Minority Voting Rights Can Maximize Majority Welfare

Abstract

I use Condorcet's information aggregation model to show that sometimes the best possible decision procedure for themajorityallows the minority to “enforce” its favored outcome even when overruled by a majority. “Special” voting power gives the minority an incentive to participate meaningfully, and more participation means more information is aggregated, which makes the majority better off. This result can be understood as a mathematical corroboration of Lani Guinier's arguments that voting procedures can be designed to encourage minority participation, benefitting everyone.