Abstract

In the Roman Catholic Church, the pope is elected by the (cardinal) electors through “scrutiny,” where each elector casts an anonymous nomination. Using historical documents, we argue that a guiding principle for the church has been the protection of electors from the temptation to defy God through dishonest nomination. Based on axiomatic analysis involving this principle, we recommend that the church overturn the changes of Pope Pius XII to reinstate the scrutiny of Pope Gregory XV, and argue that randomization in the case of deadlock merits consideration.

Details

Title
An axiomatic analysis of the papal conclave
Author
Mackenzie, Andrew 1 

 Maastricht University, Department of Economics, Maastricht, The Netherlands (GRID:grid.5012.6) (ISNI:0000 0001 0481 6099) 
Pages
713-743
Publication year
2020
Publication date
Apr 2020
Publisher
Springer Nature B.V.
ISSN
09382259
e-ISSN
1432-0479
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
ProQuest document ID
2186634163
Copyright
Economic Theory is a copyright of Springer, (2019). All Rights Reserved. This work is published under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (the “License”). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.