Arrowian characterizations of latticial federation consensus functions (Q1813338)

The paper begins with a construction of an axiomatic theory of consensus functions, where a consensus function is a function from \(L^ n\) to \(L\), \(L\) being a semi-lattice. The motivation for studying consensus functions is the central role they play in social choice theory. More specifically, the author is interested in the construction of an ``abstract'' theory in order to account for what the author claims to be two main strands in social choice theory; the first imposes axioms that lead to ``oligarchic'' or ``dictatorial'' functions, the second imposes conditions that generalize the classical majority rule. The major observation is that the consensus functions obtained in these cases can often be expressed by means of lattice operations, and that the objects that one works with in these cases are lattices and semi-lattices. The author obtains several axiomatic characterizations of all federation consensus functions, and especially of the meet projection (``oligarchic'') consensus functions.