ANRV377-PL12-05 ARI 7 April 2009 7:34

Self-Governmentin Our TimesAdam Przeworski∗

Department of Politics, New York University, New York, New York 10003;email: adam.przeworski@nyu.edu

Annu. Rev. Polit. Sci. 2009. 12:71–92

The Annual Review of Political Science is online atpolisci.annualreviews.org

This article’s doi:10.1146/annurev.polisci.062408.120543

Copyright c© 2009 by Annual Reviews.All rights reserved

1094-2939/09/0615-0071$20.00

∗This is a much revised version of the MaxWeber Lecture given in 2008 at the EuropeanUniversity Institute, Florence. Earlier versionswere presented at the Seminar on Democracy:Ancient and Modern, Fondazione AdrianoOlivetti in Rome, 2005; Beijing Forum 2007,Tsinghua University in Beijing; FudanUniversity in Shanghai 2007; IDES in BuenosAires 2007; and FLACSO in Quito 2008.

Key Words

equality, participation, agency, liberty

AbstractThe eighteenth-century ideal of self-government of the people wasbased on an assumption that renders it incoherent and unrealistic,namely, that interests and values are sufficiently harmonious that eachindividual needs to obey only himself while living under laws chosen byall. This conception collapses in the presence of heterogeneous pref-erences. Yet a weaker notion of self-government is logically coherent:A collectivity governs itself if decisions implemented on its behalf re-flect the preferences of its members. I define this second-best self-government and analyze whether democratic institutions can satisfyeven this definition.

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INTRODUCTIONThe representative institutions under which welive today evolved from a revolutionary idea thatshook the world in the second part of the eigh-teenth century, namely, that a people shouldgovern itself. Only when equal citizens deter-mine the laws under which they live are theyfree, and liberty is the ultimate political value—“everything,” as many said. Yet if we judge con-temporary democracies by the ideals of self-government, equality, and liberty, we find thatthey are not what they were dreamt to be. Couldthey have been? And if they could have been,can we today implement these ideals? These arethe questions that motivate and structure whatfollows.

“Democracy,” with all its changing mean-ings, recurrently confronted four challengesthat continue to feed widespread and intensedissatisfaction today: (a) incapacity to gener-ate equality in the social and economic realms(b) incapacity to make people feel that theirparticipation is effective, (c) incapacity toassure that governments do what they are sup-posed to do, and (d ) incapacity to balanceorder and noninterference. Still, democracy in-cessantly rekindles our hopes. We are perenni-ally eager to be lured by promises, to put ourstakes on electoral bets. True, those who aredissatisfied with the functioning of democracyare less likely to see it as the best system un-der all circumstances. Yet even more hope thatdemocratic institutions can be improved, thatall which is valuable in democracy can be main-tained while the malfunctions can be elimi-nated. Whether this is a reasonable hope is to beinvestigated.

The question, thus, is which of these “inca-pacities” are contingent—specific to particularconditions and institutional arrangements, andhence remediable—and which are structural,inherent in any system of representative gov-ernment. My ultimate concern is with the lim-its: How much equality can democracy gener-ate? How effective can it make participation ofvarious kinds? How well can it protect everyonesimultaneously from each other and from the

government? What should we expect of democ-racy? Which dreams are realistic and whichfutile?

Here is a sketch of the answer given below.The premise of the original conception of self-government was that everyone has the samepreferences about the legal order under whicheach and all want to live. This assumption of ho-mogeneity collapsed in the presence of conflictsover values, interests, or norms. Yet a weakernotion of self-government is logically coherent:A collectivity governs itself if decisions imple-mented on its behalf reflect the preferences ofits members. Although this understanding is farfrom new, it is important to identify the second-best: the best self-government under the con-straint that some people have to live under lawsthey do not like because these laws are pre-ferred by others. This second-best is plausiblydefined by four conditions: (a) everyone musthave equal influence over collective decisions,(b) everyone must have some effective influenceover collective decisions, (c) collective decisionsmust be implemented by those selected to im-plement them, and (d ) the legal order mustenable secure cooperation without undue in-terference. To identify the limits of democracy,we must investigate whether these conditionscan be satisfied, singly and simultaneously, byany system of institutions.

Let me preview the argument in differentlanguage. J.S. Mill (1989 [1859], pp. 7–8) wasperhaps the first to observe that all cannot gov-ern at the same time, a point developed force-fully by Kelsen (1988 [1929]). Moreover, in thepresence of heterogeneity, it matters to all whodoes govern. The classical Greek remedy wasfor everyone to take turns at ruling and obey-ing, but this rotation mechanism cannot beimplemented in large societies, where mostpeople would never get to rule. What can berealized is a mechanism through which peoplewho never govern themselves select their rulersand can select different rulers if they so wish.Democracy as we know it today is this mecha-nism. But no system of representative govern-ment can satisfy even the second-best ideal of

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self-government. Effective political equality isundermined by economic and social inequality.Participation cannot be effective and equal atthe same time. Some agency costs are inevitable.And the proper balance between legal securityand noninterference cannot be identified onceand for all.

To provide evidence that the founders couldnot even imagine what democracy would be-come, this article begins with a history of ideas.The first section below analyzes the origi-nal conception of self-government. The nexthighlights the issues inherent in understand-ing democracy as a system for processing con-flicts. The third section makes a brief detourto Athens, showing an alternative to the mod-ern conception of self-government. With thishistorical background, I discuss the conditionsunder which self-government can be said tooccur in societies with heterogeneous prefer-ences and analyze the limits to democracy as weunderstand it today.

SELF-GOVERNMENTOF THE PEOPLE

The problem, as posed by Rousseau (1964[1762], p. 182), was to “find a form of asso-ciation which defends and protects with all theshared force the person and the goods of eachassociate, and through which each, uniting withall, still obeys but himself, remaining as free asbefore.” Self-government of the people was thesolution to this problem. Self-government, inturn, was desirable because it was the best sys-tem to advance liberty, understood in a partic-ular way as “autonomy”: We are free when weare bound only by laws we choose. This is thesource of the “power and appeal of democracy”(Dunn 1993, p. vi). “In sharp contrast to the au-tocratic alternative,” writes another contempo-rary theorist (Lakoff 1996, p. 155), “democracyaims to empower all citizens in equal measure.However short of this claim democracies mayfall, it is this goal—the goal of autonomy—thatcharacterizes them most centrally in normativeand empirical terms.”

What could it mean that “the people gov-erns itself”?1 Note that “the people” alwaysappears in this phrase in singular, as le peuple,el pueblo, das Volk, lud, etc. This people in sin-gular is the only authority that can enact lawsto which it would be subject. As Montesquieu(1995 [1748], p. 104) observed, it is “a fun-damental law in democracies, that the peo-ple should have the sole power to enact laws.”Democracy, said Rousseau (1964 [1762], p. 47),is a state “where the subjects and the sovereignare but the same men considered under differ-ent relations.” Clearly, not all commands con-stitute laws; to qualify as laws, commands mustsatisfy certain substantive criteria, such as thoselisted by Fuller (1964). Moreover, ruling entailscommands other than laws; it is not limited tolegislating. Still, if only the people can enactlaws, the people is always bound only by laws ofits own making. And because the laws by whichthe people is bound are of its own making, thepeople is free. Hence, at the end of this cascadeof tautologies, the people is free, subject onlyto those laws it chose, when the people gov-erns itself. In Kant’s (1891 [1793], p. 43) render-ing, “it is only when all determine all about allthat each one in consequence determines aboutitself.”

Yet the people in singular cannot act. Asthe Demiurge, the people is an apathetic one.This is why Rousseau (1964 [1762], p. 184)needed to make terminological distinctions: “Asfor those associated, they collectively take thename of the people, and are called in particu-lar Citizens as participants in the sovereign au-thority and Subjects as submitted to the lawsof the State.” Kant (1891, p. 35) made sim-ilar distinctions when he spoke of everyone’sLiberty as a Man, Equality as a Subject, andSelf-dependency (self-sufficiency, autonomy) asa Citizen. But how is the will of the people insingular to be determined by people in plural?

1For an enlightening linguistic analysis of reflexive propo-sitions, of the form “I verb myself,” where the politicallyrelevant verbs are “command,” “obey,” or more generally“govern,” see Descombes (2004).

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One is free when one rules oneself, but is onefree when the people rules?

Clearly, these questions do not arise if all in-dividuals are in some way identical, if the sub-jects who choose the order they are to obey arebut copies of a species. As Descombes (2004,p. 337) puts it, “the man as subject is not this orthat man, but rather something like the ratio-nal faculty which is found among human indi-viduals, everywhere identical.” In Kant’s view,guided by universal reason, each and all indi-viduals want to live under the same laws, “ForReason itself wills this.” And if the same legalorder is considered best by all, the decision ofeach is the same as would be that of all others.Indeed, the fact that others want the same is ir-relevant: If others command me to do the sameI command myself to do, I obey but myself.Moreover, the procedure for law making is in-consequential: When everyone wants the same,all procedures generate the same decision. Eachone and any subset of all can dictate to all oth-ers with their consent. Finally, this decisionevokes spontaneous compliance: If each indi-vidual lives under the laws of his or her choice,no one needs to be coerced to follow them.

Hence, the condition under which the peo-ple would be free in plural when they rule them-selves, collectively autonomous, is that each andall want to live under the same laws. Represen-tative government was born under an ideologythat postulated a basic harmony of interests insociety.

This is not to say that the founders of repre-sentative institutions were blind to conflicts, tothe manifest fact that not everyone would agreeto everything. Some social divisions were seenas inevitable. As Madison, educated in Hume,observed in Federalist #10, “the latent sourcesof faction are . . . sown in the nature of man.”Hume (2002 [1742]) himself thought thatdivisions based on material interests were lessdangerous than those based on principles, par-ticularly religious values, or affection. Not evenSieyes maintained that the consensus must in-clude all issues: “That people unite in the com-mon interest is not to say that they put all theirinterests in common” (cited by Pasquino 1998,

p. 48). Condorcet (1986 [1785], p. 22) pointedout that “what is entailed in a law that was notadopted unanimously is submitting people toan opinion which is not theirs or to a decisionwhich they believe to be contrary to their inter-est.” The classical argument admitted that peo-ple may disagree about many issues; it claimedonly that some values or interests bind themtogether so strongly that whatever is commonoverwhelms all the divisions. All that was re-quired was an agreement on some basics, or inRousseau’s (1964 [1762], p. 66) words, “somepoint in which all interests agree.”

Yet even those who recognized the in-evitability of social divisions saw parties orfactions as spurious divisions of a naturally inte-gral body, products of ambitions of politicians,rather than reflections of any prepolitical dif-ferences or conflicts.2 The people were a body,and “No body, corporeal or political, could sur-vive if its members worked at cross-purposes”(Ball 1989, p. 160). Proponents of representa-tive government thought that since the peoplewas naturally united, it could be divided onlyartificially. As Hofstadter (1969, p. 12) reports,eighteenth-century thinkers “often postulatedthat society should be pervaded by concord andgoverned by a consensus that approached, if itdid not attain, unanimity. Party, and the ma-licious and mendacious spirit it encouraged,were believed only to create social conflictsthat would not otherwise occur . . . .” GeorgeWashington (2002 [1796], p. 48) sermonizedagainst the “spirit of party,” warning in hisFarewell Address that it “serves to distract thepublic councils and enfeeble the public ad-ministration. It agitates the community withill-founded jealousies and false alarms, kin-dles the animosity of one part against another,foments occasionally riots and insurrections.It opens the door to foreign influence andcorruption . . . .” His successor, John Adams,

2Rosenblum (2008, Pt. I) distinguishes two traditions of an-tipartyism: holism, which assumes a harmony of interests,and pluralist antipartyism, which recognizes divisions butsees them as nefarious. She provides extensive evidence ofantipartisan views.

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remarked, “There is nothing I dread so much asa division of the republic into two great parties,each arranged under its leader, and concertingmeasures in opposition to each other” (quotedby Dunn 2004, p. 39). Ironically, one solu-tion to partisan divisions, advocated by JamesMonroe (Hofstadter 1969, p. 23) could be asingle party, uniting everyone in the pursuitof common good. However unity was to beattained, unity had to prevail.

Partisan divisions had to be moderatedand mitigated by a proper design of rep-resentative institutions. “If separate interestsbe not checked, and not be directed to thepublic,” Hume (2002 [1742]) predicted, “weought to look for nothing but faction, disor-der, and tyranny from such government.” Thefirst virtue of the U.S. Constitution Madisonvaunted in the opening sentence of Federalist#10 was its “tendency to break and control theviolence of factions.” Madison recognized thatdifferences of passions and interests are ubiqui-tous and inevitable; moreover, their most com-mon and durable source is the “various andunequal distribution of property.” Such differ-ences must not be permitted to enter into therealm of politics. But the cost of prohibitingthem would be the loss of liberty. Thus, Madi-son concluded that “the causes of faction cannotbe removed; and that relief is only to be soughtin the means of controlling its effects.”

The French were less concerned about lib-erty. The last decree of the French ConstituentAssembly of 1791 stated: “No society, club, as-sociation of citizens can have, in any form, apolitical existence, nor exercise any kind of in-spection over the act of constituted powers andlegal authorities; under no pretext can they ap-pear under a collective name, whether to formpetitions or deputations, participate in publicceremonies, or whatever other goal” (quotedby Rosanvallon 2004, p. 59). This principleseems to have traveled; the 1830 Constitution ofUruguay also made it illegal for citizens to orga-nize into associations (Lopez-Alves 2000, p. 55).

The hostility to parties was so profoundthat they were banned in German principali-ties in 1842; in some countries it was illegal to

refer to parties in the parliament until 1914; andmass parties became fully legal in France onlyin 1901. Although Burke (2002, p. 40) defendedparties in 1770, he reverted to what everyoneelse considered a wishful view: “Party is a bodyof men united for promoting by their joint en-deavours the national interest upon some prin-ciple in which they are all agreed.” Henry Peter,Lord Brougham (2002, p. 52) referred in 1839to party government as “this most anomalousstate of things—this arrangement of political af-fairs which systematically excludes at least onehalf of the great men of each age from theircountry’s service, and devotes both classes in-finitely more to maintaining a conflict with oneanother than to furthering the general good.”“Party government” was a negative term, con-noting conflicts motivated by personal ambi-tions of politicians, “obsession with winningpower by winning elections,”3 and the pursuitof particularistic interests—altogether a ratherunsavory spectacle. It required a remedy in theform of some neutral, moderating power, suchas the Emperor in the 1825 Brazilian Constitu-tion or the President in the Weimar Constitu-tion. Yet, as Schmitt (1993) observes, even thissolution was devoured by partisan politics; inthe end, presidents were elected by parties. Andwhen this solution failed, constitutional reviewby independent courts emerged to constrainparty government (Pasquino 1998, p. 153).

Although representative government meantthat people have the right to organize inorder to remove the incumbent governmentthrough elections, the proper role of the peo-ple in between elections remained, and con-tinues to remain, ambiguous. Madison (1982[1788]) observed in Federalist #63 that what dis-tinguished the American from the ancient re-publics “lies in the total exclusion of the people,in their collective capacity from any share in thegovernment.” He seems to have meant it lit-erally, that the people should leave governingto their representatives “as a defense against

3German President Richard von Weizsaker quoted byScarrow (2002, p. 1).

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their own temporary errors and delusions.”According to Hofstadter (1969, p. 9):

When [the Founders] began their work, theyspoke a great deal—indeed they spoke almostincessantly—about freedom, and they under-stood that freedom requires some latitude foropposition. But they were far from clear howopposition should make itself felt, for they alsovalued social unity or harmony, and they hadnot arrived at the view that opposition, mani-fested in organized popular parties, could sus-tain freedom without fatally shattering suchharmony.

Lavaux (1998, p. 140) observes, “The concep-tions of democracies that emerged from the tra-dition of the Social Contract do not necessarilytreat the role of the minority as that of the op-position. Democracy conceived as identity ofthe rulers and the ruled does not leave roomfor recognizing the right of opposition.” Thenotion that people can freely oppose the gov-ernment elected by a majority emerged onlygradually and painfully everywhere, the UnitedStates included. After all, Hofstadter (1969,p. 7) is right: “The normal view of governmentsabout organized opposition is that it is intrinsi-cally subversive and illegitimate.”

DEMOCRACY AS A METHODOF PROCESSING CONFLICTS

Following Kelsen, theorists of democracy takeit as the point of departure that all citizens can-not rule at the same time. “[I]t is not possiblefor all individuals who are compelled and ruledby the norms of the state to participate in theircreation, which is the necessary form of exer-cise of power; this seems so evident that thedemocratic ideologists most often do not sus-pect what abyss they conceal when they makethe two ‘people’ [in singular and in plural] one.”People must be represented and they can berepresented only through political parties. Iso-lated individuals cannot have any influence overthe formation of the general will; they existpolitically only through parties (Kelsen 1988[1929], p. 29).

No other aspect of democratic ideology un-derwent as sharp a turnabout as the attitude to-ward political parties. Consider Madison him-self. As soon as he found himself in oppositionto Hamilton’s policies, by the spring of 1791, heundertook with Jefferson a trip through NewYork and Vermont with no purpose other thanto create a party (see Dunn (2004, pp. 47–61). Although he still believed that ideally, ifeconomic differences could be reduced, par-ties would not be necessary, he came to rec-ognize that “the great art of politicians lies inmaking one party a check on another” (quotedby Dunn 2004, p. 53). And toward the end ofhis life, at some time between 1821 and 1829,Madison would arrive at the conclusion (quotedby Ketcham 1986, p. 153) that “No free Coun-try has ever been without parties, which are anatural offspring of Freedom.”

First partisan divisions emerged in Englandin 1679–80. Laslett (1988, p. 31) considers the1681 “Instructions to the Knights of the Coun-try of — for their Conduct in Parliament,”perhaps written by Locke, as the first party doc-ument in history. In the United States, polar-ization over the policy toward France led to therise of parties in 1794, even if the FederalistParty dissipated after the defeat of 1800 and atwo-party system crystallized only a quarter of acentury later. In France, parties became recog-nizable in 1828. In some Latin American coun-tries, notably Colombia and Uruguay, partiesemerged from the wars of independence evenbefore the formation of the state (Lopez-Alves2000).

By 1929, Kelsen (1988, p. 29) would observethat “[m]odern democracy rests entirely onpolitical parties . . . .” Several post-1945 consti-tutions recognized parties as institutions essen-tial to democracy (Lavaux 1998, pp. 67–68).4

4The Italian Constitution of 1947 was the first to mentionthe role of parties in “the determination of national pol-icy” (Article 2). The Bonn Constitution of 1949 (Article 21)and the Spanish one of 1978 render to parties a constitu-tional status. The Swedish Constitution of 1974 mentions thepreeminent role of parties in the formation of the democraticwill.

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Moreover, parties developed the capacity to dis-cipline the behavior of their members in legis-latures, so that individual representatives couldno longer exercise their own reason. Indeed, insome countries representatives are legally com-pelled to resign their mandate if they changeparties; the law recognizes that they serve onlyas party members.

Parties, in turn, have followers and lead-ers, who become representatives through elec-tions. Representatives will for the people.“Parliamentarism,” says Kelsen (1988 [1929],p. 38), “is the formation of the directive willof the State by a collegial organ elected bythe people . . . . [T]he will of the State gener-ated by the Parliament is not the will of thepeople . . . .” Schumpeter (1942, p. 269) echoes:“Suppose we reverse the roles of these two el-ements and make the deciding of issues by theelectorate secondary to the election of the menwho are to do the deciding.” Although in theclassical theory “the democratic method is thatinstitutional arrangement for arriving at polit-ical decisions . . . by making the people decideissues through the election of individuals whoare to assemble in order to carry out its will,”in fact the democratic method is one in whichthe individuals who are to assemble to willfor the people are selected through elections(Schumpeter 1942, p. 250).

Up to this point, these views do not di-verge as far from the classical conception asSchumpeter would have it. Although Madi-son or Sieyes would be uncomfortable withthe emphasis on interests and parties, theywould have agreed that the role of representa-tives is to determine for the people, and some-times against the people, what is good for them(Sieyes 1970 [1789]). But here comes the cru-cial break with the classical tradition: Kelsen,Schumpeter, Bobbio, Dahl, and Downs allagree that nobody and no body can representthe will of all the people. In sharp contradistinc-tion to the classical view, these theorists main-tain that political parties represent distinct in-terests. The theory of democracy based on theassumption of the common good is incoher-ent. As Shklar (1979, p. 14) puts it, in an article

entitled “Let Us Not Be Hypocritical,” “A peo-ple is not just a political entity, as was oncehoped. Parties, organized campaigns, and lead-ers make up the reality, if not the promise, ofelectoral regimes . . . .”

Kelsen (1988 [1929], pp. 25–26) was perhapsthe first to systematically challenge the theoryof self-government based on the assumption ofconsensus: “Divided by national, religious andeconomic differences, the people presents itselfto the view of a sociologist more as a multiplicityof distinct groups than as a coherent mass of onepiece.” He rejects what Schumpeter would dub“the classical conception” with an equal vigor:“Moreover, the ideal of a general interest supe-rior [to] and transcending interests of groups,thus parties, the ideal of solidarity of interestsof all members of the collectivity without dis-tinction of religion, of nationality, of class, etc.is a metaphysical, more exactly, a metapoliticalillusion, habitually expressed by speaking, in anextremely obscure terminology, of an ‘organic’collective or ‘organic’ structure . . . .” (Kelsen1988 [1929], pp. 32–33).

Schumpeter (1942, p. 250ff) offers a system-atic critique of the concept of the common goodor general will by making four points:

1. “There is no such thing as a uniquely de-termined common good that all peoplecould agree on or be made to agree on bythe force of rational argument.”

2. The individual preferences which theutilitarians adopted to justify their con-ception of common good are not au-tonomous but shaped by persuasion, “nota genuine but a manufactured will.”

3. Even if a common will would emergefrom the democratic process,5 it need nothave the rational sanction of necessarilyidentifying the common good. Given thepathologies of mass psychology, nothingguarantees that people would recognizewhat is good for them.

5The difficulty of identifying the common will was recog-nized only nine years after Schumpeter published his text, byArrow (1951).

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4. Even if we could know the common good,there would still be controversies abouthow to implement it.

If no parliament or government can rep-resent of all the people, is democracy just amethod for imposing the will of some, who hap-pen to constitute a numerical majority, on oth-ers? Schumpeter (1942, pp. 272–73) does posethe question but quickly dismisses the only neg-ative answer that occurs to him, proportionalrepresentation. “Evidently,” he observes, “thewill of the majority is the will of the majorityand not the will of ‘the people.’” He insists thatthe “principle of democracy merely means thereins of government should be handed to thosewho command more support than do any of thecompeting individuals or teams.”

Kelsen (1988 [1929], p. 34) does offer a so-lution: compromise among parties. He arguesthat “the general will, if it should not expressthe interest of a single and unique group, canbe only a result of such oppositions, a compro-mise between opposing interests. The forma-tion of the people in political parties is in factan organization necessary to realize such com-promises, so that the general will could move inthe middle (dans une ligne moyenne).” He main-tains (p. 65) that the “application of the ma-jority principle contains quasi-natural limits.Majority and minority must understand eachother if they are to agree.” But here Kelsenencounters a problem so thorny that its solu-tion relies on Freudian psychology, the “un-conscious”: Why would “compromise,” in factconcessions made by the majority to the mi-nority, be specific to democracy? He claims—erroneously, in the light of recent research(Gandhi 2008)—that autocracies do not com-promise.6 The only reason Kelsen can adduce ispsychological: “Democracy and autocracy thusdistinguish themselves by a psychological dif-ference in their political state” (p. 64). But if

6The difference between these two types of regimes is notthat compromises occur only under democracy but that au-tocracies can be, and many are, ruled by a minority. But dic-tators also combine repression with cooptation to maintaintheir rule (Gandhi & Przeworski 2006).

this solution—preserving political rule by mak-ing concessions—is not exclusive to democracy,a central value Kelsen claims for democracyvanishes.

Bobbio (1989, p. 116) observes that thenormal procedure for making decisions underdemocracy is one in which “collective decisionsare the fruit of negotiation and agreementsbetween groups which represent social forces(unions) and political forces (parties) ratherthan an assembly where majority voting oper-ates,” a view he attributes to Max Weber. Andwhen party leaders negotiate, the role of votersis reduced to a minimum. All voters can do is toratify agreements “reached in other places bythe process of negotiation.”

Compromise among party leaders, subjectto periodic ratification by voters, is as muchas Kelsen or Bobbio can salvage from theclassical conception of self-government. Self-government now means the government ofparties in the parliament. Parties do not pur-sue the common good but search for compro-mises among conflicting interests. Bargainingreplaces deliberation. The outcomes are to alarge extent independent of results of elections.The specificity of democracy is reduced to therequirement that from time to time these bar-gains must be approved by voters. Yet all voterscan do is either to approve the deals negotiatedby party leaders or to throw the rascals out (inthe language of the recent Argentine outburstagainst the political class, “fuera todos!,” every-one out). And then?

In what follows, I offer an alternative view.Even if at each time a government can repre-sent only some people, it represents as manyas possible. And if majorities so wish, partiestake turns, so that most people are representedsome of the time. Although the people does notgovern itself, it can be governed by differentothers in turn.

SELF-GOVERNMENTAND ROTATION IN OFFICE

To understand the modern conception of self-government, it is enlightening to take a detour

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to classical Greece (the following is based onHansen 1991). For Aristotle, the mechanismconnecting democracy and liberty was that ev-eryone “would rule and be ruled in turn.” Hereis his crucial passage (quoted by Hansen 1991,p. 74):

A basic principle of the democratic constitu-tion is liberty. That is commonly said, andthose who say it imply that only in this consti-tution do men share in liberty; for that, theysay, is what every democracy aims at. Now,one aspect of liberty is being ruled and rulingin turn . . . . Another element is to live as youlike . . . . So this is the second defining principleof democracy, and from it has come the idealof not being ruled, not by anybody if possible,or at least only in turn.

The difference between the Greek and themodern conception of self-government is strik-ing. Commenting on a passage by Castoriadis—“I give here the term human being, anthro-pos, the sense . . . of a being that is autonomous.One can say as well, remembering Aristotle,a being capable of ruling and being ruled”—Descombes (2004, p. 327) observes, “It is re-markable that Castoriadis did not say, as wouldonly naturally a partisan of autonomy in themodern sense, ‘a being capable of ruling him-self.’ . . . The good citizen is someone who is ascapable to command as to obey.” In Manin’s(1997, p. 28) rendering, “democratic freedomconsisted not in obeying only oneself but inobeying today someone in whose place onewould be tomorrow.”

The institutional feature that implementedtaking turns in Athens was rotation in office: acombination of selection by lot with short termsand restrictions on re-eligibility. But rotationcould not have become the institutional form oftaking turns in modern democracies. AlthoughManin (1997) may be correct that their largesize does not preclude direct democracy, sizewould render rotation meaningless. The 1776Constitution of Pennsylvania, under whichlegislators, sheriffs, coroners, tax assessors, andjustices of peace were elected for one year and

executive councilors for three, all with limita-tions on re-eligibility, came closest to the idealof rotation in the modern era. But even if weassume that no one ever served twice, at mostone person in 13 would serve ever.7

One can contrast the Greek and the mod-ern democracies in several ways. The standarddistinction is that Greek democracy was di-rect, whereas the modern one is representative.Manin (1997) highlights the method for selec-tion of public office holders: In Athens it waspredominantly lot, whereas elections character-ize modern democracies. But the power of lotstemmed not from “simple political equality”in the sense of Beitz (1989), an equal procedu-ral chance, but from rotation: short terms inoffice and prohibitions of re-eligibility. Afterall, we could use lot to choose even a hered-itary monarch. The sharpest contrast, in myview, is that the Athenian democracy assuredthat most citizens would rule and be ruled inturn, while nothing of the sort would evenenter the minds of modern democrats. Evenshort terms in office and restrictions on reelec-tion, wherever they were introduced, were in-tended to prevent entrenchment by the incum-bents, rather than to give everyone a chance torule. For the Greeks—Rousseau (1964 [1762])had it right—“democracy was a state in whichthere are more citizens who are magistratesthan ordinary citizens who are not.” And al-though Paine (1989, p. 170) described theAmerican system of government as “represen-tation ingrafted upon Democracy,” the grafttransformed the entire body. All the elaborateconstructions about the common good, idealpreferences, and collective will masked the basicfact that nothing in the modern conception of

7I assume that 1000 people were elected. The population ofPennsylvania was 434,373 in 1790, and I use 400,000 for 1776.I also assume that adult life lasted 30 years. In the UnitedStates, there were 511,039 popularly elected local officials in1992 (http://www.census.gov), 7382 state legislators, and535 federal legislators, for a total of 518,956. If everyoneserved only one year and could not ever serve again, aboutone citizen in seven would ever rule, and only during oneyear of adult life (if adult life lasts 50 years).

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democracy precludes the possibility that somepeople could rule always and others never.8

DEMOCRACY AND ITS LIMITS

Second-Best Self-Government

The original conception of self-governmentwas based on an assumption that rendered itincoherent and infeasible, namely, that every-one has the same preference for the legal orderunder which all would want to live. The clas-sical Greek conception did not assume homo-geneity, but it was implemented by a mechanismthat is not feasible in large collectivities. To de-fine the ideal of self-government in large so-cieties with heterogeneous preferences, there-fore, we need to find a second-best conceptionof self-government. Then we can investigatewhether any mechanism can implement eventhis second-best.

This second-best is plausibly defined by fourconditions: (a) everyone must have equal in-fluence over collective decisions, (b) everyonemust have some effective influence over collec-tive decisions, (c) collective decisions must beimplemented by those selected to implementthem, and (d ) the legal order must enable se-cure cooperation without undue interference.To identify the limits of democracy, we mustinvestigate whether these conditions can be sat-isfied, singly and simultaneously, by any systemof institutions.

In analyzing these conditions, we are aidedby two theorems of social choice theory. May’s(1952) theorem states that simple-majority ruleis the only rule of collective decision makingthat satisfies four axioms: equality, neutrality,responsiveness, and decisiveness. In turn, this

8Indeed, Sieyes justified representation by claiming that thepeople would want those who make laws to have specializedknowledge. Having observed that in modern society individ-uals must have specialized skills, he concluded, “The commoninterest, the improvement of the state of society itself criesout for us to make Government a special profession” (quotedby Manin 1997, p. 3). A more extensive discussion of Sieyes’sview is in Pasquino (1998).

rule implies that as many people as possible liveunder a legal order they prefer. Hence, if theseaxioms are satisfied in practice, collective de-cisions reflect individual preferences, and au-tonomy is maximized given the distribution ofpreferences. But social choice theory fails toelucidate the conditions for participation to beequal and effective, the agency problems inher-ent in the fact that we are governed by others,and the scope of issues that should be decidedcollectively.

Consider first May’s (1952) four axioms:

1. Equality and anonymity. Equality meansthat all individuals have an equal weightin influencing the decision of the collec-tivity. Anonymity requires that the col-lective decision would remain the sameif any two individuals interchanged theirpreferences. If anonymity is to apply to allpossible pairs of individuals, then it canbe satisfied only if everyone has an equalweight. Hence, equality and anonymityare equivalent over open domain.9 Note,however, that equality must be effective,not only formal.

2. Neutrality. Decisions should not dependon the names attached to alternatives. Ifa majority prefers an alternative labeled Sto A, and their labels are reversed, then Ashould prevail. The crux of this conditionis that decision rules should not favor thestatus quo. Say the status quo (S) is thepresence of the death penalty, the alter-native (A) is to abolish it, and a majorityprefers the status quo. Now suppose thatthe status quo is no death penalty, the al-ternative is to introduce it, and the major-ity prefers the alternative. Then neutral-ity requires that the death penalty shouldprevail whether or not it is the status quo.

3. Decisiveness. A collective decision rule isdecisive if, having applied it, the commu-nity knows what to do. I deliberately stay

9David Austen-Smith alerted me to the importance of theopen domain assumption.

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away from issues entailed by indetermi-nacy because I have nothing to add to thevoluminous polemics on this topic. Thefact is that we do decide collectively.10

The decision may have been differentthan it was—this is what Arrow’s (1951)theorem asserts—but it is what it is.Ordinary citizens do not say, “Oh! Butgiven the preferences of the individualsthe decision may have been different.”It takes a Riker (1982) to claim thatthis fact undermines the validity or thelegitimacy of the results generated bythe democratic process. So I leave it atthat: Collectivities generate decisions byvoting.

4. Responsiveness. Technically, this is the mostcomplicated condition, and it comes invariants (see McGann 2006, p. 18). Tokeep things simple, think that a change of(at least) one individual preference eithermaintains the same collective preferenceor breaks the tie in the direction preferredby the pivotal voter. But this condition of“positive responsiveness” (Austen-Smith& Banks 2000, p. 87) applies to commit-tees, so agency problems have to be con-sidered if it is to be applied in a represen-tative framework.

These axioms imply two theorems. May’stheorem is fairly obvious and well known, soit does not need to be restated. Rae’s (1969)theorem is perhaps well known also, but it isnoteworthy that the idea was present already inKelsen’s 1929 essay. In his words (Kelsen 1988,p. 19), “There is only one idea which leads ina reasonable way to the majoritarian principle:the idea that, if not all individuals, at least thelargest possible number of them should be free;said differently, that the social order should bein contradiction with the will of the smallestnumber of people possible.”

10I am taken by Bird’s (2000) argument that deciding whatone wants to do is not any less problematic at the individuallevel, yet we assume that individuals know what they want.

Kelsen’s reasoning goes as follows. Supposethat there is a status quo social order, as therealways is. There are n people. Now, if the rulefor changing the status quo is unanimity, n − 1may want to alter it and cannot. Hence, n − 1will live under an order not to their liking. As-sume now the rule is that the status quo is al-tered if at least n/2 + 2 people support a change.Then n/2 + 1 still suffer under a status quo theydo not like. In turn, assume that the qualifyingnumber is n/2 − 1. Then the status quo can bealtered, leaving n − (n/2 − 1) = n/2 + 1 peo-ple unhappy. But under simple-majority rule,the decisive number is n/2 + 1, which leavesat most n − (n/2 + 1) = n/2 − 1 dissatisfied.Hence, majority rule minimizes the proportionof people who are unhappy about the laws un-der which they live.

Rae seems to have been unaware of Kelsen’sargument and uses different language; whatKelsen calls “autonomy” is Rae’s criterion of“political individualism.” But the intuition isthe same: The virtue Rae (1969, p. 42) claimsfor majority rule is that it “will optimize thecorrespondence between individual values andcollective policies.”

Simple-majority rule maximizes autonomybecause it is responsive to the contingency thatindividuals change preferences. The incumbentparty can be dethroned and the status quo canbe altered if enough individuals change theirpreferences. Self-government must allow par-tisan alternation in office.

To make this, perhaps redundantly, clear,consider the role of alternation in maximizingautonomy. Suppose that the society faces twoalternative legal orders, A and B, advocated re-spectively by parties A and B. Let v(t) be theproportion of citizens who support A at time t,and suppose that v(t) = 1/2 + ε(t) while v(t +1) = 1/2 − ε(t + 1), where ε(t), ε(t + 1) > 0.If there were no alternation at t + 1, the extentof autonomy over two electoral periods wouldhave been [1/2 + ε(t)] + [1/2 − ε(t + 1)] = 1 +ε(t) − ε(t + 1), whereas with alternation it wouldhave been [1/2 + ε(t)] + [1/2 + ε(t + 1)] =1 + ε(t) + ε(t + 1). Conversely, suppose that

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alternation occurs even if v(t) = v(t + 1) =1/2 + ε > 1/2. Then the extent of autonomywould have been (1/2 + ε) + (1/2 − ε) = 1 < 1+ 2ε, which would have been the case withoutalternation. All this is embarrassingly obviousbut important, because it shows that autonomyis maximized if partisan control alternates ac-cording to current majorities.

Yet, in contrast to rotation, the mere possi-bility of alternation does not guarantee that dif-ferent people rule in turn. The Greeks ensuredthat everyone would have an equal chance torule by using lot and arranged that the chancewould materialize by keeping the terms in of-fice short, but representative government of-fers no such assurances. Some people may haveto wait indefinitely. Indeed, in an electoratein which grandchildren inherited the prefer-ences of their forefathers, a perfectly account-able party would remain in office forever. Thispossibility haunts democracy in ethnically di-vided societies. For alternation to be possible,that is, for the chances of victory of particu-lar alternatives to be uncertain, either individ-ual preferences must be changing or the in-cumbents must err in representing them.11 Andeven then, people who are unlucky enough tohave unpopular preferences will never see themimplemented.

To identify the limits of democracy, weneed to ask whether May’s axioms can be sat-isfied in any real society and whether these ax-ioms are sufficient to realize second-best self-government even if they, and the two theoremsthey imply, are satisfied.

Democracy and Equality

Even if the founders of representative institu-tions spoke in the language of equality, they

11Following Miller (1983), there is now a line of argumentthat claims that policies change as a virtuous consequence ofcycling. This seems to me a misinterpretation of Arrow’s the-orem. This theorem asserts nothing about the occurrence ofcycling; it says only that collective decisions are indetermi-nate (Austen-Smith & Banks 2000, p. 184). Cycling may ormay not occur, and I am not persuaded by McGann (2006)that it often does.

meant something else, best conceived as a veilover all the features that distinguish individ-uals in society, political oblivion to social dis-tinctions (Pasquino 1998, Rosanvallon 2004).Despite lofty pronouncements about everyonebeing equal, the equality they had in mindwas formal political equality, equal procedu-ral chances to influence collective outcomes,and an equal treatment by laws. It was not so-cial or economic equality. And effective po-litical equality is undermined by economicinequality.

The puzzle we are left with is why democ-racy did not generate more economic equal-ity. Because the issue is burning, explanationsabound. Bartels (2008) provides a complex andnuanced account of several of these explana-tions. Here I only list generic varieties:

1. One class of explanations maintains that,for a variety of reasons, those withoutproperty do not want to equalize prop-erty, incomes, or even opportunities. Thereasons come in several variants:

(a) false consciousness due to a lack ofunderstanding of the distinction be-tween productive and nonproductiveproperty;

(b) ideological domination due to theownership of the media by the prop-ertied (Anderson 1977);

(c) divisions among the poor due to re-ligion or race (Roemer 2001, Frank2004);

(d ) expectations that the poor would be-come rich (Benabou & Ok 2001);

(e) poor information about the effects ofparticular policies even among peo-ple holding egalitarian norms (Bartels2008); and

( f ) the belief that inequality is just be-cause it is a consequence of efforts,rather than of luck (Piketty 1995).

2. Another variety of explanations claimsthat even if a majority holds egalitar-ian norms, formal political rights areineffective against private property. Somedistinctions are again relevant:

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(a) Wealth holders enjoy disproportion-ate political influence, which theyuse to successfully defend themselvesfrom redistribution (Miliband 1970,Lindblom 1977). Nominally equalpolitical rights are not enough tobar the privileged access of the richto politics. Grossman & Helpman(2001) analyze mechanisms throughwhich the rich buy political influencein the United States. Benabou (2000)argues that the political influence ofthe rich increases with income in-equality.

(b) Independently of any lobbying bythe rich, governments of all partisanstripes must anticipate the trade-offbetween redistribution and growth.Confronting the prospect of losingtheir property or not being able toenjoy its fruits, property owners saveand invest less, thus reducing the fu-ture wealth and future income of ev-eryone. This “structural dependenceon capital” imposes a limit on re-distribution even for those govern-ments that want to equalize incomes(Przeworski & Wallerstein 1988).

None of these explanations remains un-scathed when exposed to counterarguments andto evidence. Personally, I am not taken bythe claim that the poor would not want tolive better, even if it were at the expense ofthe rich. In turn, the relation between redis-tribution and growth is extremely controver-sial theoretically, and the empirical evidence isinconclusive (Banerjee & Dufflo 2003). Someforms of redistribution—those that take theform of subsidies to education or to investmentby those who are credit constrained—are obvi-ously growth enhancing. A pure redistributionof consumption, however, may retard growth.

Yet this entire way of thinking confronts anawkward fact: Many governments were electedwith the support of the poor, wanted to equal-ize incomes, and tried to do so. Hence, to theextent to which they failed, it must have been

for reasons other than not wanting or not try-ing. Since we are now approaching the limits ofdemocracy, the argument has to be developedwith some care.

There are different ways to equalize in-comes. One is to tax “market incomes” and ei-ther finance consumption by the poor or spendthe revenues on equally valued public goods.This is what most governments do, albeit tovarying degrees. There is strong evidence thatredistribution is more extensive under left-winggovernments (for references and discussion, seeBeramendi & Anderson 2008). Redistributionvia taxes and transfers (“the fisc”), however,does not reduce underlying inequality of the ca-pacities to earn incomes. It finances private orpublic consumption, with little effect onincome-earning potentials. Hence, this form ofredistribution has to be undertaken over andover again, year after year, just to alleviate theinequality of earned incomes. And because it iscostly, either in terms of incentives or merelyadministrative expenditures, it is an urgent, nota permanent, solution.

While almost the entire political economyliterature focuses on this mechanism of redistri-bution, governments affect income distributionthrough many policies other than taxes and ex-penditures. Indeed, as Stigler (1975) observes,all policies—from credentialing nurses to issu-ing taxi medallions to prohibiting of noxiousproducts—affect incomes differentially. Hence,Bartels (2008, p. 58) should not have been sur-prised that U.S. “presidents have had less in-fluence on the distribution of post-tax incomethan on the distribution of pre-tax income . . . .”Markets are creations of governments. “Marketincomes” are generated under a system ofwage-setting institutions, regulatory policies,trade barriers, monopoly legislation . . . the listis endless. Corporatist arrangements, for exam-ple, account for significant differences in in-come distribution among the OECD countries(Beramendi & Anderson 2008).

Once we understand that incomes are gen-erated under politically regulated conditions,we can consider the second mechanism throughwhich they may be equalized, namely through

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an equalization of income-earning potentials.And because incomes are generated by ef-forts applied to productive assets, whether land,physical capital, education, or skills, to equal-ize the capacities to earn incomes, we mustthink in terms of distribution of productiveassets.

But what assets can be equalized in modernsocieties? When the idea of equal property firstappeared, productive assets meant land. Landis relatively easy to redistribute: It is enoughto take it from some and give it to others.But today the distribution of land plays a rel-atively minor role in generating income in-equality, and other assets resist such a simpleoperation:

1. Communists redistributed industrial cap-ital by turning it into the hands of thestate and promising that uninvested prof-its would be equally distributed to house-holds. Although this system generated areasonable degree of equality, for reasonsthat cannot be discussed here it turned outto be dynamically inefficient: It inhibitedinnovation and technical progress.

2. Alternatively, one could redistribute titlesto property in the form of shares. But thisform of redistribution has problems of itsown. One is that, as the Czech privatiza-tion experience shows, they could be andlikely would be quickly re-concentrated.People who are otherwise poorer wouldsell them to those who are wealthier.Another problem is that dispersion ofownership lowers the incentives of share-holders to monitor managers. Althoughsome solutions to this problem have beenproposed, they do not seem to be veryeffective.

3. Many countries equalized human capitalby investing in education. But people ex-posed to the same educational system ac-quire different income-earning capacitiesas a function of their social and economicbackground. Moreover, because peopleare born with different talents and be-cause the use of these talents is socially

beneficial, we would want to educate tal-ented people more.

4. Finally, income-earning capacities can beequalized by policies that are narrowlytargeted on increasing the productivityof the poor (“pro-poor growth”), suchas relaxing credit constraints, trainingfor specific skills, subsidizing the neces-sary infrastructure, focusing on diseasesto which poor people are most vulnerable,etc. Such policies, however, take time tobear fruit, and both diagnosing the needsand targeting the policies require a highlevel of administrative competence.

Even if productive assets were equalized,perfect equality cannot be sustained in a marketeconomy. Individuals have different and unob-servable abilities to transform productive assetsinto incomes. Moreover, they are subject to vi-cissitudes of luck. Assume that particular indi-viduals (or projects they undertake) are subjectto slightly different rates of return: Some loseat the rate of −0.02 per annum and some gainat the rate of 0.02. After 25 years, the individ-ual who generates a 2% return will be 2.7 timeswealthier than the individual who loses 2% peryear, and after 50 years (say from the age of 18to 68), this multiple will be 7.4.12 Hence, evenif productive assets were to be equalized, in-equality would creep back in. (See Mookherjee& Ray (2003) and Benhabib & Bisin (2008) fordifferent versions of this argument.)

Equalizing productive assets turns out to bedifficult in modern societies, in which land isno longer the most important source of in-come. And even if capacities to earn incomeswere equalized, equality is just not a feasi-ble economic equilibrium. Obviously, this doesnot imply that inequalities could not be re-duced in many democracies in which they areflagrant and intolerable. But there are limitsto economic equality. We should not expect

12The assumption that the annual rates of return are cor-related for each individual over time reflects the fact thatpeople differ in unobserved traits that affect their capacity touse productive assets.

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democracy to do what no system of politi-cal institutions conceivably could. And to theextent that economic inequality affects ef-fective political equality, self-government isundermined.

Democracy, Choice, and Participation

Self-government is exercised through elections.Hence, the collective decision-making processoperates indirectly: Citizens choose parties orcandidates, authorizing them to make decisionson behalf of the collectivity. Even when elec-toral competitors present clear policy orienta-tions, “platforms,” the alternatives from whichvoters can choose are only those that are pro-posed in an election. Hence, although collec-tive choice is a choice among alternatives, notall conceivable or even feasible alternatives be-come subject to choice.

The choices presented to voters in electionsdo not include the ideal points of all citizens.The number of options is necessarily limited,so that if voters are sufficiently heterogeneous,some find that their preferences are far awayfrom the closest platform that is being pro-posed. Moreover, electoral competition inex-orably pushes political parties, at least those thathave a chance to win, to offer similar platforms.The result is that alternatives are few and thechoice they offer is paltry. Indeed, if electionswere truly described by the model that servesas the workhorse of electoral analysis—the me-dian voter model—individual voters would haveno choice at all.

Now, one may think that if voters do notget a chance to choose, they do not decide any-thing. Bobbio (1987, p. 25), at least, includes inhis minimal definition of democracy the condi-tion that “those called upon to take decisions,or to elect those who are to take decisions, mustbe offered some real alternatives.” But evenif individual voters are not offered any choiceat the moment of the election, the collectivityis deciding among alternatives. Consider againthe median voter model. Even if parties repre-sent diametrically opposed interests, to have achance to win parties must please the decisive

voter. Hence, both parties offer the same plat-form, proposing to do what the decisive voterwants them to do (Downs 1957, Roemer 2001).But the decisive voter is not a dictator; she isdecisive only contingent on the preferences ofeveryone else. Even if voters are offered nochoice, the decision reached by the collectiv-ity reflects the distribution of individual pref-erences. Had this distribution been different,so would have been the collective decisionresulting from the election. Hence, even if in-dividuals do not get to choose when they vote,the absence of choice does not invalidate self-government. In fact, a choice has been made:The parties have read the peak preferences ofall citizens and compared the numerical supportfor each of them. (One need not assume thatpeople’s preferences are independent of whatparties propose, only that parties anticipate howpeople would end up voting for each platformafter all is said and done.) Only that after theparties calculate which among the alternativesis the majority winner, at the moment of theelection they can say to voters: “This is whatthe majority wants. We, citizens, have chosen,and this is what our choice is.”

Yet many people object to collective choicesbeing made in this way [for a list of examples,see Przeworski (2003, pp. 266–67)]. They wantto be given distinct alternatives and to be ableto cast their votes selecting among them. Howgeneral this dissatisfaction is is impossible totell, but at least some voices loudly bemoanthe meagerness of choice. They seem to valuechoosing independently of the outcomes of thecollective choice. This reaction may just stemfrom a lack of understanding of the electoralmechanism, but that does not make it any lessintense. Why else would we have the peren-nial complaints about “Tweedledum and Twee-dledee,” “bonnet blanc et blanc bonnet”? What isnot clear is whether people object because theyindeed value choosing or because they do notlike the particular collective decision that re-sults from aggregating preferences that includesome different from their own. Do people ob-ject that there is no choice, or do they object towhat the choices are?

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Moreover, even if voters do face choices, ina large electorate in which all have equal in-fluence over the collective decision, no singleindividual can cause a particular alternative tobe selected. Equal participation cannot be ef-fective participation. The program of “partici-patory democracy,” which springs up intermit-tently around the globe,13 is not feasible at thenational scale. If participation means causal im-pact on the exercise of government by equalindividuals, “participatory democracy” is anoxymoron. Only a few can causally affect col-lective decisions. These few can be selected byelections or they can buy “influence.” They canbe those who are exceptionally vociferous orperhaps exceptionally brilliant. But everyonecannot be equally efficacious and efficacious.If everyone is equal, everyone is condemnedto causal impotence. Despite valiant efforts(Barber 2004, Roussopoulos 2003), the circlecannot be squared.

Pace Berlin (2002, p. 49), participation can-not be the reason to value self-government.Collective self-government is achieved notwhen each voter has causal influence on the finalresult, but when collective choice is a result ofaggregating individual wills. The value of themechanism of voting rests in the ex-post cor-respondence between the laws everyone mustobey and the will of a majority. Selecting gov-ernments by elections does maximize the num-ber of people who live under laws to their lik-ing, even if no individual can treat these laws asa consequence of his or her choosing. Hence,even if individuals see their own vote as ineffec-tive, they may value voting as a procedure formaking collective choices, and there is dramaticevidence that often they do. To value the mech-anism even in the face of individual impotence,it is sufficient that, to cite Bird (2000, p. 567),“Both governors and governed must recognize‘will-revealing’ procedures and view them ascommunicating instructions, which governing

13Googling “participatory democracy” returns 177,000 itemsin English and 276,000 in Spanish.

agencies are then expected to execute as a mat-ter of course.”

But the appeal of this conception of self-government is much weaker than that of theoriginal ideal. Under the original conception,a legal order could prevail only if everyoneconsented to it. The criterion of unanimitypromised causal efficacy to each and everymember of the collectivity. The only peoplewho ever used it, Poles between 1652 and 1791,defended it vigorously until the death of theircountry in 1795 ( Je↪druch 1998). And the nostal-gia for effective participation continues to hauntmodern democracies, in which, as Kelsen (1988[1929], p. 35) was forced to concede, “politicalrights—which is to say liberty—are reduced inthe essential to a simple right to vote.”

Democracy and Agency

Our institutions are representative. Citizensdo not govern. They are governed by others,perhaps different others in turn, but othersnevertheless. To assess whether we collectivelygovern ourselves when we are governed by oth-ers, we need to consider two relations: amongdifferent parts of the government and betweencitizens and governments.

The structure of government is logicallyprior to its connection with citizens, becausethat which citizens can demand or expect ofgovernments depends on what governmentscan and cannot do. And what governmentsare able to do depends on how they are or-ganized. Governments separated into powersmay be unable to respond to the will of themajority as expressed in elections, specifically,to a mandate for change. At least one emi-nent student of the U.S. Constitution thoughtthat the framers’ “fear of the government’s do-ing harm . . . incapacitated it for doing muchgood” (McIlwain quoted by Maddox 1989,p. 62). Finer (1934, p. 89) judges that “theConstitution succeeded in making governmentnext to impossible, by certain checks and bal-ances.” Vile (1998 [1967], p. 15) concludes,“The concern to prevent the government from

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encroaching upon individual liberty leads tomeasures which weaken it to the point whereit is unable to act in order to provide those pre-requisites of social and economic life which areessential if an individual is to be able to makeproper use of his faculties.”

The axiom of neutrality is violated by any ar-rangement that is equivalent to super-majorityrules. This is why Rae (1971) wanted to measureapproximations to the ideal of democracy by theextent to which decision rules deviate from sim-ple majority. He provides a list of such devices,so we need not go into detail. Perhaps mostnoteworthy is the fact that bicameralism is,under general conditions, equivalent to super-majority rule, a fact noted already by Condorcet(1986 [1787]). McGann (2006) argues that onlycountries with proportional electoral systems,with unicameral legislatures, and without an ex-ecutive veto and other contra-majoritarian de-vices, de facto use simple-majority rule. And inhis count such countries are few.

Whether this is good or bad by some othercriteria is not the issue here. We have seen re-peated claims that the people has to be pro-tected from itself, at least from its temporarypassions or its wanton preferences. But it isstriking that super-majoritarian devices such asbicameralism or executive veto power protectnot only those specific aspects of the status quosingled out as rights but also ordinary interests.Rights are guarded separately, by special pro-cedures and specialized counter-majoritarian(non-counting) agencies, principally constitu-tional courts. But the super-majoritarian pro-tection of the status quo extends to purelydistributive issues that do not entail anyfundamental rights. Ostensibly, it still pro-tects “minorities.” But because these days itis politically correct to use this designationto indicate groups that are for various rea-sons underprivileged—indeed, we use the “mi-nority” label even for a numerical majority,women—we forget that the minority whichsuper-majority rule was originally designed toprotect, and which these arrangements con-tinue to protect, is the propertied.

The responsiveness axiom means roughlythat government policies follow collective de-cisions of citizens. This axiom can hold only ifthere are some collective decisions that can befollowed, if results of elections can be read asexpressing some kind of a will. I believe theycan. By their inherent logic, elections structureindividual wills into collective support for par-ticular parties. Hence, although I agree with allthose who observe that no government can rep-resent the will of everyone, parties and partisangovernments can represent the collective will oftheir supporters. It is a different matter whetherthey, in fact, do.

“Representation,” or its cognates, is fre-quently treated as quintessential, if not defi-nitional, for democracy. Dahl (1971, p. 1) ob-serves that “a key characteristic of a democracyis the continued responsiveness of the govern-ment to the preferences of its citizens”; Riker(1965, p. 31) asserts that “democracy is a formof government in which the rulers are fully re-sponsible to the ruled”; and Schmitter & Karl(1991, p. 76) maintain that “modern politicaldemocracy is a system of governance in whichrulers are held accountable for their actions inthe public realm by citizens . . . .” Note that therelation between citizens and actions of govern-ment is variously described as responsiveness,responsibility, or accountability. This is not theplace to delve into these distinctions; what iscrucial is that some agency costs are inevitableunless governments want exactly the same astheir supporters.

Consider the simplest possible model ofaccountability. Suppose that a government iselected for a term of T years and that during thisperiod it can extract as rents some amount S(T )at the cost of citizens. Anticipating this possi-bility, citizens (either homogeneous or pivotal)set an incentive scheme according to which ifthe government extracts in rents no more thanR it remains in office; if it extracts more than Rit is voted out. Assuming that politicians wantto extract as much as possible, the governmentfaces a choice between extracting S during oneperiod or extracting R and remaining in office.

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The amount of rents that makes the govern-ment indifferent is then given by the solution to

U(S ) = 11 − ρ

U(R),

where ρ < 1 is the rate at which politiciansdiscount the future. [If the government stays inthe office one term, it gets U(S ). If it extractsno more than R, it is re-elected forever andgets

∑T ρTU(R) = 1

1−ρU(R). These utilities

are standardized in such a way that politicianswho are voted out get 0 from then on.]

This model can be and has been complicatedin innumerable ways, but the essence of theaccountability mechanism remains the same:(a) The government is induced to respond tothe will of the majority by the threat that ifit does not it will be voted out of office; and(b) the government is never a perfect agent:Citizens must be willing to suffer agency coststo make the incentive scheme effective. Theseagency costs arise not only if governments havesome interests of their own but also if they havealtruistic, paternalistic preferences that differfrom those of the majority that supports them.Agency costs mean simply that citizens musttolerate some latitude in governing, that theirmandates are not exactly imperative. Agencycosts are not the same as “corruption,” which isan excess of material rents above the inevitableamount that citizens must and want to tolerate.Responsiveness, therefore, does not precludeagency costs. Agency costs are inevitable in anysystem of government, but not all governmentsare responsive.

Finally, there is one normative issue onwhich democratic theory is perennially ambiva-lent, namely, the role of the people during theperiods between elections. The entire socialchoice perspective is couched in terms in whichthe people express their collective will througha voting mechanism, and governments imple-ment (or not) the collective decision. But in fact,elections are only periodic, not incessant, andthey bundle issues together. Whether or not itcould be or should be, self-government is notimplemented by a series of referendums but byperiodic elections with broad and often vague

mandates. The normative question is whetherself-government requires that governments re-spond to the voices expressed publicly throughvarious kinds of mechanisms other thanelections.

Two types of situations need to be distin-guished, depending on whether a particularpolicy is opposed by a majority or by an intenseminority. Clearly, one difficulty is that the pop-ular voices may or may not be countable, andeven when they are, as in public opinion polls,manners of counting other than elections haveneither their authority nor their reliability. Andeven if minorities can be intense, we have noway of assessing their intensity. Intense minori-ties are still numerical minorities. We may notlike this fact; reasonable people may say, “SinceI do not really care one way or another while shecares intensely, her view should prevail.” Onecould think of a reflexive equilibrium based onthis principle. But interpersonal comparisons ofintensity are impossible, and the strategic is-sues are patent. Self-government can only be asystem of counting heads, perhaps enlightenedheads, but heads nevertheless.

Democracy and Liberty

Autonomy is a particular kind of liberty: thefreedom to live under laws one wants to live un-der, given that live under laws one must. Theargument, from Rousseau to Kelsen, has beenthat because to live together we must live underlaws, this is the only kind of freedom possible.Liberty cannot mean freedom in the state ofnature. Legal order enables actions that are notfeasible in the state of nature: In the latter, eachindividual is exposed to aggression or exploita-tion by others, so that no one is free from in-terference. Freedom is possible only in society,not outside of it.

But necessity does not freedom make.Rousseau’s promises notwithstanding—that wewould be as free “as before”—counterfactualcomparisons are irrelevant. Any legal order isa form of oppression. Even if we were to agreeunanimously to a particular order, it does notmean that each individual enjoys being subject

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to it. A legal order is but cooperation imposedby a threat of force. An order imposed by a ma-jority is even more onerous, because it is justone way of imposing cooperation among sev-eral possible.

Some legal orders are more onerous thanothers. Even if we must live under a system oflaws, not all aspects of our lives must be regu-lated. The axiom of decisiveness does not im-ply that everything must be or should be thesubject of collective decisions—only that oncepreferences are revealed, we know what shouldbe done, including what should be regulatedand what should be left to individual discretion.People often do have different preferences as towhat should be subject to public regulation: sex-ually explicit materials, drug use, and forms ofcohabitation are recent examples. The framersof the U.S. Constitution, for example, decidednot to legislate on matters of religion (Holmes1988), whereas in some democracies the staterecognizes a religion as official.

One implication of the possibility of leav-ing matters outside the scope of laws is that,contrary to Dahl (1989, p. 142ff ), autonomyis not a welfarist criterion. Welfare is definedover objects from which individuals derive util-ity. Because laws distribute consumption andallocate resources between public and privategoods, one could think that a preference for alegal order is only a preference over distribu-tions of welfare. Legal systems, however, differnot only in what they generate but also in whatthey allow individuals to achieve by their ownactions; they differ in the extent to which theyallow individual choice. A law may order indi-viduals with particular incomes to pay a specificamount of tax or it may leave to individuals’ dis-cretion how much they contribute to the wel-fare of others (the latter was an idea of Presi-dent Bush, Sr.). A law may force all people toread the Bible or it may leave to their discretionwhether they read the Bible, Lady Chatterley’sLover, neither, or both. Laws shape what Sen(1988) calls “capability sets,” defined as bun-dles of “functionings” that one may achieve byone’s own actions. Because capability sets in-clude the ability to exercise choice, they are

not exhausted by consumption of commoditiesor leisure, Rawlsian primary goods, or utilities.Autonomy, thus, is not a welfarist criterion be-cause laws determine what one can, not onlywhat one does, achieve.

Liberty, therefore, must mean more thanRousseau or Kelsen meant by autonomy: notonly the freedom awarded by living under lawsbut also the freedom from interference by thegovernment, freedom through law and free-dom from law. Hence, one way to character-ize real democracies is by posing the questionof Berlin (2002, p. 35): “How much am I gov-erned?” The problem the founders faced wasto maximize both freedoms, to restrain inter-ference in private lives as little as possible andto guarantee security as much as possible. Thedifficulty was, and is, that both cannot be maxi-mized at the same time, and the proper balanceis neither obvious nor the same under differ-ent conditions. Take Voltaire’s principle, “Thefreedom of one ends where the freedom of an-other begins.” As the Prussian General Codeof 1791 declared, “The laws and ordinances ofthe state should no further restrict the naturalliberty and rights of citizens than the public wel-fare demands” (quoted by Palmer 1959, p. 406).Somewhere there is a line dividing the actionsthat do not impinge on others and those thatdo affect them. If my actions have no effects onthe welfare of others, no negative externalities,I should be legally free to pursue them. Even insociety we are not interdependent in all of ouractions, and one is free in the sense of nonin-terference when laws do not impinge on actionsthat have no externalities.

Yet the line between your freedom and mineis imperceptible. We can err in one direction oranother. And err we do. One can always find ex-ternalities. If I do not brush my teeth correctly,I will get cavities, and impose on society thecost of my dental care. If other children are al-lowed to read Huckleberry Finn, my child will becorrupted by them. Suppose that all our actions,even my manner of brushing my teeth, not tospeak of my private reading of Lady Chatterley’sLover, are subject to laws. We are still free inthe sense of Rousseau: Our liberty is enabled

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by laws. This is why, following Constant (1997[1815]), some interpretations of his theory see itas totalitarian (see Descombes 2004, p. 345ff ).The freedom from command no longer ex-ists. “Tyranny of the majority,” or “totalitariandemocracy,” to use the language in which someGerman refugees from fascism (Fromm 1994[1941], Marcuse 1971) described the UnitedStates, is not an oxymoron. As Berlin (2002,p. 209) put it, “An equal right to oppress—orinterfere—is not equivalent to liberty.” To put itin different language, maximizing welfare is in-compatible with tolerating heterogeneous pref-erences. This is what Sen (1970) refers to as theimpossibility of a Pareto liberal.

To maintain order, some amount of oppres-sion of individual desires and even values is nec-essary. Yet order can extend beyond the realmof necessity, and it may be arbitrarily admin-istered. The ambivalence of the founders wasbetween security and noninterference. Thisambivalence is not easy to resolve, and it cannever be resolved once and for all.

CONCLUSION

Democracy faces limits to the extent of eco-nomic equality, effective participation, perfectagency, and liberty. But no political system, Ibelieve, can do better. No political system can

generate and maintain in modern societies thedegree of economic equality that many peo-ple in these societies would like to prevail. Nopolitical system can make everyone’s politicalparticipation individually effective. No politicalsystem can make governments perfect agentsof citizens. And although order and noninter-ference do not cohere easily in democracies,no other political system comes even close toachieving that coherence. Politics, in any formor fashion, has limits in shaping and trans-forming lives of societies. This is just a fact oflife.

It is important to know these limits, so as notto criticize democracy for not achieving what nopolitical arrangements can achieve. But this isnot a call for complacency. Recognizing limitsserves to direct our efforts toward these limits,elucidating directions for reforms that are fea-sible. I am far from certain to have correctlyidentified what the limits are, and I realize thatsome reforms are not undertaken because theythreaten interests, but I do believe that knowingboth the limits and the possibilities is a usefulguide to political action. For in the end, democ-racy is but a framework within which some-what equal, somewhat effective, and somewhatfree people can struggle peacefully to improvethe world according to their different visions,values, and interests.

DISCLOSURE STATEMENT

The author is not aware of any affiliations, memberships, funding, or financial holdings that mightbe perceived as affecting the objectivity of this review.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I am deeply indebted to Bernard Manin and Ignacio Sanchez-Cuenca for tearing apart earlierversions. I also appreciate comments from Robert Barros, John Ferejohn, Raquel Fernandez,Joanne Fox-Przeworski, Mogens Herman Hansen, Stephen Holmes, Margaret Levi, FernandoLimongi, Jose Marıa Maravall, Wilfred Nippel, Pasquale Pasquino, John Roemer, and BarryWeingast. This work has been supported by the National Science Foundation.

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AR377-FM ARI 7 April 2009 11:25

Annual Review ofPolitical Science

Volume 12, 2009Contents

A Conversation with Robert A. DahlRobert A. Dahl and Margaret Levi � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 1

Neorepublicanism: A Normative and Institutional Research ProgramFrank Lovett and Philip Pettit � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � �11

Domestic Terrorism: The Hidden Side of Political ViolenceIgnacio Sánchez-Cuenca and Luis de la Calle � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � �31

Women in Parliaments: Descriptive and Substantive RepresentationLena Wängnerud � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � �51

Self-Government in Our TimesAdam Przeworski � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � �71

Social Policy in Developing CountriesIsabela Mares and Matthew E. Carnes � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � �93

Variation in Institutional StrengthSteven Levitsky and María Victoria Murillo � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 115

Quality of Government: What You GetSören Holmberg, Bo Rothstein, and Naghmeh Nasiritousi � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 135

Democratization and Economic GlobalizationHelen V. Milner and Bumba Mukherjee � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 163

Has the Study of Global Politics Found Religion?Daniel Philpott � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 183

Redistricting: Reading Between the LinesRaymond La Raja � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 203

Does Efficiency Shape the Territorial Structure of Government?Liesbet Hooghe and Gary Marks � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 225

Bargaining Failures and Civil WarBarbara F. Walter � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 243

Hobbesian Hierarchy: The Political Economy of PoliticalOrganizationDavid A. Lake � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 263

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Negative CampaigningRichard R. Lau and Ivy Brown Rovner � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 285

The Institutional Origins of Inequality in Sub-Saharan AfricaNicolas van de Walle � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 307

RiotsSteven I. Wilkinson � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 329

Regimes and the Rule of Law: Judicial Independence in ComparativePerspectiveGretchen Helmke and Frances Rosenbluth � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 345

Field Experiments and the Political Economy of DevelopmentMacartan Humphreys and Jeremy M. Weinstein � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 367

Laboratory Experiments in Political EconomyThomas R. Palfrey � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 379

Field Experiments on Political Behavior and Collective ActionEline A. de Rooij, Donald P. Green, and Alan S. Gerber � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 389

Experiments on Racial Priming in Political CampaignsVincent L. Hutchings and Ashley E. Jardina � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 397

Elections Under AuthoritarianismJennifer Gandhi and Ellen Lust-Okar � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 403

On Assessing the Political Effects of Racial PrejudiceLeonie Huddy and Stanley Feldman � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 423

A “Second Coming”? The Return of German Political TheoryDana Villa � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 449

Group Membership, Group Identity, and Group Consciousness:Measures of Racial Identity in American Politics?Paula D. McClain, Jessica D. Johnson Carew, Eugene Walton, Jr.,and Candis S. Watts � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 471

Opiates for the Matches: Matching Methods for Causal InferenceJasjeet Sekhon � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 487

Indexes

Cumulative Index of Contributing Authors, Volumes 8–12 � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 509

Cumulative Index of Chapter Titles, Volumes 8–12 � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � 511

Errata

An online log of corrections to Annual Review of Political Science articles may be foundat http://polisci.annualreviews.org/

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AnnuAl Reviewsit’s about time. Your time. it’s time well spent.

AnnuAl Reviews | Connect with Our expertsTel: 800.523.8635 (us/can) | Tel: 650.493.4400 | Fax: 650.424.0910 | Email: service@annualreviews.org

New From Annual Reviews:Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational BehaviorVolume 1 • March 2014 • Online & In Print • http://orgpsych.annualreviews.org

Editor: Frederick P. Morgeson, The Eli Broad College of Business, Michigan State UniversityThe Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior is devoted to publishing reviews of the industrial and organizational psychology, human resource management, and organizational behavior literature. Topics for review include motivation, selection, teams, training and development, leadership, job performance, strategic HR, cross-cultural issues, work attitudes, entrepreneurship, affect and emotion, organizational change and development, gender and diversity, statistics and research methodologies, and other emerging topics.

Complimentary online access to the first volume will be available until March 2015.TAble oF CoNTeNTs:•An Ounce of Prevention Is Worth a Pound of Cure: Improving

Research Quality Before Data Collection, Herman Aguinis, Robert J. Vandenberg

•Burnout and Work Engagement: The JD-R Approach, Arnold B. Bakker, Evangelia Demerouti, Ana Isabel Sanz-Vergel

•Compassion at Work, Jane E. Dutton, Kristina M. Workman, Ashley E. Hardin

•ConstructivelyManagingConflictinOrganizations, Dean Tjosvold, Alfred S.H. Wong, Nancy Yi Feng Chen

•Coworkers Behaving Badly: The Impact of Coworker Deviant Behavior upon Individual Employees, Sandra L. Robinson, Wei Wang, Christian Kiewitz

•Delineating and Reviewing the Role of Newcomer Capital in Organizational Socialization, Talya N. Bauer, Berrin Erdogan

•Emotional Intelligence in Organizations, Stéphane Côté•Employee Voice and Silence, Elizabeth W. Morrison• Intercultural Competence, Kwok Leung, Soon Ang,

Mei Ling Tan•Learning in the Twenty-First-Century Workplace,

Raymond A. Noe, Alena D.M. Clarke, Howard J. Klein•Pay Dispersion, Jason D. Shaw•Personality and Cognitive Ability as Predictors of Effective

Performance at Work, Neal Schmitt

•Perspectives on Power in Organizations, Cameron Anderson, Sebastien Brion

•Psychological Safety: The History, Renaissance, and Future of an Interpersonal Construct, Amy C. Edmondson, Zhike Lei

•Research on Workplace Creativity: A Review and Redirection, Jing Zhou, Inga J. Hoever

•Talent Management: Conceptual Approaches and Practical Challenges, Peter Cappelli, JR Keller

•The Contemporary Career: A Work–Home Perspective, Jeffrey H. Greenhaus, Ellen Ernst Kossek

•The Fascinating Psychological Microfoundations of Strategy and Competitive Advantage, Robert E. Ployhart, Donald Hale, Jr.

•The Psychology of Entrepreneurship, Michael Frese, Michael M. Gielnik

•The Story of Why We Stay: A Review of Job Embeddedness, Thomas William Lee, Tyler C. Burch, Terence R. Mitchell

•What Was, What Is, and What May Be in OP/OB, Lyman W. Porter, Benjamin Schneider

•Where Global and Virtual Meet: The Value of Examining the Intersection of These Elements in Twenty-First-Century Teams, Cristina B. Gibson, Laura Huang, Bradley L. Kirkman, Debra L. Shapiro

•Work–Family Boundary Dynamics, Tammy D. Allen, Eunae Cho, Laurenz L. Meier

Access this and all other Annual Reviews journals via your institution at www.annualreviews.org.

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AnnuAl Reviewsit’s about time. Your time. it’s time well spent.

AnnuAl Reviews | Connect with Our expertsTel: 800.523.8635 (us/can) | Tel: 650.493.4400 | Fax: 650.424.0910 | Email: service@annualreviews.org

New From Annual Reviews:

Annual Review of Statistics and Its ApplicationVolume 1 • Online January 2014 • http://statistics.annualreviews.org

Editor: Stephen E. Fienberg, Carnegie Mellon UniversityAssociate Editors: Nancy Reid, University of Toronto

Stephen M. Stigler, University of ChicagoThe Annual Review of Statistics and Its Application aims to inform statisticians and quantitative methodologists, as well as all scientists and users of statistics about major methodological advances and the computational tools that allow for their implementation. It will include developments in the field of statistics, including theoretical statistical underpinnings of new methodology, as well as developments in specific application domains such as biostatistics and bioinformatics, economics, machine learning, psychology, sociology, and aspects of the physical sciences.

Complimentary online access to the first volume will be available until January 2015. table of contents:•What Is Statistics? Stephen E. Fienberg•A Systematic Statistical Approach to Evaluating Evidence

from Observational Studies, David Madigan, Paul E. Stang, Jesse A. Berlin, Martijn Schuemie, J. Marc Overhage, Marc A. Suchard, Bill Dumouchel, Abraham G. Hartzema, Patrick B. Ryan

•The Role of Statistics in the Discovery of a Higgs Boson, David A. van Dyk

•Brain Imaging Analysis, F. DuBois Bowman•Statistics and Climate, Peter Guttorp•Climate Simulators and Climate Projections,

Jonathan Rougier, Michael Goldstein•Probabilistic Forecasting, Tilmann Gneiting,

Matthias Katzfuss•Bayesian Computational Tools, Christian P. Robert•Bayesian Computation Via Markov Chain Monte Carlo,

Radu V. Craiu, Jeffrey S. Rosenthal•Build, Compute, Critique, Repeat: Data Analysis with Latent

Variable Models, David M. Blei•Structured Regularizers for High-Dimensional Problems:

Statistical and Computational Issues, Martin J. Wainwright

•High-Dimensional Statistics with a View Toward Applications in Biology, Peter Bühlmann, Markus Kalisch, Lukas Meier

•Next-Generation Statistical Genetics: Modeling, Penalization, and Optimization in High-Dimensional Data, Kenneth Lange, Jeanette C. Papp, Janet S. Sinsheimer, Eric M. Sobel

•Breaking Bad: Two Decades of Life-Course Data Analysis in Criminology, Developmental Psychology, and Beyond, Elena A. Erosheva, Ross L. Matsueda, Donatello Telesca

•Event History Analysis, Niels Keiding•StatisticalEvaluationofForensicDNAProfileEvidence,

Christopher D. Steele, David J. Balding•Using League Table Rankings in Public Policy Formation:

Statistical Issues, Harvey Goldstein•Statistical Ecology, Ruth King•Estimating the Number of Species in Microbial Diversity

Studies, John Bunge, Amy Willis, Fiona Walsh•Dynamic Treatment Regimes, Bibhas Chakraborty,

Susan A. Murphy•Statistics and Related Topics in Single-Molecule Biophysics,

Hong Qian, S.C. Kou•Statistics and Quantitative Risk Management for Banking

and Insurance, Paul Embrechts, Marius Hofert

Access this and all other Annual Reviews journals via your institution at www.annualreviews.org.

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