Torun Dewan

I study political institutions and collective decision-making: parties, coalitions, cabinets, leadership and elections. My research uses formal models to examine cooperation, conflict and political incentives, alongside work on British political history. A recent strand studies the political economy of the Talmud, treating its legal procedures as mechanisms for allocating resources and making collective decisions.

Working Papers

• When Consensus Acquits
  SSRN 7250198 (earlier version)

  Political interference can make unanimous agreement less informative than a divided verdict. Rejecting unanimity can protect collective judgment and, under specified conditions, deter attempts to manufacture consensus.

• Deciding Before You Are Persuaded
  with Kfir Eliaz · Working paper

  Deciding earlier can improve decisions by changing how a biased sender investigates. A deadline announced in advance can steer testing towards conclusive evidence and, under stated conditions, deliver perfect accuracy.

• Claims to Office
  Working paper · SSRN 7293718 (earlier version)

  Coalition partners’ claims to office can exceed what is available. The Talmud rule reconciles claims based on seats and coalition standing, shaping allocations and incentives to advance costly demands.

• Apparentment: Seat Division and Stable Matching
  Working paper · SSRN 7459519 (earlier version)

  Electoral partners may agree to pool surplus votes yet disagree over who receives an extra seat. The allocation rule shapes partner choice and whether stable agreements can form.

Parties and Leadership

• Splits as Price Wars: Policy Control and Party Discipline
  SSRN 7285498
• Holding Talent in Reserve: Journeymen, Stars, and the Rule of Succession
  SSRN 7285978

The Political Economy of the Talmud

• What the Court Cannot See: Commitment and Inference in the Civil Law of the Talmud
  with Limor Ressler · SSRN 7285721
• Reading the Economic Logic of Law from Its Recorded Disputes: The Machloket as Identification
  with Limor Ressler · SSRN 7285838
• When the Buy–Sell Clause Fails: Co-ownership Dissolution, from gud o agud to the Custody of Wards
  SSRN 7285839
• The Ransom Cap: Collective Commitment and the Price of Redemption

Under Review

• The Cabinet as Yardstick: Comparison, Composition, and the Graded Contest
  SSRN 7261079
• Playing for the Winning Team: Stepping Stones in Dynamic Talent Recruitment and Motivation
  with David P. Myatt
• The Luck of the Draw: New Evidence on Windfalls from Thousands of Randomized Income Shocks
  with Daniel Rubenson
• Candidate Exit and Voter Loyalty during Early Democratization
  with Christopher Kam, Jaakko Meriläinen & Janne Tukiainen
• Class, Social Mobility, and Voting in Democratizing and Industrializing England
  with Christopher Kam, Jaakko Meriläinen & Janne Tukiainen

Publications

Articles

• A Political Economy of Social Discrimination
  with Stephane Wolton · Journal of the European Economic Association, 24(4), August 2026, 1368–1403
• Victorian Voting: Party Orientation and Class Alignment Revisited
  with Jaakko Meriläinen & Janne Tukiainen · American Journal of Political Science, 64(4), 2020
• Electoral Competition, Control and Learning
  with Rafael Hortala-Vallve · British Journal of Political Science, 49(3), 2019
• Leadership with Trustworthy Associates
  with Francesco Squintani · American Political Science Review, 112(4), 2018
• In Defence of Factions
  with Francesco Squintani · American Journal of Political Science, 60(4), 2016
• Information Aggregation and Optimal Structure of the Executive
  with Andrea Galeotti, Christian Ghiglino & Francesco Squintani · American Journal of Political Science, 59(2), 2015
• Elements of Political Persuasion: Content, Contact, Cue
  with Macartan Humphreys & Daniel Rubenson · Economic Journal, 124, 2014
• Franchise Extension and the British Aristocracy
  with Samuel Berlinski & Brenda Van Coppenolle · Legislative Studies Quarterly, 39(4), 2014
• Dynamic Government Performance
  with David P. Myatt · American Political Science Review, 106(1), 2012
• The Rhetorical Strategies of Leaders: Standing Back, Stepping Down, and Speaking Clearly
  with David P. Myatt · Journal of Theoretical Politics, 24(4), 2012
• The 3 A's of Government Formation: Appointment, Allocation, and Assignment
  with Rafael Hortala-Vallve · American Journal of Political Science, 55(4), 2011
• Strategic Opposition and Government Cohesion in Westminster Democracies
  with Arthur Spirling · American Political Science Review, 105(2), 2011
• The Political Effects of Franchise Extension: Evidence From the Second Reform Act
  with Samuel Berlinski · Quarterly Journal of Political Science, 6(4), 2011
• The Declining Talent Pool of Government
  with David P. Myatt · American Journal of Political Science, 54(2), 2010
• Individual and Collective Ministerial Performance and the Tenure of Ministers in the UK 1945–1997
  with Samuel Berlinski & Keith Dowding · Journal of Politics, 72, 2010
• Political Economy Models of Elections
  with Kenneth A. Shepsle · Annual Review of Political Science, 12, 2009
• The Qualities of Leadership: Direction, Communication and Obfuscation
  with David P. Myatt · American Political Science Review, 102(3), 2008
• Recent Economic Perspectives on Political Economy, Part I
  with Kenneth A. Shepsle · British Journal of Political Science, 38(1), 2008
• Recent Economic Perspectives on Political Economy, Part II
  with Kenneth A. Shepsle · British Journal of Political Science, 38(2), 2008
• Leading the Party: Coordination, Direction and Communication
  with David P. Myatt · American Political Science Review, 101(4), 2007
• The Length of Ministerial Tenure in the UK 1945–1997
  with Samuel Berlinski & Keith Dowding · British Journal of Political Science, 37(2), 2007
• Scandal, Protection and Recovery in the Cabinet
  with David P. Myatt · American Political Science Review, 101(1), 2007
• Why States Don't Defect: Refugee Protection and Implicit Burden Sharing
  with Eiko Thielemann · West European Politics, 29(2), 2006
• The Corrective Effect of Ministerial Resignations on Government Popularity
  with Keith Dowding · American Journal of Political Science, 49(1), 2005

Books

• Accounting for Ministers: Scandal and Survival in British Government 1945–2007
  with Samuel Berlinski & Keith Dowding · Cambridge University Press, 2012
• Rational Choice Politics, Volumes I–IV
  co-edited with Keith Dowding & Kenneth A. Shepsle · Sage, 2009

Book chapters

• Rational Choice Classics in Political Science
  with Keith Dowding & Kenneth A. Shepsle, in Rational Choice Politics, Vols I–IV, Sage, 2008
• Choosing, Moving and Resigning at Westminster
  with Samuel Berlinski, Keith Dowding & Gita Subrahmanyam, in The Selection of Ministers in Europe: Hiring and Firing (K. Dowding & P. Dumont, eds), Routledge, 2008

About

I teach courses on Social Choice, Public Choice and Game Theory (undergraduate and postgraduate), a graduate seminar on Leadership, and one on Institutions (Parties and Coalitions, Elections and Government).

As well as studying and teaching institutions, I help build them in my own field. I founded the Political Science and Political Economy (PSPE) research group at LSE in 2010, with Simon Hix, and the LSE/NYU annual conference, held since 2012, with Dimitri Landa. I am also a co-founder of the PolEconUK network. I currently run the Political Economy seminar with Tim Besley, Tak-Huen Chau and Noam Yuchtman. In 2015 I hosted the inaugural Comparative Politics and Formal Theory conference at LSE. I am co-editor, with John Patty, of the Journal of Theoretical Politics.

My private passions are first and foremost Chelsea Football Club, where I have long stood on its famous “Shed End”, and now proudly stand alongside my two children; combat sports (mainly BJJ, Brown Belt since 2025 under Manxhina at London Fight Factory); and music (second generation punk, now classical). I enjoy food and wine and am currently writing a book (with Abhinay Muthoo), Breaking Bread: The Politics of Food, that connects models of leadership, bargaining, and conflict to chefs, restaurants and markets. Much of its case material, and especially the chapters on leadership, grew out of long conversations with the Israeli chef Uri Jeremias, known as Uri Buri. His restaurant in Akko is, to my mind, a study in leadership: in the team he builds and holds together in the kitchen, and in the place that team has made in the wider community. It is a working model of coexistence in a mixed city.

Position

Professor of Political Science, LSE (since 2011) · Visiting Professor, Tel Aviv University

Education

D.Phil, Nuffield College, Oxford 2002 · M.Sc, LSE 1997 · B.Sc (Econ) 1996

Contact

Department of Government, London School of Economics, Houghton Street, London WC2A 2AE.
Email: [email protected]