Political Economy Research Seminar & Political Economy Research Seminar
Echo Chamber Elections
Helios Herrera (University of Warwick), joint with Ravideep Sethi
Tuesday 12 October 2021 14:00 - 15:30
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Those unable to join the seminars in-person are welcome to participate via zoom if the event is hybrid.
About this event
Elections aggregate information of citizens who gather information, in part from mainstream news, but possibly to a large extent from their different echo chambers which filter news in particular ways. We study information aggregation and electoral outcomes in the presence of endogenous echo chambers. Citizens choose their echo chambers in a self-serving way, in part to shield them from the outside world (mainstream news) and thus preserve their political faith as often as possible. The key asymmetry is how isolated citizens are, namely how much they trust/distrust mainstream news to begin with. We study in several contexts the electoral advantage that the side with more isolated followers may have. This advantage can turn into a sure electoral victory regardless of the true state of the world, thereby failing information aggregation, in some instances. Information aggregation can still fail if voters can abstain, don't fully trust their echo chamber sources, and with echo chamber disinformation.
The Political Economy Research Seminar is jointly organised by the Departments of Economics, of Government, and of Management, with financial support from STICERD.
It brings together scholars across multiple departments at the LSE and from nearby universities. The series consists of talks by external and internal faculty presenting theoretical or empirical papers on a wide range of topics associated with political economy.
These seminars are held on Tuesdays in term time at 14.00-15.30, in room MAR 6.33, unless specified otherwise.
Seminar coordinators: Timothy Besley (Economics), Tak-Huen Chau (Government), Stephane Wolton (Government), Noam Yuchtman (Management)
Contact gov.comms@lse.ac.uk to be added to the mailing list or for further information.
The Political Economy Research Seminar is jointly organised by the Departments of Economics, of Government, and of Management, with financial support from STICERD.
It brings together scholars across multiple departments at the LSE and from nearby universities. The series consists of talks by external and internal faculty presenting theoretical or empirical papers on a wide range of topics associated with political economy.
These seminars are held on Tuesdays in term time at 14.00-15.30, in room MAR 6.33, unless specified otherwise.
Seminar coordinators: Timothy Besley (Economics), Tak-Huen Chau (Government), Stephane Wolton (Government), Noam Yuchtman (Management)
Contact gov.comms@lse.ac.uk to be added to the mailing list or for further information.