There is increasing interest in promoting participatory democracy, in particular by allowing voting by mail or internet and through random-sample elections. A pernicious concern, though, is that of vote buying, which occurs when a bad actor seeks to buy ballots, paying someone to vote against their own intent. This becomes possible whenever a voter is able to sell evidence of which way she vote...

How do domestic political institutions affect the outcomes of international trade negotiations? Specifically, are the aggregate trade barriers agreed upon by a democratic pair lower than those by a pair composed of a democracy and an autocracy? I revisit these important questions by highlighting some problematic aspect of the analysis by Mansfield, Milner, and Rosendorff (2000). Contrary to the...

Behavior contracts are being used more and more in renal settings as a way to address problematic patient behavior. While behavior contracts can be very effective tools for modifying self-destructive or aggressive behavior, a poorly written or implemented behavior contract may lead to a patient’s refusal to cooperate and/or continued or increased problematic behavior. Appropriate use of a behav...

The aim of this paper is to describe and solve a new type of planning problem in which a group of peers need to find and agree upon a plan that solves a given problem. Classical planning only addresses the finding of a plan, whereas agent research defines the concept of commitment which we will use to define the “agreed” aspect of a plan. The problem will be solved by introducing a level of ind...

the issue of water resources and their effect on human life doesn't need any analysis and reasoning. however, such factors as population growth, improved quality of life and development of urbanization along with improved industrial and technological dimensions of human life have necessitated logical and reasonable planning for optimal use of water and water basins of the world. these fact...

Abstract This article reviews three books that offer thought-provoking insights on a central political science question, namely the relationship between capitalism and democracy in twenty-first century. First, ‘ Democracy Prosperity’ by Iversen Soskice posits symbiotic democracy. Advanced capital thrives nationally rooted institutions, hence it needs democratic politics. A majority of voters as...

Agent negotiation is a form of decision making where two or more agents jointly search for a mutually agreed solution to a certain problem. In multiissue negotiation, with information available about the agents’ preferences, a negotiation may result in a mutually beneficial agreement. In a competitive negotiation environment, however, self-interested agents may not be willing to reveal their pr...