A theory of gridlock: Strategic behavior in legislative deliberations

Evan Osborne

Atlantic Economic Journal, 1998, vol. 26, issue 3, 238-251

Abstract: This paper studies compromise and inflexibility in political negotiations. It provides the first analysis of gridlock, a result in which politicians fail to agree on an ideal compromise but which most voters find preferable to the status quo. A multistage game is developed in which contending political blocs choose from hardline or compromise strategies. The outcomes—compromise, gridlock, or one party's ideal legislation—are a function of the incentives of political actors to cooperate or fight. The model illustrates problems in political markets that may occur when consumers are poorly informed. Copyright International Atlantic Economic Society 1998

Date: 1998
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/BF02299342 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:kap:atlecj:v:26:y:1998:i:3:p:238-251

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer. ... cs/journal/11293/PS2

DOI: 10.1007/BF02299342

Access Statistics for this article

Atlantic Economic Journal is currently edited by Kathleen S. Virgo

More articles in Atlantic Economic Journal from Springer, International Atlantic Economic Society Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().