Abstract
We offer a new proof of the well-known Arrow’s impossibility theorem. The proof is simple, very short and it follows from the assumptions in a transparent way.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Arrow K.J.: Social Choice and Individual Values. Wiley, NewYork (1951)
Barberá S.: Pivotal voters: a new proof of Arrow’s theorem. Econ Lett 6(1), 13–16 (1980)
Geanakoplos J.: Three brief proofs of Arrow’s Impossibility Theorem. Econ Theory 26(1), 211–215 (2005)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
I would like to thank Professor Matthew O. Jackson for some of the notations, and Professor Kenneth J. Arrow, Michael Leung, Paul Wong, three anonymous reviewers, and the editor Professor Nicholas C. Yannelis for very helpful comments. This study is supported by NSFC (71073102 and 70703023). I am also grateful for generous support from the Koret Foundation Stanford Graduate Fellowship Fund.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Yu, N.N. A one-shot proof of Arrow’s impossibility theorem. Econ Theory 50, 523–525 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00199-012-0693-3
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00199-012-0693-3