Which Preferences Can Democracy Serve?

Abstract

Democracy is often perceived or justified as a means to realizing voters' preferences. Two major difficulties have received much attention: how to aggregate votes and how to align the interests of representatives with the preferences of voters. This paper identifies a third difficulty which stems from the fact that some voters care not only about the electoral outcome (Outcome preferences) but also about the act of voting itself (Voting preferences). If Voting and Outcome preferences are incongruent, then democracy may not be able to satisfy voters’ preferences even if all voters have identical preferences and if all representatives scrupulously implement the policies voters choose. Indeed, as no voter is likely to be pivotal, rational voters would tend to vote primarily on the basis of their Voting preferences. In this case, the person elected (or the policy executed) may not be the one voters wish to see elected (or executed). Taking Voting preferences seriously sheds new light on classical controversies in political theory, e.g., the delegate/trustee controversy, the democratic deficit, and judicial review. We show that, at times, seemingly undemocratic practices could be understood as a means to facilitate the simultaneous satisfaction of both Outcome and Voting preferences.