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- Title
The Impossibility of a Just Liberal.
- Authors
Kelly, Jerry S.
- Abstract
In the literature that tries to find a way around the difficulties suggested by Arrow's (1963) Impossibility Theorem, one strand has taken issue with the nature of the domain of the social welfare function (and often, at the same time, with independence of irrelevant alternatives). Arrow assumed that a social preference ordering was to be obtained by examining only individuals' (ordinal) preferences over social states. But several authors have suggested that, in doing so, he has excluded the possibility of making use of certain kinds of information that might aid us in making "good" social choices. <BR> A common remark is that, in this restricted format, Arrow ignores issues of "intensity" of preference. This is raised, for example, by Phelps (1973, p. 19), who relates this issue to "the matter of whether preferences are to be supposed representable by an ordinal utility function or instead by a cardinal utility function". However, simply seeing a difficulty in one of Arrow's conditions does not solve the problem, as those conditions were sufficient, not necessary, for revealing difficulties in social choice. Phelps continues: "It appears to have been proven by Sen [1970b], however, that representability of the individual preferences in terms of cardinal utility does not suffice to dispel Arrow's impossibility result." <BR> Another variant of this theme suggests that Arrow's framework ignores the information available from "extended sympathy". Arrow himself (1963, p. 114; 1967) raises this issue in talking about the English tombstone carving: <BR> Here lies Martin Englebrodde, Ha'e mercy on my soul, Lord God, As I would do were I Lord God, And thou wert Martin Englebrodde. <BR> Interpersonal comparisons of extended sympathy are of the form: state x is better for me than state y is for you; in operational form: it is better (in my judgment) to be myself in state x than to be you in state y. <BR> Comparisons of this sort have been formalized by Suppes (1966),...
- Subjects
WELFARE economics; ARROW, Kenneth Joseph, 1921-2017; IMPOSSIBILITY of performance; ECONOMISTS; PUBLIC welfare; ECONOMIC policy
- Publication
Economica, 1976, Vol 43, Issue 169, p67
- ISSN
0013-0427
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.2307/2553017