Coalition And Connection In Games

Coalition and Connection in Games: Problems of Modern Game Theory using Methods Belonging to Systems Theory and Information Theory focuses on coalition formation and on connections occurring in games, noting the use of mathematical models in the evaluation of processes involved in games. The book first takes a look at the process of strategy in playing games in which the conditional choices of players are noted. The sequence of decisions during the playing of games and observance of the rules are emphasized. The text also ponders on the mathematical tool of game theory in which the differences in the playing of games is seen as influenced by the number of players involved. The manuscript reviews how the von Neumann-Morgenstern theory is used in measuring the conditions on how games are played. The theory points out that games with more than two players call for the introduction of concepts and an instrument in comparison with two-person zero-sum games. The text also underscores the tendency of players to obtain a large share of the payoff, whether playing by themselves or participating in coalitions. The book is a fine reference for readers interested in the analysis of game theories.

Drawing upon and extending his inaugural Lipsey Lectures, Debraj Ray looks at coalition formation from the perspective of game theory. Ray brings together developments in both cooperative and noncooperative game theory to study the analytics of coalition formation and binding agreements.

This book introduces new concepts for cooperative game theory, and particularly solutions that determine the distribution of a coalitional surplus among the members of the coalition. It also addresses several generalizations of cooperative game theory. Drawing on methods of welfare economics, new value solutions are derived for Non-Transferable Utility games with and without differences of bargaining power among the members of the coalition. Cooperation in intertemporal games is examined, and conditions that permit the reduction of these games to games in coalition function form are outlined. Biform games and games that combine non-cooperative search and matching of coalition members with cooperative solutions (i.e., efficient contracts) within the coalition are considered. Contents:Value Solutions for Superadditive Transferable Utility Games in Coalition Function FormZeuthen–Nash BargainingNontransferable Utility Games and Games in Partition Function FormA Shapley Value Algorithm for Games in Partition Function FormExtension of the Nucleolus to Nontransferable Utility Games in Partition Function FormA Core Imputation with Variable Bargaining PowerBargaining Power Biform GamesIntertemporal Cooperative Games: A Sketch of a TheoryA Theory of Enterprise Readership: Graduate students and researchers in the field of game theory. Keywords:Cooperative Games;Value;Imputation;Bargaining TheoryKey Features:Proposes a value solution for games of two or more players that: (i) is the Nash bargaining solution in a special case, (ii) allows for unsymmetrical bargaining power, (iii) allows for group-to-group bargaining, and (iv) is always a point in the core of the game if the game is not nullUses methods from mathematical welfare economics to bridge the gap from non-transferable utility to transferable utilityRelying on Biform Games (Brandenburger and Stuart), constructs a model of cooperative value creation in coalitions formed by non-cooperative search and matching

The theory of n-person cooperative games presented by von Neumann and Morgenstern is a mathematical theory of coalition behaviour. A fundamental problem posed in game theory is to determine what outcomes are likely to occur if a game is played by rational players. Given an n-person cooperative game and assuming rational behaviour, it is natural to inquire which of the possible coalitions can be expected to form and what will be the final payoffs to each of the players. However, most of the research in game theory has been concerned explicityly with predicting player's payoff and only implicityly (if at all) with predicting which coalitions shall form. In this investigation, the primary emphasis is on the first aspect of coalition behaviour, namely the formation of coalitions.

A comprehensive survey of computational aspects of collective decisions for graduate students, researchers, and professionals in computer science and economics.

Two crucial aspects of economic reality are uncertainty and dynamics. In this book, new models and techniques are developed to analyse economic dynamics in an uncertain environment. In the first part, investment decisions of firms are analysed in a framework where imperfect information regarding the investment's profitability is obtained randomly over time. In the second part, a new class of cooperative games, spillover games, is developed and applied to a particular investment problem under uncertainty: mergers. In the third part, the effect of bounded rationality on market evolution is analysed for oligopolistic competition and incomplete financial markets.

Cooperative game theory is a branch of (micro-)economics that studies the behavior of self-interested agents in strategic settings where binding agreements among agents are possible. Our aim in this book is to present a survey of work on the computational aspects of cooperative game theory. We begin by formally defining transferable utility games in characteristic function form, and introducing key solution concepts such as the core and the Shapley value. We then discuss two major issues that arise when considering such games from a computational perspective: identifying compact representations for games, and the closely related problem of efficiently computing solution concepts for games. We survey several formalisms for cooperative games that have been proposed in the literature, including, for example, cooperative games defined on networks, as well as general compact representation schemes such as MC-nets and skill games. As a detailed case study, we consider weighted voting games: a widely-used and practically important class of cooperative games that inherently have a natural compact representation. We investigate the complexity of solution concepts for such games, and generalizations of them. We briefly discuss games with non-transferable utility and partition function games. We then overview algorithms for identifying welfare-maximizing coalition structures and methods used by rational agents to form coalitions (even under uncertainty), including bargaining algorithms. We conclude by considering some developing topics, applications, and future research directions.

Drawing upon and extending his inaugural Lipsey Lectures, Debraj Ray looks at coalition formation from the perspective of game theory. Ray brings together developments in both cooperative and noncooperative game theory to study the analytics of coalition formation and binding agreements.