'
This Handbook
is a timely addition to the public/social choice literature. The editors have assembled an impressive list of authors who have contributed chapters covering a wide expanse of the literature starting with Iain McLean's chapter, which traces the public choice literature from Aristotle to the present, followed by surveys of recent developments like Keith L. Dougherty's excellent chapter on voting rules, and the equally fine chapter by Christopher Hare and Keith T. Poole on measuring ideology in Congress. Indeed, all contributions are of uniformly high quality. This Handbook
is a welcome addition to my bookshelf.'
- Dennis Mueller, University of Vienna, Austria
'This book gives a comprehensive and up-to-date overview of the rapidly expanding field of social choice and voting. Written in a non-technical style by a group of leading experts in the field, it makes a perfect reference book for scholars and students. The authors and editors are to be congratulated for making relatively complex ideas accessible even to readers with no background in the theory of voting. This makes the volume suitable not only for classroom use, but also for independent study.'
- Hannu Nurmi, University of Turku, Finland
This Handbook provides an overview of interdisciplinary research related to social choice and voting that is intended for a broad audience. Expert contributors from various fields present critical summaries of the existing literature, including intuitive explanations of technical terminology and well-known theorems, suggesting new directions for research.
Each chapter presents an expository primer on a particular topic or theme within social choice, with the aim of making the material fully accessible to students and scholars in economics, political science, mathematics, philosophy, law and other fields of study. Topics covered include preference aggregation, voting rules, spatial models, methodology and empirical applications.
Scholars, graduate students and even advanced undergraduates in a variety of disciplines will find this introductory and relatively non-technical book an indispensable addition to the field.
Contributors: J.F. Adams, W.T. Bianco, A. Blais, P.J. Coughlin, K.L. Dougherty, D.S. Felsenthal, T.H. Hammond, C. Hare, J.C. Heckelman, R.G. Holcombe, C. Kam, M.M. Kaminski, M. Machover, B.C. McCannon, I. McLean, N.R. Miller, S. Moser, E.M. Penn, K.T. Poole, R. Ragan, D.G. Saari, I. Sened, R.A. Smyth, N. Tideman