Abstract
A definition of a social state is proposed that incorporates the notion of procedural fairness into Harsanyi's (1955) analytical framework. We show that, within the new framework, a Harsanyi-type social welfare function is immune to Diamond's (1967) criticism. Moreover, the resulting social welfare function embodies the notion of procedural fairness held by individual members of the society.
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The author would like to thank Larry Epstein, Mark Machina, Zvi Safra, David Schmeidler, and Uzi Segal for very useful conversations, and John Weymark and two anonymous referees, for their valuable comments on an earlier version of this paper.
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Karni, E. Social welfare functions and fairness. Soc Choice Welfare 13, 487–496 (1996). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00182859
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00182859