# kaal:claim:3782203-011

**Claim.** Plurality voting predictably produces a system that swings between two polarized parties who are less acceptable to the majority but strongly preferred by interested minorities, because voters are incentivized to vote for their preferred one of the perceived top two rather than waste their vote.

**Type.** mechanism  **Support.** argued

**Holds when.**

- plurality voting rules
- voters who want their vote to matter

**Source quote.**

> So plurality voting predictably leads to a system which swings between two polarized parties who are less acceptable to the majority, but strongly preferred by interested minorities—Duverger's Law.

**From.** Craig Calcaterra, Wulf A. Kaal, *A Technical Perspective on Decentralization* (2021), Application to network forking, page 7

**Cite as.** Craig Calcaterra, Wulf A. Kaal, A Technical Perspective on Decentralization (2021). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3782203

**Verify.** sha256 of source PDF `ab8a22d0dbb026a09212a4c85963f3c05787cf80775e8613ae3724e3883e7a56` at https://raw.githubusercontent.com/wulfkaal/Academic-Papers/main/papers/pdf/Calcaterra%20and%20Kaal%20-%202021%20-%20A%20Technical%20Perspective%20on%20Decentralization.pdf

**Failure mode.** duverger-polarization  (family: governance-participation-collapse)

**Topics.** governance-design

**Keywords.** duvergers-law, plurality-voting, polarization, strategic-voting

**Canonical form.** This markdown file is the canonical hashed representation of the claim. Its sha256 is the content hash used for attestation.