Riots, revolutions, democratization, and information cascades
In the Economic Journal, Chris Ellis and John Fender, economics professors from the University of Oregon and the University of Birmingham respectively, discuss the nature of information cascades and how they can be used as a model to analyze regime change. Examples of revolutionary regime change written around the time of the article focus on the Arab spring and the sudden nature with which populace in the middle east rose up against long established regimes. Ellis and Fender assert that this sudden rise can be explained through the lens of information cascade, where people make decisions based on information they receive from others. In the case of a revolution, information cascades begin when enough people have made the decision to rise up that it encourages others to rise up. This is measured in the paper by how crime is viewed during revolution. Periods of high crime with organized demonstrations occurring encourage higher levels of low crime, because perpetrators are aware that they will not be punished when such graver concerns are present. This concept of an information cascade helps explain why more people are willing to participate at low levels in revolution as it grows and how these revolutions inspire other nations to revolt as well.
This exploration of information cascades links back to how we covered the topic in lecture by giving the concept a real world application. Our discussion of information cascades focused on at what point information from others begins to persuade. The example of the Arab spring gives a real world example of decisions persuading others, when enough chose to revolt we reached a tipping point where it seemed advantageous to follow suit. This is similar to our bag problems in which we calculate how many guesses in one direction until other players follow what has been done previously. It would be an interesting thought experiment to try and find the point at which the revolutions became a cascade and many joined in protest
https://voxeu.org/article/riots-and-revolutions-digital-age