ECOLE POLYTECHNIQUE CENTRE NATIONAL DE LA RECHERCHE SCIENTIFIQUE One Round versus Two Round Elections: An Experimental Study

The paper presents a series of experiments in which participants were invited to vote in four one round elections and four two round elections, with the same set of five candidates, among which three were viable and two were not. The experiments were designed to test the arguments put forward by Duverger and Cox about the propensity to vote sincerely or strategically in one round and two round elections. Our findings indicate little difference between the two systems. In both systems, there was a strong tendency to strategically desert the unviable candidates. The data thus support Cox over Duverger. Mots clés : Vote stratégique, Cox, Duverger