Argumentation Based Resolution of Conflicts between Desires and Normative Goals

Norms represent what ought to be done, and their fulfillment can be seen as benefiting the overall system, society or organisation. However, individual agent goals (desire) may conflict with system norms. If a decision to comply with a norm is determined exclusively by an agent or, conversely, if norms are rigidly enforced, then system performance may be degraded, and individual agent goals may be inappropriately obstructed. To prevent such deleterious effects we propose a general framework for argumentation-based resolution of conflicts amongst desires and norms. In this framework, arguments for and against compliance are arguments justifying rewards, respectively punishments, exacted by ‘enforcing’ agents. The arguments are evaluated in a recent extension to Dung’s abstract argumentation framework, in order that the agents can engage in metalevel argumentation as to whether the rewards and punishments have the required motivational force. We provide an example instantiation of the framework based on a logic programming formalism.