When aggregating individual preferences through the majority rule in an n-dimensional spatial voting model, the "worst-case" scenario is a social choice configuration where no political equilibrium exists unless a super majority rate as high as 1-1/n is adopted. In this paper the authors assume...

Keynes' General Theory (1936) is arguably one of the most important books of the twentieth century. His ideas for stabilizing the aggregate economy have profoundly influenced economic theory as well as popular opinion about what governments can and should do with respect to the business cycle....

This paper analyzes the a priori influence of the European Parliament (EP) and the Council of Ministers (CM) on legislation of the European Union adopted under its codecision procedure. In contrast to studies which use conventional power indices, both institutions are assumed to act...

Traditional power indices ignore preferences and strategic interaction. Equilibrium analysis of particular non-cooperative decision procedures is unsuitable for normative analysis and assumes typically unavailable information. These points drive a lingering debate about the right approach to...

The decision-making rules of the European Union (EU) are defined in an incomplete contract signed by 15 national governments. The design of the contract defines the set of policy issues where it applies – in decision-making rules i.e. the majority rules and the division of powers among the...

We explore the dynamics of a model of two-party competition under spatial voting. The parties are allowed to incrementally adapt their platforms by following the voting gradient imposed by the preferences of the electorate and platform of the opposition. The emphasis in this model is on the...

This paper considers empirically whether preference-based (empirical) power indices differ significantly from their preference-free (theoretical) counterparts. Drawing on the to date most comprehensive sample of EU Council votes (1993-2011), we use item-response models to estimate the EU27...

In the present study I use spatial voting model to assess the importance of the left-right and immigration issue dimensions on electoral behavior in Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. My findings indicate that distances between parties and voters on both left-right and immigration dimensions do...

We develop several results related to equilibrium in sophisticated voting under an amendment agenda procedure and supermajoritarian voting rules. Contrary to the simple majority case, we demonstrate that attainable equilibria are a function of the location of the status quo ex ante as well as...