Citizen Candidates Under Uncertainty

Abstract

In this paper we make two contributions to the growing literature on "citizen-candidate" models of representative democracy. First, we add uncertainty about the total vote count. We show that in a society with a large electorate, where the outcome of the election is uncertain and where winning candidates receive a large reward from holding office, there will be a two-candidate equilibrium and no equilibria with a single candidate. Second, we introduce a new concept of equilibrium, which we term "sincere-strategic," and we show that with this refinement, the two equilibrium candidates will not be too extreme, one will lean to the left and the other one to the right.