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Social Norms and the Paradox of Elections’ Turnout

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Abstract

People vote although their marginal gain from voting is zero.We contribute to the resolution of this paradox by presentinga model for equilibrium configuration of attitudes regardingthe decision to vote. Each individual is seen as an element ofa social network, within which pairs of individuals expressideas and attitudes, exerting mutual influence. We model therole of such networks in propagating the mutual influenceacross pairs of individuals. We show that it may suffice thata small set of individuals have a strong feeling about showingup to vote to generate a significant turnout in elections.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Faculdade de Economia, Campus de Campolide, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, 1099-032, Lisboa, Portugal

    João Amaro de Matos & Pedro P. Barros

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  1. João Amaro de Matos
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  2. Pedro P. Barros
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Amaro de Matos, J., Barros, P.P. Social Norms and the Paradox of Elections’ Turnout. Public Choice 121, 239–255 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11127-004-2251-4

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