Citizen Voters' Power in Representative Systems :

MUTO Shigeo, OHNISHI Masamitsu, ONO Rie

doi:10.11218/ojjams.10.147

The aim of this paper is to analyze the ability of citizen-voters to affect outcomes of legislative decisions through the medium of their legislator's votes. To measure voter's power, the well-known Shapley-Shubik index (SS index) is used.<BR> We first review the following known fact. If the voting system is formulated as a traditional voting game, the index gives curious and counter-intuitive outcomes: these include in part the fact that power of a voter in a electoral district with even number of representatives is negligibly small. Then we present a new cooperative game formulation: its characteristic function is given by the number of representatives that each coalition of voters can control. In the new game formulation, the SS index of a voter is given by the ratio of the number of representatives apportioned to his/ her district to the number of voters in the district. In case elections of representatives in blocs, consisiting of several districts, are simultaneously carried out, the SS index of a voter is given by the sum of the ratios in his/ her district and in the bloc that contains the distirict. Finally citizen-voters' power in elections of the Japanese Upper and Lower Houses are measured in terms of the SS index in the modified game formulation.<BR> The Banzhaf index, another well-known and widely used power index, provides counter-intuitive outcomes not only in the voting game formulation but in the new mage formulation.

Citizen Voters' Power in Representative Systems :

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