Decentralized advice

We compare the amount of information credibly transmitted by cheap talk when information is centralized to one sender and when it is decentralized, with each of several senders holding a distinct but interdependent piece. Under centralization, full information transmission is typically impossible. Under decentralization, however, the number of receivers is decisive: decentralized communication with one receiver is completely uninformative, but decentralized communication with multiple receivers can be fully informative. We analyze the extent of such fully-informative communication, and apply our results to the issue of transparency in advisory committees.