A logic-based framework to compute pareto agreements in one-shot bilateral negotiation

We propose a logic-based approach to automated oneshot multi-issue bilateral negotiation. We use logic in two ways: (1) a logic theory to represent relations among issues-e.g., logical implication-in contrast with approaches that describe issues as uncorrelated with each other; (2) utilities over formulas to represent agents having preferences over different bundles of issues. In this case, the utility assigned to a bundle is not necessarily the sum of utilities assigned to single elements in the bundle itself. We illustrate the theoretical framework and the one-shot negotiation protocol, which makes use of a facilitator to compute some particular Pareto-efficient outcomes. We prove the computational adequacy of our method by studying the complexity of the problem of finding Pareto-efficient solutions in a propositional logic setting. © 2006 The authors.