Description
This book is about the social choice theory of Duncan Black and his work on committees and elections. Black focuses on the mathematics of these topics in order to describe the ways in which different voting systems can produce different results. This information can be used to determine whether a candidate or motion is agreeable to all or only to a majority of voters. Black also provides a history of the political science of elections and discusses the work of earlier theorists. This book is accessible to readers who have a basic understanding of mathematics and economics.
In this book, first published in 1958, the social choice theorist and economist Duncan Black aims to formulate a pure science of politics. Focusing on the mathematics of committees and, accordingly, of elections, Black's writing engages with the theories of Condorcet, Borda and Laplace in order to describe the ways in which different systems of voting will yield different results. This can, as Black discusses in detail, influence whether the chosen candidate or motion is relatively agreeable to all, or only suited to the majority group of voters. Black also presents a history of the political science of elections, placing his own work within the context of earlier research and thought on this subject. Professor Black ensures that only a basic knowledge of arithmetic is needed to understand his arguments, although his methods of reasoning will be more familiar to those readers who have previously studied mathematics and economics.
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