Foundations of Interactive Democracy

这个项目研究互动民主的公理和计算基础。互动民主（ID）是一个总括性术语，包含了各种方法，使民主进程更具参与性和响应性。这些方法的一个共同目标是利用现代信息技术-特别是互联网-以实现更多的互动决策过程。许多ID提案的一个组成部分是在线决策平台，它提供了比传统民主系统更多的灵活性和互动可能性。在线决策平台的成功设计提出了一个多学科的研究挑战;偏好聚合理论（又名社会选择理论）似乎特别相关。然而，现有的ID提案大多与关于偏好聚合的大量科学文献脱节。拟议的项目旨在通过探索如何利用数学基础的投票理论来帮助设计在线决策平台和其他ID工具来弥补这一点。这两个公理和计算技术将发挥至关重要的作用，在这个严格的基础分析的投票理论方面的ID。从计算的社会选择，一个新兴的研究领域，在计算机科学和经济学的交叉点的见解，将是特别相关的这一奋进。

This project studies axiomatic and computational foundations of Interactive Democracy. Interactive Democracy (ID) is an umbrella term that encompasses a variety of approaches to make democratic processes more engaging and responsive. A common goal of these approaches is to utilize modern information technology---in particular, the Internet---in order to enable more interactive decision making processes.An integral part of many ID proposals are online decision platforms that provide much more flexibility and interaction possibilities than traditional democratic systems. The successful design of online decision platforms presents a multidisciplinary research challenge; the theory of preference aggregation (aka social choice theory) seems particularly relevant. However, existing ID proposals are mostly disconnected from the vast body of scientific literature on preference aggregation.The proposed project aims to remedy this by exploring how mathematically grounded voting theory can be employed to aid the design of online decision platforms and other ID tools. Both axiomatic and computational techniques will play a vital role in this rigorous foundational analysis of the voting-theoretic aspects of ID. Insights from computational social choice, an emerging research area at the intersection of computer science and economics, will be particularly relevant for this endeavor.