Development of Social Choice Theory in the Framework of Information Study

2015 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 25282088
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B)
• Allocation Type: Partial Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: Social systems engineering/Safety system
• Research Institution: Gunma University
• Principal Investigator: IWAI Atsushi 群馬大学, 社会情報学部, 准教授 (60293081)
• Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha): TOMIYAMA Yoshinori 群馬大学, 社会情報学部, 教授 (50207627) ; SHIDA Kiyoshi 横浜国立大学, 環境情報研究院, 教授 (90178872) ; USAMI Makoto 京都大学, 地球環境学堂, 教授 (80232809) ; YOSHIHARA Naoki 高知工科大学, 経済・マネジメント学群, 教授 (60272770) ; INOHARA Takehiro 東京工業大学, 社会理工学研究科, 教授 (80293075)
• Project Period (FY): 2013-04-01 – 2016-03-31
• Keywords: 社会的選択理論 / 情報学 / 厚生 / 幸福 / 匿名性

Outline of Final Research Achievements

This study explored the potential development of social choice theory in the framework of information study. In particular, it focused on Amartya Sen’s theory and proposed a software system to calculate the amount of information processing needed in a social choice procedure to examine the validity of the theory. In the software system, a Shannon-based calculation method was introduced to evaluate the amount of information. Sen’s framework has a characteristic in that it contains logics for social choices, which are not based on simple voting but on observation and evaluation from the viewpoint of society. This aspect is now related to various approaches to establish “happiness” indexes, although Sen himself did not intend this originally. The quantitative analysis method developed by this study is expected to serve as a tool to re-examine the degree of how a desirable social choice is achievable via an observation- and evaluation-based methodology.

Free Research Field

社会情報システム学