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Multiple Criteria Decision Aid

Complex decision problem often requires to explicitly consider several points of view. The classical approaches in the field of operations research consider only a single objective function to be optimized; hence, such single criterion models one aspect of the decision problem, or aggregates relevant aspects into a single criterion (such aggregation being usually rather simplistic). Many multidimensional approaches have been proposed as extensions of the classical ones. A first was the so called Multicriteria Decision Making (MCDM), developed by the so-called American School. More recently, the European School has created a new type of approach to these problems, called Multicriteria Decision Aid (MCDA). Many real life applications have successfully validated the feasibility of this approach. MCDM/MCDA is today an important research fields in Operation Research.

MCDA/MCDM deals with different classes of decision problems (choice, classification, sorting, ranking), taking explicitly into consideration several points of view (multiple attributes or criteria, i.e. attributes with ordered domain), in order to support Decision Makers (DMs) to find a consistent solution of the problem at hand. Modern tools in preference modeling have been successfully applied in the framework of MCDA. The scientific aspects and the practical applications have attracted numerous researchers and practitioners towards MCDA world, stimulating both theoretical and methodological developments, as well as real life applications and specific software implementation.

Goals of the Summer School

The aim of the school is to give to doctoral students/young researchers a state-of-the-art presentation of multiple criteria methods, applications and software. Multicriteria decision aid (MCDA) is a rapidly evolving domain which scientific developments are altogether based on fundamental sciences as mathematics, computer science, operation research, engineering, etc. and on social sciences and management science as sociology, management, political sciences. Interdisciplinarity needs a special involvement and will to insure full collaboration. The field of application is continuously expanding and social demands are numerous. The specific objectives of the school are:

  • to exchange knowledge to provide an efficient approach of real life decision problems;
  • to present recent developments in MCDA methods and practices;
  • to present software developments;
  • to analyse and discuss several applications of MCDA to complex evaluation situations.

Target audience

The ideal number of participants is about 40 and, in any case, less than 50. The summer school will host:

  • young researchers who wish to achieve a thesis on the subject or to carry on a personal work which uses Multicriteria decision aid or to in-depth their knowledge in this discipline in order to complete their training,
  • professionals (staff members in Government and Industry, managers, consultants) who wish to familiarize with the tools on Multicriteria decision aid in view to use them in the frame of their work;

It is very important that both categories described be present in order to favour the exchanges between people who are used to deal with decision problems in very different manners.

Language

The official language of the School is English. No simultaneous translation will be provided.

Welcoming institution

LGI (Industrial Engineering Laboratory), Ecole Centrale Paris

Supporting institutions

Multicriteria Summer School Scientific Committee

  • Jose Figueira
  • Martin Geiger
  • Vincent Mousseau
  • Roman Slowinski
  • Theodor Stewart
  • Benedetto Matarazzo

Local Scientific Committee

  • Denis Bouyssou
  • Vincent Mousseau (Chair)
  • Meltem Özturk
  • Alexis Tsoukiŕs

Organizing Committee

Trombinoscope

  • Alessandro Alberici
  • Olivier Cailloux
  • Carlo Casorzo
  • Stéphane Deparis
  • Sylvie Guillemain
  • Vincent Mousseau
  • Corinne Olliver
  • Anne Prévot
  • Jun Zheng