The paradox was created by management guru Jerry B. Harvey[?] in his book The Abilene Paradox and other Meditations on Management.
The paradox's name comes from an anecdote in the book that Harvey uses to illustrate the nature of the paradox:
This anecdote was also made into a short film for management education.
The Abilene Paradox theory is often used to help explain extremely poor business decisions, especially notions of the superiority of "rule by committee."
The paradox is sometimes also used as a criticism of the Preferential Voting[?] system. For example, say a person wants to vote for Candidate C, yet realistically realizes that Candidate C will never beat the much more popular Candidates A and B. The person thus votes for Candidate A, whom he doesn't like, yet believes to be the best alternative to candidate C. The voter has thus committed the Abilene Paradox by performing an action that is in direct violation to his actual desire.
See: Groupthink
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