An Economic Theory of Democracy

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An Economic Theory of Democracy is the title of a monograph by the American political and economist Anthony Downs , published in 1957 . A German-language edition was published in 1968 under the title “Economic Theory of Democracy”. In the book, Downs develops an explanation, based on economic premises, of the relationships between parties and voters in a democracy and of the behavior of individuals in political elections . The work is considered the basis of the rational choice approach in electoral research and a classic of political theory .

content

In the work "An Economic Theory of Democracy", with which Anthony Downs published his dissertation thesis submitted to Stanford University in unchanged form , he developed a conception of the political system in a democratic one based on ideas from Max Weber and Joseph Schumpeter, based on economic principles State. In this sense, he viewed parties as providers and voters as consumers of a market . This basic model, which he described in the first part of the book, is based on the assumption that these two groups behave rationally and strive to maximize their “utility income”. According to this premise, voters choose the alternative in a political election which they believe will best enable them to achieve their own goals. In terms of their utility income, the decisive factor for the voters is the achievement of given goals, primarily of an economic and political nature. Anthony Downs, on the other hand, sees the utility income of the parties as the advantages that they achieve from obtaining public office. In this regard, he defines winning elections as the only purpose pursued by the parties, which is why they are not tied to any particular content-related programs , since these only function as a means to an end.

In the second part of his work, Downs addressed the importance of uncertainty in the decisions of parties and voters. In his opinion, voters orientate themselves primarily on the “party ideology”, a mapping of all political positions on a one-dimensional left-right scale, which saves them information costs. In his opinion, the parties choose the position on this scale that ensures them a maximum of votes. The result is a convergence of the parties' positioning in the political center . The third part of the book is devoted to the relationship between information costs and utility income, as well as the resulting consequences for the behavior of voters. In this regard, Downs posits that voters would only be willing to invest information costs if their vote played a role in the outcome of the election. Since this is very unlikely, voters are “rational ignoramuses” of political issues. Furthermore, he assumes that the participation of individuals in elections can only be explained by the fact that they see a value in the vote itself, such as a contribution to maintaining democracy.

criticism

The considerations presented by Anthony Downs in “An Economic Theory of Democracy” called into question, among other things, his view of political parties and the party system. This is especially true for its emphasis on the importance of the total electorate for the conduct of parties rather than the influence of core voters that are comparable to investors could set the parties on certain actions in terms of investor interests.

The failure to consider factors influencing voting behavior that result from other theories of electoral research was also criticized. This applies, for example, to party identification , the evaluation of the candidates by the voters and socio-structural factors. According to Jürgen Habermas , rationally acting actors would not, strictly speaking, have sufficient reasons to comply with the democratic rules of the game. Anthony Downs' overall model, which essentially consists of voters, parties, governments and the right to vote , has also been criticized for being oversimplified.

meaning

With the book "An Economic Theory of Democracy", Anthony Downs laid the foundation for the rational choice approach to explaining voter behavior, which, alongside that of Angus Campbell and his collaborators Philip E. Converse , Warren E. Miller and Donald E. Stokes in her essay “ The American Voter ” based Ann Arbor model and the microsociological school of thought, which goes back to Paul Felix Lazarsfeld's work “ The People's Choice ”, is one of the three main currents of electoral research . For this reason, the book is considered a classic of political theory and one of the most important publications on the theory of rational decision-making . The importance of the work arises from the fact that Anthony Downs postulated theoretical explanations based on a few assumptions for various already known facts, such as the tendency of party positions towards the political center, low voter turnout and the low level of political interest of the voters. He also formulated a series of testable sentences that he derived from his theoretical considerations.

literature

  • Anthony Downs: An Economic Theory of Democracy. Harper & Brothers, New York 1957
  • Anthony Downs, Rudolf Wildenmann (ed.): Economic theory of democracy. JCB Mohr (Paul Siebeck), Tübingen 1968. Reading sample books.google
  • Joachim Behnke: Anthony Downs, An Economic Theory of Democracy, Stanford 1957. In: Steffen Kailitz (Ed.): Key works of political science. VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, Wiesbaden 2007, ISBN 978-3-531-14005-6 , pp. 96-99
  • Manfred G. Schmidt: Economic theory of democracy: Anthony Downs. In: Theories of Democracy: An Introduction. Fifth edition. VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, Wiesbaden 2010, ISBN 3-53-117310-3 , pp. 196–209