ON SURFACES OF CONSTANT SOCIETAL LOSS IN A MODEL OF SOCIAL CHOICE.

There are of course many factors that influence social policy in a democratic society, one factor being that the rulers of a democratic society cannot totally ignore the will of the people. Recent years have witnessed an increasing interest in the problem of making social choices. The ruler of a democratic society may be more concerned with maintaining power than with having his society incur a minimal loss. In these later works the authors do not consider the position that would be assumed by a beneficent dictator. It is instructive to look at this position for several reasons. First, in the Davis and Hinich model a dominant strategy cannot always be guaranteed. This can put the candidate in a quandary, and, not being able to think of a strategy more suited to his desire for re-election, he might try to adopt the position of the beneficent dictator which is easy to find under mild restrictions. He also might wish to pay lip-service to this strategy in any case. Second, the position of the beneficent dictator may actually be his best strategy under a slightly different model of the electoral process.