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Operations research methods in political decisions: a case study on the European Parliament composition

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  • Janusz Łyko

    (Wrocław University of Economics)

  • Radosław Rudek

    (Wrocław University of Economics)

Abstract

In this paper, we show that operations research methods can be successfully applied to support decision-making in politics on the case study of the apportionment of seats in the European Parliament. The related political constraints and assumptions are quantitatively described and the optimization problem is formulated. On this basis, it is revealed that the current composition of the European Parliament as well as some intuitive propositions do not respect degressive proportionality as far as it was assumed. Nevertheless, our algorithm allows us to find better solutions, and among them, there is only one best allocation, which respects degressive proportionality as far as possible, according to the well known and often applied measures. Namely, over 9 thousands allocations consistent with the political requirement “nobody gains and nobody loses more than one” are referred to over 5.4 millions degressively proportional solutions, and only one allocation is revealed to be the best for all defined criteria under given populations of countries.

Suggested Citation

  • Janusz Łyko & Radosław Rudek, 2017. "Operations research methods in political decisions: a case study on the European Parliament composition," Computational and Mathematical Organization Theory, Springer, vol. 23(4), pages 572-586, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:comaot:v:23:y:2017:i:4:d:10.1007_s10588-017-9243-7
    DOI: 10.1007/s10588-017-9243-7
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    Cited by:

    1. Katarzyna Cegielka & Piotr Dniestrzanski & Arkadiusz Maciuk & Maciej Szczecinski, 2022. "The Implications of Possible Enlargements of the European Union for the Configuration of Power in the European Parliament," European Research Studies Journal, European Research Studies Journal, vol. 0(2), pages 145-159.
    2. Katarzyna Cegiełka & Piotr Dniestrzański & Janusz Łyko & Arkadiusz Maciuk & Maciej Szczeciński, 2021. "A neutral core of degressively proportional allocations under lexicographic preferences of agents," Eurasian Economic Review, Springer;Eurasia Business and Economics Society, vol. 11(4), pages 667-685, December.

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