Opinion Dynamics with Conflicting Interests

TL;DR

This paper presents an agent-based model illustrating how information inequality and economic resources influence opinion formation, potentially leading a well-informed minority to sway societal decisions, with implications for democracy and issues like climate change denial.

Contribution

It introduces a simple agent-based model that demonstrates the impact of economic and informational inequality on opinion dynamics and decision-making.

Findings

Minority groups with more information and resources can significantly influence opinions.

Information technology amplifies the ability of well-informed minorities to sway decisions.

Economic and information inequality pose risks to democratic processes.

Abstract

I develop a rather simple agent-based model to capture a co-evolution of opinion formation, political decision making and economic outcomes. I use this model to study how societies form opinions if their members have opposing interests. Agents are connected in a social network and exchange opinions, but differ with regard to their interests and ability to gain information about them. I show that inequality in information and economic resources can have a drastic impact on aggregated opinion. In particular, my model illustrates how a tiny, but well-informed minority can influence group decisions to their favor. This effect is amplified if these agents are able to command more economic resources to advertise their views and if they can target their advertisements efficiently, as made possible by the rise of information technology. My results contribute to the understanding of pressing questions such as climate change denial and highlight the dangers that economic and information inequality can pose for democracies.