graph

Graph may refer to:* A graphic depicting the relationship between two or more variables used, for instance, in visualising scientific data....
 and if that graph shows a single peak, then a median
Median

In probability theory and statistics, a median is described as the number separating the higher half of a sample, a population, or a probability distribution, from the lower half....
 voter can be identified and in a representative democracy, the choice of candidates and the choice of policies will gravitate toward the positions of the median voter. Conversely, if the graph of ideological distribution is double-peaked, indicating that most voters are either extremely liberal or extremely conservative, the tendency toward political consensus
Consensus

Consensus has two common meanings. One is a general Wiktionary:agreement among the members of a given group or community, each of which exercises some discretion in decision making and follow-up action....
 or political equilibrium is difficult to attain because legislator
Legislator

A legislator is a person who writes and passes laws, especially someone who is a member of a legislature. Legislators are usually politicians and are often elected by the people....
s representing each mode are penalized by voters for attempting to achieve consensus with the other side by supporting policies representative of a middle position. Here is a list of the key propositions Downs attempts to prove in chapter eight:
  1. A two-party democracy cannot provide stable and effective government
    Government

    Government is the body within any organization that has the authority to make and the power to enforce laws, regulations, or rules. Typically, the government refers to a civil government -- local, provincial, or national -- but commercial, academic, religious, or other formal organizations are also administered by governing bodies....
     unless there is a large measure of ideological consensus among its citizens.
  2. Parties in a two-party system deliberately change their platforms so that they resemble one another; whereas parties in a multi-party system try to remain as ideologically distinct from each other as possible.
  3. If the distribution of ideologies in a society’s citizenry remains constant, its political system will move toward a position of equilibrium in which the number of parties and their ideological positions are stable over time.
  4. New parties can be most successfully launched immediately after some significant change in the distribution of ideological views among eligible voters.
  5. In a two-party system, it is rational for each party to encourage voters to be irrational by making its platform vague and ambiguous.


The conditions under which his theory prevails are outlined in chapter two. Many of these conditions have been challenged by later scholarship. In anticipation of such criticism, Downs quotes Milton Friedman
Milton Friedman

Milton Friedman was an United States economist, statistician and public intellectual, and a recipient of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences....
 in chapter two that: “Theoretical models should be tested primarily by the accuracy of their predictions rather than by the reality of their assumptions” (Friedman, 1953
Essays in Positive Economics

Milton Friedman's book Essays in Positive Economics has as its lead an original essay "The Methodology of Positive Economics," on which this article focuses....
).

See also

  • Mancur Olson
    Mancur Olson

    Mancur Lloyd Olson, Jr. was a leading United States of America economics and social scientist who, at the time of his death, worked at the University of Maryland, College Park....


External links


  • . Article at WikiSummary.