Why one person one vote?

Hans Gersbach

Social Choice and Welfare, 2004, vol. 23, issue 3, 449-464

Abstract: We provide a simple justification as to why the core principal in liberal democracies the one-person-one-vote is desirable. We compare two possible constitutions. In a “fixed democracy”, each individual has one vote and the same opportunity to propose public projects. In a “flexible democracy”, those that set the agenda can additionally propose to limit future participation in voting and agenda-setting. We show that a fixed democracy restricts majorities from taxing minorities to a greater extent than a flexible democracy. A flexible democracy may be more suited to enable a polity to undertake public projects. This possible advantage may be too small to outweigh taxation distortions and citizens unanimously favor the one-person-one-vote rule ex ante. Copyright Springer-Verlag 2004

Date: 2004
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DOI: 10.1007/s00355-003-0271-5

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