The paper explores how politicians in established democracies respond to election outcome in terms of attitudinal … voluntary acceptance perspective adds insight about the forces that motivates politicians to consent. Politicians (and citizens … politicians that are elected to office. Indeed, given standard institutional arrangement of representative democracies, losing …

of experimentation is suboptimal, taking decisions by direct democracy, or electing risk-loving politicians, could …

---voters are pessimistic about common-interest opportunities, politicians behave in a purely partisan manner that shuts down voter …, with politicians engaging in strategically polarized and polarizing behavior which leads to pessimistic beliefs among …