Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-745bb68f8f-lrblm Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-01-13T03:17:01.042Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

2 - The many facets of social choice theory

from Part I - Social Choice and Capabilities

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2024

By
Wulf Gaertner
Edited by
Flavio Comim ,
P. B. Anand  and
Shailaja Fennell
Flavio Comim
Affiliation:
Universitat Ramon Llull
P. B. Anand
Affiliation:
University of Bradford
Shailaja Fennell
Affiliation:
University of Cambridge
Get access

Summary

The theory of social choice is very rich in topics and issues that have been discussed since Kenneth Arrow’s seminal contribution in 1951. This keynote chapter is only able to deal with only a few of them. The start is Arrow’s impossibility theorem, two routes that escape from this negative result and the issue of whether there are some properties that should be satisfied by every aggregation rule in order to qualify as desirable. Next, the literature on individual liberty and rights is related to the notion of freedom in the sense of control over one’s functioning bundle. Then the procedural aspect of individual and collective choice, often mentioned but not worked out in detail, is discussed. Finally, a particular approach to measure and compare capability sets is proposed.

Keywords

social choiceArrow’s theoremvoting rulesrights exercisingfreedomfunctioningscapability setsmeasurement and comparabilityprocedural aspects
Type
Chapter
Information
Social Choice, Agency, Inclusiveness and Capabilities , pp. 17 - 41
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2024

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Arrow, K. J. (1951) Social Choice and Individual Values. New York: Wiley.Google Scholar
Balinski, M., and Laraki, R. (2007) A theory of measuring, electing, and ranking. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 104 (21): 8720–5.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Balinski, M., (2010) Majority Judgment: Measuring, Ranking and Electing. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Basu, K. (1987) Achievements, capabilities and the concept of well-being. Social Choice and Welfare, 4 (1): 69–76.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Broome, J. (1984) Uncertainty and fairness. Economic Journal, 94: 624–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Buchanan, J. M. (1986) Liberty, Market and State: Political Economy in the 1980s. Brighton: Wheatsheaf.Google Scholar
Coase, R. H. (1960) The problem of social cost. Journal of Law & Economics, 3: 1–44.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Diamond, P. A. (1967) Cardinal welfare, individualistic ethics, and interpersonal comparisons of utility: comment. Journal of Political Economy, 75 (5): 765–6.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Felsenthal, D. S., and Tideman, N. (2013) Varieties of failure of monotonicity and participation under five voting methods. Theory and Decision, 75 (1): 59–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fleurbaey, M., and Gaertner, W. (1996) Admissibility and feasibility in game forms. Analyse & Kritik, 18 (1): 54–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gaertner, W. (2012) Evaluating sets of objects in characteristics space. Social Choice and Welfare, 39: 303–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gaertner, W. (2017) Wickedness in social choice. Journal of Economic Surveys, 31 (2): 369–92.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gaertner, W., Pattanaik, P. K., and Suzumura, K. (1992) Individual rights revisited. Economica, 59: 161–78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gaertner, W., and Xu, Y. (2004) Procedural choice. Economic Theory, 24: 335–49.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gaertner, W., (2006) Capability sets as the basis of a new measure of human development. Journal of Human Development, 7 (3): 311–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gaertner, W., (2008) A new class of measures of the standard of living based on functionings. Economic Theory, 35 (2): 201–15.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gärdenfors, P. (1981) Rights, games and social choice. Nous, 15 (3): 341–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Harsanyi, J. C. (1955) Cardinal welfare, individualistic ethics, and interpersonal comparisons of utility. Journal of Political Economy, 63 (4): 309–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Korsgaard, C. M., and Gaertner, W. (1993) Commentators on Cohen and Sen. In The Quality of Life, Nussbaum, M. C., and Sen, A. K. (eds.): 54–66. Oxford: Clarendon Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lancaster, K. (1966). A new approach to consumer theory. Journal of Political Economy, 74 (2): 132–57.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Leininger, W. (1993) The fatal vote: Berlin versus Bonn. FinanzArchiv N. F., 50: 1–20.Google Scholar
Nozick, R. (1974) Anarchy, State, and Utopia. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Nurmi, H. (1987) Comparing Voting Systems. Dordrecht: D. Reidel Publishing.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nussbaum, M. C. (2000) Women and Human Development: The Capabilities Approach. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nussbaum, M. C. (2011) Creating Capabilities: The Human Development Approach. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pattanaik, P. K., and Xu, Y. (2017) On a concept of freedom. In Markets, Governance, and Institutions in the Process of Economic Development, Mishra, A., and Ray, T. (eds.): 31–46. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Peleg, B. (1998) Effectivity functions, game forms, games, and rights. Social Choice and Welfare, 15 (1): 67–80.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rawls, J. (1971) A Theory of Justice. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Saari, D. G. (1995) Basic Geometry of Voting. Berlin: Springer-Verlag.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Salas Montoya, M. F. (2017) The electoral college in theory and praxis: election inversions in the 2016 US elections. Manuscript. Humboldt University, Berlin.Google Scholar
Sen, A. (1970a) Collective Choice and Social Welfare. San Francisco: Holden-Day.Google Scholar
Sen, A. (1970b) The impossibility of a Paretian liberal. Journal of Political Economy, 78 (1): 152–7.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sen, A. (1985) Commodities and Capabilities. Amsterdam: North-Holland.Google Scholar
Sen, A. (1988) Freedom of choice: concept and content. European Economic Review, 32 (2/3): 269–94.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sen, A. (1997) Maximization and the act of choice. Econometrica, 65 (4): 745–79.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sen, A. (2002) Freedom and social choice: the Arrow lectures. In Rationality and Freedom: 581–712. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Sen, A. (2005) Human rights and capabilities. Journal of Human Development, 6 (2): 151–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sen, A. (2017) Collective Choice and Social Welfare, expanded edn. London: Penguin.Google Scholar
Sugden, R. (1993) Welfare, resources, and capabilities: a review of ‘Inequality Reexamined’ by Amartya Sen. Journal of Economic Literature, 31 (4): 1947–62.Google Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×