Social Welfare Functions

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Weymark
Keyword(s):  
Social Welfare ◽  
Social Choice ◽  
Comparative Evaluation ◽  
Social Welfare Function ◽  
Social Preferences ◽  
Choice Theory ◽  
Social Choice Theory ◽  
Welfare Economics

This chapter provides an introduction to the use of social welfare functions in welfare economics and social choice theory for the comparative evaluation of social alternatives. With a social welfare function, social preferences depend on individual well-beings. These well-beings are expressed in terms of either preferences or utilities. Three main approaches are considered: Bergson-Samuelson social welfare functions, Arrovian social welfare functions, and Sen’s social welfare functionals. How the measurability and comparability of utility can be modeled and how limitations on the types of utility comparisons that are possible restrict the kinds of social welfare functions that can be considered is also discussed. Extensive social choice theory is used to deal with heterogeneous opinions about how to make utility comparisons.

scholarly journals The Death of Welfare Economics

2019 ◽  
Vol 51 (5) ◽  
pp. 827-865 ◽  
Author(s):  
Herrade Igersheim
Keyword(s):  
Social Welfare ◽  
Social Choice ◽  
Social Welfare Function ◽  
Choice Theory ◽  
Social Choice Theory ◽  
Welfare Economics ◽  
Impossibility Result ◽  
Impossibility Theorem ◽  
Individual Values ◽  
The Social

The death of welfare economics has been declared several times. One of the reasons cited for these plural obituaries is that Kenneth Arrow’s impossibility theorem, as set out in his pathbreaking Social Choice and Individual Values in 1951, has shown that the social welfare function—one of the main concepts of the new welfare economics as defined by Abram Bergson (Burk) in 1938 and clarified by Paul Samuelson in the Foundations of Economic Analysis—does not exist under reasonable conditions. Indeed, from the very start, Arrow kept asserting that his famous impossibility result has direct and devastating consequences for the Berg-son-Samuelson social welfare function, though he seemed to soften his position in the early eighties. On his side, especially from the seventies on, Samuelson remained active on this issue and continued to defend the concept he had devised with Bergson, tooth and nail, against Arrow’s attacks. The aim of this article is precisely to examine this rather strange controversy, which is almost unknown in the scientific community, even though it lasted more than fifty years and involved a conflict between two economic giants, Arrow and Samuelson, and, behind them, two distinct communities—welfare economics, which was on the wane, against the emerging social choice theory—representing two conflicting ways of dealing with mathematical tools in welfare economics and two different conceptions of social welfare.

Arrow’s Theorem

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Conal Duddy ◽  
Ashley Piggins
Keyword(s):  
Social Welfare ◽  
Social Choice ◽  
Social Welfare Function ◽  
Social Preference ◽  
Social Choice Theory ◽  
Impossibility Theorem ◽  
Preference Ordering ◽  
Individual Values ◽  
Arrow’S Theorem ◽  
Arrow's Theorem

Kenneth Arrow’s “impossibility” theorem is rightly considered to be a landmark result in economic theory. It is a far-reaching result with implications not just for economics but for political science, philosophy, and many other fields. It has inspired an enormous literature, “social choice theory,” which lies on the interface of economics, politics, and philosophy. Arrow first proved the impossibility theorem in his doctoral dissertation—Social Choice and Individual Values—published in 1951. It is a remarkable result, and had Arrow not proved it, it is unlikely that the theorem would be known today. A social choice is simply a choice made by, or on behalf of, a group of people. Arrow’s theorem is concerned more specifically with the following problem. Suppose that we have a given set of options to choose from and that each member of a group of individuals has his or her own preference over these options. By what method should we construct a single ranking of the options for the group as a whole? Any such method may be represented mathematically by a “social welfare function.” This is a function that receives as its input the preference ordering of each individual and then generates as its output a social preference ordering. Arrow defined some properties that would seem to be essential to any reasonable social welfare function. These properties are called “unrestricted domain,” “weak Pareto,” “independence of irrelevant alternatives,” and “non-dictatorship.” Each of these properties, when taken alone, does appear to be very necessary indeed. Yet, Arrow proved that these properties are in fact mutually incompatible. This troubling fact has been central to the study of social choice ever since.

A Conversation with Amartya Sen

1989 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 135-150 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arjo Klamer
Keyword(s):  
Social Choice ◽  
Choice Theory ◽  
Adam Smith ◽  
Social Choice Theory ◽  
Welfare Economics ◽  
Amartya Sen ◽  
Academic Background ◽  
Rationality Assumption

Arjo Kalmer interviews Amayrtya Sen in December 1985. After some biographical and academic background, the discussion moves to welfare economics, rationality, and Adam Smith. In a postscript, Sen discusses the connection between his critique of the rationality assumption and his work on social choice theory.

scholarly journals Negotiating Socially Optimal Allocations of Resources

2006 ◽  
Vol 25 ◽  
pp. 315-348 ◽  
Author(s):  
U. Endriss ◽  
N. Maudet ◽  
F. Sadri ◽  
F. Toni
Keyword(s):  
Social Welfare ◽  
Social Choice ◽  
Multiagent System ◽  
Optimal Allocation ◽  
Choice Theory ◽  
Social Choice Theory ◽  
Allocation Of Resources ◽  
Artificial Society ◽  
The Social ◽  
Optimal Allocations

A multiagent system may be thought of as an artificial society of autonomous software agents and we can apply concepts borrowed from welfare economics and social choice theory to assess the social welfare of such an agent society. In this paper, we study an abstract negotiation framework where agents can agree on multilateral deals to exchange bundles of indivisible resources. We then analyse how these deals affect social welfare for different instances of the basic framework and different interpretations of the concept of social welfare itself. In particular, we show how certain classes of deals are both sufficient and necessary to guarantee that a socially optimal allocation of resources will be reached eventually.

On Sen's Liberal Paradox and its Reception within Political Theory and Welfare Economics

Politics ◽  
2000 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-31 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pieter Vanhuysse
Keyword(s):  
Social Choice ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
Choice Theory ◽  
Social Choice Theory ◽  
Welfare Economics ◽  
Individual Rights ◽  
Liberal Paradox

In this article, Amartya Sen's seminal proof of the impossibility of a Paretian liberal is briefly reviewed. I then discuss the reception of this alleged ‘liberal paradox’ within the fields of political theory and welfare economics. In particular, I examine the criticisms made by Brian Barry, and their wider implications for the field of social choice theory. It is argued that the various criticisms made on Sen's characterisation of liberty are fundamental, and that Sen's subsequent defence of his position is unconvincing. Moreover, there remain some wider doubts as to the usefulness of social choice theory's SWF approach to individual rights and freedoms.

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