Rosters and connected apportionments

Manshu Khanna () and Haydar Evren ()
Additional contact information
Haydar Evren: Akuna Capital

Public Choice, 2025, vol. 202, issue 1, No 8, 167-191

Abstract: Abstract Affirmative action in India reserves explicit proportions of seats and jobs in publicly funded institutions for various beneficiary groups. Because seats are indivisible and arise in small numbers over time, implementation of this policy requires that beneficiary groups take turns claiming seats, for which purpose India relies on a device called a roster. We study the problem of constructing a roster, which involves addressing a series of connected apportionment problems. To identify suitable apportionment methods, six essential requirements direct our search to a large class of divisor methods. We show that the Webster–Sainte-Laguë method is the unique divisor method that satisfies several practical properties and fairness criteria. Comparative analysis between an existing Indian roster and the application of the Webster–Sainte-Laguë method highlights that method’s benefits.

Keywords: Rotation; Indivisibility; Apportionment; Divisor methods (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11127-024-01182-0 Abstract (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:pubcho:v:202:y:2025:i:1:d:10.1007_s11127-024-01182-0

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer. ... ce/journal/11127/PS2

DOI: 10.1007/s11127-024-01182-0

Access Statistics for this article

Public Choice is currently edited by WIlliam F. Shughart II

More articles in Public Choice from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().