Meetings with costly participation

We study a collective decision-making process in which people who are interested in an issue are invited to attend a meeting, and the policy chosen is a compromise among the preferences of those who show up. We show that in an equilibrium the number of attendees is small and their positions are extreme; in a wide range of circumstances the outcome is random. These characteristics of an equilibrium are consistent with evidence on the outcome of hearings on us regulatory policy. We thank Carolyn Pitchik for comments. Copyright c 1998 by Martin J. Osborne, Je rey S. Rosenthal, and Matthew A. Turner.