On combining partial and incompatible information in e-negotiation and e-arbitration

The complexity of the problems to be addressed in an e-democracy
framework and the variety of involved stakeholders, with different backgrounds,
views and access to information sources, lead us to consider the case in which an
e-negotiation should be performed among subjects who have partial, sometimes
incompatible, information and can hardly gather to discuss issues together, under the
supervision of a facilitator. We propose a statistical method which addresses the
issue of partial and incompatible information, merging it and then using it to get a
final decision, possibly in an automatic way, through processes of e-negotiation and
e-arbitration.