Unpopular Policies and the Theory of Representative Democracy

  • Pierre Salmon
Chapter
Part of the International Studies in Economics and Econometrics book series (ISEE, volume 28)

Abstract

Their platforms reflect concern with enhancing the probability of being elected, but some candidates often, or all candidates occasionally, voluntarily adopt stances that reduce that probability. Governments care about their popularity, but sometimes they choose, even before an election, to announce or implement policies that are unpopular. For most people, the phenomenon is no news and is not altogether a unhappy one. Deprecating words such as demagogy or “mob rule” and praising ones such as leadership or statesmanship express a deeply-rooted, widely-shared concern about the possibility that democratic politicians could be too subservient to public opinion.

Keywords

Public Choice Public Opinion Policy Preference Policy Position Policy Space 
These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.
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Copyright information

© Springer Science+Business Media New York 1993

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  • Pierre Salmon

There are no affiliations available

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