The Development and Decline of Medieval Voting Institutions: A Comparison of England and France

Yoram Barzel and Edgar Kiser

Economic Inquiry, 1997, vol. 35, issue 2, 244-60

Abstract: This paper argues that, in the middle ages, voting institutions emerged as mechanisms that allowed rulers to cooperate with subjects on mutually profitable projects. In spite of their utility, many of these voting institutions eventually declined. The authors test the model on the English parliament and the French estates general. The historical evidence strongly supports their view that these institutions declined in France, but not in England, due to increases in the heterogeneity of voters' interests and the insecurity of French rulers, since these factors made cooperation between French rulers and their subjects more difficult. Copyright 1997 by Oxford University Press.

Date: 1997
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