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This paper aims to introduce a negotiation support system (NSS) with a theoretical modeling that considers the aspects of human personality and negotiator’s behavior to assist the decision-making of public managers and stakeholders in democratic bargaining processes and support social-efficient outcomes.

A game theoretical modeling of public participatory negotiations characterized by complete and perfect information is explored with the inclusion of personality aspects and negotiation styles. The importance of the negotiation knowledge disclosure in the sequential bargains of participative budgeting is highlighted by an experiment with 162 state-owned companies’ managers and graduate students to present the contribution of the system’s applicability.

A considerable number of Pareto-efficient deliberation agreements are obtained with few interactions when the negotiation strategies and the personality aspects of opponents and stakeholders are freely available (a symmetry in the public negotiation knowledge). In addition to the set of Pareto-efficient agreements, those with the best social outcome (i.e. that maximize the group satisfaction despite individual losses) are observed when the informational tool for personality and negotiation style inference is enabled.

Many scholars argue for Pareto-efficient allocation instead of equal divisions of resources within participative democracies and public governance. This work provides a new system with an empirical application and theoretical modeling which may support those arguments based on the nonverbal negotiation aspects.

To present a support system which will be useful to mediators of brownfield redevelopment negotiations between government and industry representatives.

The support system optimizes a weighted utility function of the parties involved in the negotiation. It provides not only the optimal solution but also some sensitivity reports which the mediator can use to lead the negotiations in the most effective direction.

The spreadsheet technology is sufficient to solve the optimization problem and produce sensitivity reports in real time. Consequently, a mediator equipped with a laptop computer can lead the negotiations efficiently.

It is possible to achieve Pareto optimal contingent contracts among the stakeholders of brownfield redevelopment projects.

Many negotiations that were stalled in the past could be completed successfully using the support system presented here. New negotiations might be completed more efficiently than without the system.

This is the first paper to offer detailed guidance to mediators of brownfield redevelopment projects.

This study aims to provide probable future developments in the form of holistic scenarios for business negotiations. In recent years, negotiation research did not put a lot of emphasis on external changes. Consequently, current challenges and trends are scarcely integrated, making it difficult to support negotiation practice perspectively.

This paper applies the structured, multi-method approach of scenario analysis. To examine the future space of negotiations, this combines qualitative and quantitative measures to base our analysis on negotiation experts’ assessments, estimations and visions of the negotiation future.

The results comprise an overview of five negotiation scenarios in the year 2030 and of their individual drivers. The five revealed scenarios are: digital intelligence, business as usual, powerful network – the route to collaboration, powerful network – the route to predominance and system crash.

The scenario analysis is a suitable approach that enables to relate various factors of the negotiation environment to negotiations themselves and allows an examination of future changes in buyer–seller negotiations and the creation of possible future scenarios. The identified scenarios provide an orientation for business decisions in the field of negotiation.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a mathematical model of a make-to-order manufacturing company simultaneously negotiating multiple contingent orders that possess conflicting issues in order to achieve order acceptance decisions (OADs).

The paper developed a mathematical model by incorporating probabilistic theory and some theories of negotiation in the OAD problem. The model helps to harness the relationship between the manufacturer and customers of contingent orders on conflicting issues. A numerical example is enumerated to illustrate the working mechanism and sensitivity of the model developed.

In the negotiation-based OAD system, if more than one customer is willing to negotiate on the offer of manufacturer, rather than engaging in one-to-one negotiation, the manufacturer has to negotiate with all the customers simultaneously to maximize the expected contribution and acceptance probability from all the orders. Also, the numerical example illustrates that, sometimes, rejecting an order/orders from the order set gives better results in terms of the expected contribution than continuing negotiations on them.

Through continuing research efforts in this domain, certain models and strategies have been developed for negotiation on a one-to-one basis (i.e. negotiation by the manufacture with only one customer at a time). One-to-one negotiation will neither help companies to streamline their production systems nor will it maximize the expected contribution. To the best of the author’s knowledge, so far, this is the first instance of research work in the domain of a joint OAD and negotiation framework that attempts to develop a simultaneous negotiation method for arriving at OADs.

Intercultural interfirm relationships have become a new challenge for international management. The purpose of this paper is to explore differences in computer‐mediated negotiation behavior between participants who come from nations which differ as regards two major cultural values: individualism and collectivism.

This is an empirical study with a sample containing 170 negotiators with different cultural backgrounds; it comprises content analysis; and multivariate analysis of variance models.

Comparing negotiators from Asian, North American, and European cultures, it is found that people who come from an individualist culture exhibit different negotiation strategies to individuals from a collectivist culture.

Based on the results management may sensitize negotiators in intercultural interfirm relationships to their counterparts' communication strategies.

The paper highlights how negotiators' cultures affect their strategic orientation.

Different housing development stakeholders need to cooperate and collaborate to perform various project activities. Housing development requires infrastructure development, which includes preparation of sand material embankment as much as ± 200,000 m³. The objectives are to find a model for agreement options and coalition, to validate the algorithms of the best fit for material locations and to determine how much the proposed agreement option was achieved. This study provides a structured methodology that can lead to systematic support system and automated negotiation for decision-making on housing development process.

Agreement option on group decision techniques was applied to determine the relative value of the alternative solutions for performing the function of project solutions. Analytical hierarchy process based on satisficing option was applied for decision process and game theory-based agent system for coalition formation. It is conducted in two stages that determine the decision preference and decision process consisting of four steps. The steps are constructing decision hierarchy, making judgment and synthesis, determining payoff optimum and analyzing the best fit option for all decision-makers.

The proposed model enables each decision-maker to select individually its coalition. It will improve the value of strategic decision. All solutions are chosen by more than one decision-maker and coalitions, where all decision-makers agree with the result. It becomes possible location for the material of a housing development. A support model enables negotiation process in group decision. Decision algorithms are based on the cooperative game theory to develop the agreement options and coalition formation. Similar research studies were carried out in this area, but this research is – to the knowledge of the authors – the first to apply the satisficing of value-based on desirable and considerable.

The result is limited to the first-round negotiation of collaborative decision. A trade-off algorithm among decision-maker preference is needed for negotiation process. Future research is to continue working on multi-attribute decision-making, specifically on the process of eliciting user preference models such as neural network application and value function, and on establishing expert quantitative data from qualitative description of the feature of the alternative solution. It will need the development of trade-off algorithms to analyze value of technical solution in real time.

The support model can be extended to an automated negotiation and in different strategic decision on all stages of housing development.

The satisficing algorithm of the coalition will satisfy all stakeholders. This will reduce any potential conflict.

Combination of value-based decision, group decision and collaborative support. Application of coalition formation for agreement options is used to select the best fit material location. It is based on satisficing game theory rather than optimization.

The starting point of this paper is the propositional model of conflict resolution which was presented and critically discussed in Lempp (2016). Based on this model, a software implementation, called ProCON, is introduced and applied to three scenarios. The purpose of the paper is to demonstrate how ProCON can be used by negotiators and to evaluate ProCON’s practical usefulness as an automated negotiation support system.

The propositional model is implemented as a computer program. The implementation consists of an input module to enter data about a negotiation situation, an output module to generate outputs (e.g. a list of all incompatible goal pairs or a graph displaying the compatibility relations between goals) and a queries module to run queries on particular aspects of a negotiation situation.

The author demonstrates how ProCON can be used to capture a simple two-party, non-iterative prisoner’s dilemma, applies ProCON to a contract negotiation between a supplier and a purchaser of goods, and uses it to model the negotiations between the Iranian and six Western governments over Iran’s nuclear enrichment and stockpiling capacities.

A limitation of the current version of ProCON arises from the fact that the computational complexity of the underlying algorithm is EXPTIME (i.e. the computing time required to process information in ProCON grows exponentially with respect to the number of issues fed into the program). This means that computing time can be quite long for even relatively small negotiation scenarios.

The three case studies demonstrate how ProCON can provide support for negotiators in a wide range of multi-party, multi-issue negotiations. In particular, ProCON can be used to visualise the compatibility relations between parties’ goals, generate possible outcomes and solutions and evaluate solutions regarding the extent to which they satisfy the parties’ goals.

In contrast to standard game-theoretic models of negotiation, ProCON does not require users to provide data about their preferences across their goals. Consequently, it can operate in situations where no information about the parties’ goal preferences is available. Compared to game-theoretical models, ProCON represents a more general approach of looking at possible outcomes in the context of negotiations.

The purpose of this paper is to introduce a new agent-based simulation model of bilateral negotiation based on a synthesis of established theories and empirical studies of negotiation research. The central units of the model are negotiators who pursue goals, have attributes (trust, assertiveness, cooperativeness, creativity, time, etc.) and perform actions (proposing and accepting offers, exchanging information, creating value, etc).

Methodologically, the model follows the agent-based approach to modeling. This approach is chosen because negotiations can be described as complex, non-linear systems involving autonomous agents (i.e. the negotiators), who interact with each other, pursue goals and perform actions aimed at achieving their goals.

This paper illustrates how the model can simulate experiments involving variables such as negotiation strategy, creativity, reservation value or time in negotiation. An example simulation is presented which investigates the main and interaction effects of negotiators’ reservation value and their time available for a negotiation. A software implementation of the model is freely accessible at https://tinyurl.com/y7oj6jo8.

The model, as developed at this point, provides the basis for future research projects. One project could address the representation of emotions and their impact on the process and outcome of negotiations. Another project could extend the model by allowing negotiators to convey false information (i.e. to bluff). Yet another project could be aimed at refining the routines used for making and accepting offers with a view to allow parties to reach partial settlements during a negotiation.

Due to its broad scope and wide applicability, the model can be used by practitioners and researchers alike. As a decision-support system, the model allows users to simulate negotiation situations and estimate the likelihood of negotiation outcomes. As a research platform, it can generate simulation data in a cost- and time-effective way, allowing researchers to simulate complex, large-N studies at no cost or time.

The model presented in this paper synthesizes in a novel way a comprehensive range of concepts and theories of current negotiation research. It complements other computational models, in that it can simulate a more diverse range of negotiation strategies (distributive, integrative and compromise) and is applicable to a greater variety of negotiation scenarios.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a framework for the manufacturer of a make-to-order company to simultaneously negotiate with multiple customers through mediator to achieve order acceptance decisions (OADs).

The paper developed mathematical models for the manufacturer, as well as customers to revise their offers during negotiations. Moreover, the paper also proposed a method for the mediator to carry out his assigned duties to assist in negotiation. In the decision process, mediator acts as a bridge between the manufacturer and customers to reach an agreement. A numerical example is enumerated to illustrate the working mechanism and superiority of proposed framework as compared to the framework where simultaneous negotiations are carried out without the presence of mediator.

Iterative method of negotiation conducted without mediator leads to delay in reaching agreement as the aspiration level of manufacturer offer and counter-offer of customer will never cross each other. In addition, the party who submits the offer first may suffer as the opponent can take the advantage of his/her offer during negotiation, thereby, derailing the issue of fairness. Introducing mediator between the manufacturer and the customer for their negotiations could overcome these two issues. Numerical analysis clearly illustrates that, in average, the rounds of negotiation to reach an agreement can be reduced by 22 percent using proposed negotiation framework. In addition, the fairness in negotiations can be improved by 33 percent with the incorporation of mediator.

Through continuing research efforts in this domain, certain models and strategies have been developed for negotiation. Iterative method of negotiations without mediator will help neither the manufacturer nor the customer in terms of fairness and negotiations round to reach an agreement. To the best of the author’s knowledge, so far, this is the first instance of research work in the domain of OAD and negotiation framework that attempts to incorporate mediator for simultaneous negotiation between manufacturer and customers on multiple issues simultaneously.

Negotiators from Asia are increasingly confronted with exchange partners from other regions, particularly Europe. The European culture differs from the Asian culture in many regards, one major aspect being distinct levels of power distance (hierarchy versus egalitarianism). The purpose of this paper is to analyze the impact of power distance in electronic negotiations between Asia and Europe.

The paper describes an experimental study with a sample of 126 participants investigating the impact of power distance on strategies applied by Asian and European buyers and sellers in computer‐mediated negotiations.

Significant effects of power distance in electronic negotiations were identified. Culture confirms to play a significant role in negotiations. The results indicate that negotiation schemes differ depending on the cultural dimension power distance in Asia and Europe. In the hierarchical (Asian) culture, sellers show more efforts in negotiations, while buyers apply more power‐related negotiation strategies but also tend to take more responsibility. In contrast, in the egalitarian (European) culture, buyers prefer negotiation behavior spreading power.

First, use of a student sample engaging in a negotiation simulation might restrain the generalizability of the findings. Second, the authors investigated only two cultures in Asia and Europe.

The paper describes an experimental study comparing negotiators from Asia and Europe in order to analyze whether culture plays a significant role in electronic negotiations between Asia and Europe. The authors focus on power distance as the main cultural dimension.