The inverse plurality rule—an axiomatization

Under the ‘inverse plurality rule’, voters specify only their least preferred alternative. Our first result establishes that this rule is the only scoring rule that satisfies the minimal veto condition (MV). We then prove that the inverse plurality rule is characterized by MV and the four well known conditions that characterize scoring rules; namely, Anonymity (A), Neutrality (N), Reinforcement (RE) and Continuity (CO). Our new characterization result is related to the characterizations of approval voting and of the widely used plurality rule. We finally show how the axiomatization of the inverse plurality rule can be extended to the axiomatization of elementary scoring rules (vote for t-alternatives scoring rules).