On the role of zealotry in the voter model

2007/06/30 by Mauro Mobilia, M. Mobilia, Alexander M. Petersen +2 · 3 citations
Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology · Physics and Astronomy · #Complex Network Analysis Techniques #Diffusion and Search Dynamics #Opinion Dynamics and Social Influence #cond-mat.stat-mech #physics.gen-ph #physics.soc-ph

paper · pdf · doi:10.1088/1742-5468/2007/08/p08029

published as J. Stat. Mech. P08029, (2007) · 9 pages, 7 figures, 2-column revtex4 format. Revision has a figure added and minor changes in response to referee comments. For publication in JSTAT

openalex publication_date 2007/08/01 · arxiv created 2007/08/02 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/30

Abstract

We study the voter model with a finite density of zealots—voters that never change opinion. For equal numbers of zealots of each species, the distribution of magnetization (opinions) is Gaussian in the mean-field limit, as well as in one and two dimensions, with a width that is proportional to , where Z is the number of zealots, independent of the total number of voters. Thus just a few zealots can prevent consensus or even the formation of a robust majority.

Citations

• Does a Single Zealot Affect an Infinite Group of Voters?
• Voting and catalytic processes with inhomogeneities
• The Dissemination of Culture

Cited by

• Some new results on one-dimensional outflow dynamics
• A voter-model representation of the multi-allelic Moran process: Exact stationary distributions and diversity thresholds from well-mixed populations to complex networks
• Analytical solution of the voter model on uncorrelated networks