What is logrolling in simple terms?

Legislators trade votes: 'I'll vote for your bill if you vote for mine.'

It can help compromise and pass intensely wanted measures, but it can also inflate wasteful spending and leave everyone worse off.

Logrolling

🏛️ Politics & Public Administration By CampusDown Wiki Editorial Team Last updated October 27, 2026 Views 6

Logrolling is vote trading in which politicians agree, in effect, 'I'll support your bill if you support mine'. The name comes from American settlers helping one another roll logs. Public choice scholars such as Gordon Tullock and James Buchanan analysed it systematically.

Contents

1. Concept and classic analysis
2. Benefits and the paradox
3. Institutions and evidence
4. FAQ
5. References

Concept and classic analysis

Tullock (1959) showed that when each district wants its own road project, legislators who trade votes can pass even low-value projects by majority rule, inflating spending, because benefits are concentrated locally while costs are shared. It is a classic public choice analysis.

Benefits and the paradox

Buchanan and Tullock (1962) argued that simple majority rule ignores intensity of preference, and vote trading can let intensely held minority preferences prevail, possibly raising efficiency; Coleman (1966) also saw it aiding preference aggregation. Riker and Brams (1973), however, showed the paradox of vote trading: each trade benefits its parties, yet all trades together can leave everyone worse off, a structure similar to the voting paradox and collective action dilemmas.

Institutions and evidence

Vote trades are unstable because promises are hard to enforce. Weingast and Marshall (1988) argued that congressional committees stabilise bargains by giving members property rights over policy areas. Carrubba and Volden (2000) showed institutions shape logrolling coalitions, and Stratmann (1992) found evidence of vote trading on farm bills. Logrolling enables compromise but can also feed pork-barrel spending.

FAQ

What is logrolling in simple terms?: Legislators trade votes: 'I'll vote for your bill if you vote for mine.'
Is logrolling bad?: It can help compromise and pass intensely wanted measures, but it can also inflate wasteful spending and leave everyone worse off.

Sources reviewed: 2026-10-26

References

Tullock, G. (1959). Problems of majority voting. Journal of Political Economy, 67(6), 571–579. The classic model showing vote trading leads to overspending.
Buchanan, J. M., & Tullock, G. (1962). The calculus of consent: Logical foundations of constitutional democracy. University of Michigan Press. The public choice classic on vote trading and preference intensity.
Riker, W. H., & Brams, S. J. (1973). The paradox of vote trading. American Political Science Review, 67(4), 1235–1247. Shows vote trading can leave everyone worse off.
Weingast, B. R., & Marshall, W. J. (1988). The industrial organization of Congress; or, why legislatures, like firms, are not organized as markets. Journal of Political Economy, 96(1), 132–163. Committees as institutions that enforce legislative bargains.
Carrubba, C. J., & Volden, C. (2000). Coalitional politics and logrolling in legislative institutions. American Journal of Political Science, 44(2), 261–277. How legislative institutions shape logrolling coalitions.
Stratmann, T. (1992). The effects of logrolling on congressional voting. American Economic Review, 82(5), 1162–1176. Empirical evidence of logrolling on US farm bills.
Coleman, J. S. (1966). The possibility of a social welfare function. American Economic Review, 56(5), 1105–1122. Argues vote trading can help aggregate preferences.

Reports and materials that use this theory (Korean)

There are no materials dedicated to this theory yet, but you can search related reports in the CampusDown library (Korean).

Find more reports · Search '로그롤링' on CampusDown →

Public Choice TheoryWhat public choice theory is, its origins in Wicksell, Black, Arrow and Downs, Buchanan and Tullock's The Calculus of Consent, the median voter theorem, rent seeking, Niskanen's bureaucracy model, regulatory capture, constitutional economics, government failure and major critiques.🏛️ Politics & Public Administration Paradox of VotingWhat the paradox of voting is: one vote almost never decides an election yet many people vote, plus Downs's expected-utility calculus, the D term, minimax regret, game-theoretic models, altruistic voting and field experiments on turnout.🏛️ Politics & Public Administration Median Voter TheoremWhat the median voter theorem states, Black's proof, Hotelling's location model and Downs's two-party convergence, cycling in multidimensional space (McKelvey), size-of-government models, empirical evidence and critiques.🏛️ Politics & Public Administration Collective Action ProblemWhat the collective action problem is, Olson (1965) on group size and selective incentives, links to the prisoner's dilemma and the commons, Axelrod on repeated cooperation, Ostrom's self-governance, public-goods experiments and climate cooperation.🏛️ Politics & Public Administration

Latest ArticlesView all ›

New guides for college study and assignments (Korean)

This article was last updated on October 27, 2026. It is based on widely recognized original works and textbooks; when citing it in a paper, please check the original sources listed in the references.