Abstract
Public sector decision makers are often concerned about the preferences of various groups that will be affected by their decisions. This paper discusses the use of utility theory for analyzing such situations. A conflict between Pareto optimality and certain equity considerations is identified. Also, a number of practical difficulties in applications work are discussed, and areas for further research are indicated.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Arrow, K. J., Social Choice and Individual Values, 2nd edition, Wiley, New York, 1963.
Hax, A.C. and Wiig, K.M., “The Use of Decision Analysis in Capital Investment Problems,” Sloan Management Review, (Winter, 1976), pp. 19–48.
Henderson, J. M., and Quandt, R.E., Microeconomic Theory, McGraw-Hill, New York, 1958.
Howard, R.A., “The Foundations of Decision Analysis,” IEEE Transactions on Systems Science and Cybernetics, Vol. SSC-4, (1968), pp. 211–219.
Howard, R.A., “Social Decision Analysis,” Proceedings of the IEEE, Vol. 63, (1975), pp. 359–371.
Howard, R.A., Matheson, J.E. and North D.W., “The Decision to Seed Hurricanes,” Science, Vol. 176 (1972), pp. 1191–1202.
Keeney, R.L., “A Decision Analysis with Multiple Objectives: the Mexico City Airport,” Bell Journal of Economics and Management Science, Vol. 4, (1973), pp. 101–117.
Keeney, R.L., “A Utility Function for Examining Policy Affecting Salmon on the Skeena River,” Journal of the Fisheries Research Board of Canada, Vol. 34 (1977), pp. 49–63.
Keeney, R. L. and Kirkwood, C.W., “Group Decision Making Using Cardinal Social Welfare Functions,” Management Science, Vol. 22 (1975), pp. 430–437.
Keeney, R. L. and Raiffa, H., Decisions With Multiple Objectives, Wiley, New York, 1976.
Kirkwood, C.W., “Decision Analysis Incorporating Preferences of Groups,” Technical Report No. 74, Operations Research Center, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts, June, 1972.
Pratt, J.W., Raiffa, H. and Schlaifer, R., “The Foundations of Decision Under Uncertainty: An Elementary Exposition,” Journal of the American Statistical Association, Vol. 32 (1964), pp. 122–136.
Raiffa, H., Decision Analysis, Addison-Wesley, Reading, Massachusetts, 1968.
von Neumann, J. and Morgenstern, O., Theory of Games and Economic Behavior, 3rd edition, Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, 1953.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 1978 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
About this paper
Cite this paper
Kirkwood, C.W. (1978). Social Decision Analysis Using Multiattribute Utility Theory. In: Zionts, S. (eds) Multiple Criteria Problem Solving. Lecture Notes in Economics and Mathematical Systems, vol 155. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-46368-6_16
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-46368-6_16
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-540-08661-1
Online ISBN: 978-3-642-46368-6
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive