The weak maximizing property, compact perturbations and duality

Abstract

We construct a one-parameter family $(X_c)_{0<c<1}$ of real reflexive Banach spaces, isomorphic to $\ell_2$ and satisfying $d_{\mathrm{BM}}(X_c,\ell_2)\le c^{-1}$, such that $(X_c,X_c)$ fails the weak maximizing property while $(X_c^*,X_c^*)$ has it. The failure of the WMP for $X_c$ is witnessed by a diagonal operator which does not attain its norm but admits a non-weakly null maximizing sequence. On the dual side, a separated-block estimate yields, after dualization, a reverse Pythagorean inequality and a quantitative form of the Opial property; together with property $(M)$, this gives the weak maximizing property for $X_c^*$. We also show that the compact perturbation property is self-dual for reflexive pairs. Since the weak maximizing property implies the compact perturbation property, each $(X_c,X_c)$ has the compact perturbation property. Consequently, the compact perturbation property does not imply the weak maximizing property even arbitrarily close to Hilbert space, and the weak maximizing property is not stable under duality in the reflexive setting.