In this paper I study elections where the preferences of the voters are derived from their position in the social network. I argue that in some cases studying the ideology of the electorate is not the right way to understand the result of an election. In small electorates or in committees the personal connections can be much more important than political ideology. I develop a voting model where these personal connections add up to a social network and I study what network properties and the social structures lead to a voting equilibrium. I show that single peaked preferences on chain and tree networks are inherent in my model. Then I define a set of networks where the equilibrium is robust to changes in the intensity of a connection. Finally I derive the conditions of having a ballot (list of candidates) over which all voters’ preferences are single peaked.
Abstract
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