Aggregation of opinions in networks of individuals and collectives

Hervé Crès and Mich Tvede

Journal of Economic Theory, 2022, vol. 199, issue C

Abstract: We study the formation of opinions in a bipartite network of firms' boards and directors theoretically. A director and a board are connected provided the director is a board member. Opinions are sets of beliefs about the likelihood of different states of the world tomorrow. Our basic assumption is that boards as well as directors aggregate opinions of each other: a production plan is better than another for a board (director) provided every director (board of which she is a member) finds it better. Opinions are stable provided aggregation does not result in revision of opinions. We show that for connected networks: opinions are stable if and only if they are unambiguous and identical; and repeated aggregation leads to stable opinions. Hence, there will eventually be a single society-wide intersubjective “truth”.

Keywords: Boards; Directors; Networks; Pareto principle (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D2 D5 D6 D8 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jetheo:v:199:y:2022:i:c:s0022053121001228

DOI: 10.1016/j.jet.2021.105305

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