AP MicroeconomicsGame Theory & Information
Condorcet Paradox
The Condorcet paradox is when majority preferences cycle (A beats B, B beats C, C beats A) even though each individual voter has consistent rankings.
Majority rule can produce intransitive group preferences: a majority prefers A to B, another majority prefers B to C, yet another prefers C to A, so no option is a stable winner. This 'voting cycle' means the outcome can depend on the agenda or order of votes rather than true preferences. It is the simplest illustration of why fair aggregation of preferences is hard and is the seed of Arrow's impossibility theorem.