The Logic of Collective Belief

Many political failure arguments implicitly assume that voters are irrational. (Wittman 1995, 1989; Coate and Morris 1995) This paper argues that this assumption is both theoretically and empirically plausible: In politics, rationality, like information, is a collective good that individuals have little incentive to supply. In consequence, voters are frequently not only rationally ignorant but also "rationally irrational." Rational irrationality leads to both demand side and supply side political failures: Competition not only pressures politicians to act on voters' biased estimates, but selects for politicians who genuinely share those biases. The analytical framework also sheds new light on log-rolling, political shirking and advertising, and politicians' human capital. For discussion and useful suggestions I would like to thank Don Boudreaux, Tyler Cowen, Pete Boettke, Jim Schneider, Geoffrey Brennan, Bill Dougan, Bill Dickens, Mitch Mitchell, Ed Lopez, J.C. Bradbury, Todd Zywicki, David Bernstein, Robin Hanson, Dan Klein, Alex Tabarrok, Nicky Tynan, Timur Kuran, Ron Heiner, seminar participants at George Mason, participants at the Public Choice Outreach seminar and the Public Choice Society meetings, and members of my Armchair Economists’ listserv. Gisele Silva provided excellent research assistance. The standard disclaimer applies.