Algorithmics, Social choice, Market Design, and Other Topics

The Guardian has an interesting report on how G erman academics at the  Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research  "have used the mathematics behind the strategic behaviour of countries to propose a way though the myriad impasses".  The relevant paper is available from here .

 There is an interesting mini workshop on 'Recent Developments in Market Design' on 14th September 2011 at Maastricht University. The abstract of the talks are available .

Mathematical biologist, Martin Nowak talks about his new book ' Supercooperators: Evolution, Altruism and Human Behaviour or, Why We Need Each Other to Succeed '.

Hal Varian has a nice article on What Use is Economic Theory? Varian views Economics as Policy Science and then gives a number of reasons why economic theory is helpful in this regard: Theory as a substitute for data Theory helps keep track of benefits and costs Theory helps relate seemingly disparate problems Theory can generate useful insights A theory that is wrong can still yield insight Theory provides a method for solving problems Theory is an antidote to introspection Verifying that something is obvious may show that it isn’t Theory allows for quantification and calculation Economics is amenable to experimental verification

http://cfem.au.dk/newsevents/mechdesign/ The workshop will be held from September 6-9, 2011, at Copenhagen Business School, Denmark. New Trends in Mechanism Design will bring together researchers from economics and computer science working on the design and analysis of economic mechanisms and on applications of such mechanism to solve real-life economic problems for companies, organizations and governments. The workshop will cover both the design of mechanisms using game theoretical analysis of incentives, and the calibration of mechanisms using experimental techniques. Confirmed Speakers Rick Antle , Yale School of Management, Yale University Peter Cramton , University of Maryland Uriel Feige , the Weizmann Institute Jason Hartline , Northwestern University Nicole Immorlica , Northwestern University Hervé Moulin , Rice University Tim Roughgarden , Stanford University

Spain, Italy and Netherlands meeting on Game Theory (SING) was held this year in France and is being organized in Hungary in 2012 . Perhaps, this is reason enough for having a more representative meaning for the word SING :-).

The Society for Social Choice and Welfare will organize its next biannual meeting in New Delhi from 17th August to 20th August, 2012.  ------ Submission starts: 1st November, 2011   Submission deadline: 28th February, 2011 Notification of acceptance: 31st March, 2012   Early registration deadline: TBA   Late registration deadline: TBA   Conference dates: August 17 - 20, 2012 -----  Invited Speakers:  Matthew O. Jackson , Claude d’Aspremont   Maurice Salles