EconPapers    
Economics at your fingertips  
 

Judgment aggregators and Boolean algebra homomorphisms

Frederik Herzberg

Journal of Mathematical Economics, 2010, vol. 46, issue 1, 132-140

Abstract: The theory of Boolean algebras can be fruitfully applied to judgment aggregation: assuming universality, systematicity and a sufficiently rich agenda, there is a correspondence between (i) non-trivial deductively closed judgment aggregators and (ii) Boolean algebra homomorphisms defined on the power-set algebra of the electorate. Furthermore, there is a correspondence between (i) consistent complete judgment aggregators and (ii) 2-valued Boolean algebra homomorphisms defined on the power-set algebra of the electorate. Since the shell of such a homomorphism equals the set of winning coalitions and since (ultra)filters are shells of (2-valued) Boolean algebra homomorphisms, we suggest an explanation for the effectiveness of the (ultra)filter method in social choice theory. From the (ultra)filter property of the set of winning coalitions, one obtains two general impossibility theorems for judgment aggregation on finite electorates, even without assuming the Pareto principle.

Keywords: Judgment; aggregation; Systematicity; Impossibility; theorems; Filter; Ultrafilter; Boolean; algebra; homomorphism (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2010
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0304-4068(09)00070-6
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
Working Paper: Judgment aggregators and Boolean algebra homomorphisms (2010) Downloads
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:eee:mateco:v:46:y:2010:i:1:p:132-140

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Mathematical Economics is currently edited by Atsushi (A.) Kajii

More articles in Journal of Mathematical Economics from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().

 
Page updated 2025-03-31
Handle: RePEc:eee:mateco:v:46:y:2010:i:1:p:132-140