Centre for Development Economics
and
Department of Economics, Delhi School of Economics
ANNOUNCE A SEMINAR
Accommodating Procedural Fairness in Harsanyi’s Impartial Observer Setting:
Do we really need Non-linear Social Welfare Functions?
by
Abhinash Borah
Johannes Gutenberg University
Monday, December 3, 2012 at 3:00 p.m.
Venue : AMEX Conference Room (Second Floor)
Department of Economics, Delhi School of Economics
All are cordially invited
Abstract
This paper revisits, within Harsanyi’s impartial observer setting, the classic question of accommodating procedural fairness in society’s choices over risky social prospects. We propose and axiomatically characterize an adjusted utilitarian representation under which an impartial observer assesses risky social prospects based on (i) a utilitarian evaluation in the Harsanyi sense and (ii) an adjustment that corrects this evaluation to capture individuals’ attitudes toward equality of opportunities in society. Our proposal differs from several popular approaches to accommodating procedural fairness within social choices in that we relax the independence axiom at the level of individual rather than social choices, i.e., the impartial observer adheres to Bayesian rationality, albeit within the limits set by the acceptance principle. Because of this, our social welfare function is linear in individual utilities, thus retaining the spirit of Harsanyi’s original formulation.