Abstract
Representative government, whereby voters elect representatives to govern on their behalf, is a hallmark of modern democracies. However, the use of representatives to make collective decisions is far from universal. In many instances, such as referenda and ballot initiatives, individuals make collective decisions directly. When group decisions are assigned to representatives, the structure of representative governments can vary along several dimensions, creating a variety of forms of representative government. Differences in the structure of representative governments can potentially have significant impacts on the decisions made by representative bodies and the costs incurred in making those decisions.
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© 2004 Kluwer Academic Publishers
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Sass, T.R. (2004). The Anatomy of Political Representation. In: Rowley, C.K., Schneider, F. (eds) The Encyclopedia of Public Choice. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-306-47828-4_33
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-306-47828-4_33
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