Truth and lies in election campaigns

Abstract

Political candidates do not infrequently lie during the campaign. Afterwards, when a candidate has won the election, the difference between the campaign announcements and the implemented policy of the candidate is made clear. There are candidates for whom the difference between the campaign announcement and the implemented policy will be quite large, while the difference may be zero for more truthful candidates. In this thesis we will transform the political election into a game theoretic model. In the model different candidates can differ in the amount they are willing to lie. We find that the presence of liars in an election affects the behavior of the more truthful candidates. Also, the presence of truthful candidates changes the behavior of candidates who are more willing to lie. We conclude that liars have a slight advantage over truthful candidates regarding the chance of being elected into office.