The rank reversal problem in multi-criteria decision making : a literature review

Despite the importance of multicriteria decision-making (MCDM) techniques for constructing effective decision models, there are many criticisms due to the occurrence of a problem called rank reversal. Nevertheless, there is a lack of a systematic literature review on this important subject which involves different methods. This study reviews the pertinent literature on rank reversal, based on 130 related articles published from 1980 to 2015 in international journals, which were gathered and analyzed according to the following perspectives: multicriteria technique, year and journal in which the papers were published, co-authorship network, rank reversal types, and research goal. Thus our survey provides recommendations for future research, besides useful information and knowledge regarding rank reversal in the MCDM field

A mixed-data evaluation in group TOPSIS with differentiated decision power

[[abstract]]This main objective of this paper is to provide decision support for mixed data in group Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to Idea Solution (TOPSIS) with differentiated decision power. We use a signum function to compare the ordinal performance of alternatives on any qualitative criterion, or the partial information provided by decision makers. The proposed process for ordinal information is uniformly coherent with the traditional TOPSIS steps, preserving the characteristic of distance-based utilities. Ordinal weights are also considered herein, and the decision power of the group members is formulated by their weights under an agreement in the group. Two examples demonstrate that the proposed approach has some benefits and achieves robustness with two types of sensitivity analyses. Some discussions and their limitations to the approach are also provided.[[notice]]補正完

Adam Smith: left or right?

This article engages with some of the recent literature on Adam Smith which has sought to distance the ‘father of economics’ from his contemporary free market admirers and to reclaim him as a hero and inspiration for the political left. The article explores a problem for this attempted recovery of Smith by the contemporary social democrat which arises from his strictly negative understanding of the virtue of justice. I argue that Smith's distinctions between justice, benevolence and ‘police’ should be taken seriously as an attempt at introducing conceptual clarity into the terminology of political theory. The article makes the case for reading Smith as someone who quite explicitly rejects the notion of regarding our obligations to the poor in terms of justice and whose distinctly sceptical view of politics makes him an unlikely inspiration for contemporary philosophers concerned with developing normative notions of social justice intended to justify the redistribution of wealth