We analyze the optimal timing problem of an agenda setter who can propose a project that is then voted on by a committee. The payoff consists of a common stochastic component and an idiosyncratic component that differs among committee members. The agenda setter may be biased for or against the...

Gerrymandering undermines representative democracy by creating many uncompetitive legislative districts, and generating the very real possibility that a party that wins a clear majority of the popular vote does not win a majority of districts. We present a new approach to the determination of...

How does electoral accountability affect the effectiveness of terrorism prevention in a democracy? We analyze the connection between electoral accountability and policy effectiveness in the context of terrorism prevention. We develop a formal model of an interaction between a government, a...

Consider a setting in which several groups of individuals with common interests (clubs) compete with each other for recognition by other individuals. Depending on the context, recognition may be expressed by these other individuals joining a club, or choosing one club to admire. Clubs compete by...

This paper develops a theory of political behavior in which moral values are a luxury good: the relative weight that voters place on moral rather than material considerations increases in income. This idea both generates new testable implications and ties together a broad set of empirical...

In many important political problems, citizens can directly participate in the political decision making through a referendum. These settings are often characterized by uncertainty over the future consequences of the decision, the possibility of learning about these over time, and the...

We consider a society that has to elect an official who provides a public service for the citizens. Potential candidates differ in their competence and every potential candidate has private information about his opportunity cost to perform the task of the elected official. We develop a new...

How should we evaluate the welfare implications of improvements to safety technologies in the presence of offsetting behavior? We model this problem as a symmetric game in which each player's payoff depends on his own action and the average action of the other players, and analyze under which...

We consider a dynamic oligopoly model in which a seller may drop out of the market when demand for its product is insufficient in the first period. Buyers suffer some disutility if a seller exits the market and so their first period purchase decision does not only depend on current period...