Report of Dagstuhl Seminar 15482
Social Concepts in Self-organising Systems
Edited by
Ada Diaconescu
1
, Stephen Marsh
2
, Jeremy Pitt
3
, Wolfgang Reif
4
,
and Jan-Philipp Steghöfer
5
1 Telecom Paris Tech, FR, ada.diaconescu@telecom-paristech.fr
2 UOIT – Oshawa, CA, stephen.marsh@uoit.ca
3 Imperial College London, GB, j.pitt@imperial.ac.uk
4 Universität Augsburg, DE, reif@informatik.uni-augsburg.de
5 Chalmers UT – Göteborg, SE, jan-philipp.steghofer@cse.gu.se
Abstract
This report documents the program and the outcomes of Dagstuhl Seminar 15482 “Social Con-
cepts in Self-organising Systems”. The seminar brought together researchers from computer
sciences (in particular from the fields of multi-agent systems and self-organisation) and from
social sciences to discuss the impact of the use of social concepts in technical systems as well as
the interaction between technical and social systems. In an engaging and interactive setting, the
problem was illuminated from a technical as well as a philosophical and legal point of view. The
talks, discussions, and working groups identified a growing body of work in the field, a number of
interesting and promising research avenues, as well as a set of open issues for future investigation.
Seminar November 22–27, 2015 – http://www.dagstuhl.de/15482
1998 ACM Subject Classification H.1.2 User/Machine Systems, I.2.11 Distributed Artificial
Intelligence, K.4 Computers and Society
Keywords and phrases computational justice, multi-agent sytems, norms, organic computing,
reputation, self-organisation, social capital, socio-technical systems, sociologically-inspired
computing, trust
Digital Object Identifier 10.4230/DagRep.5.11.127
1 Executive Summary
Jan-Philipp Steghöfer
Ada Diaconescu
Stephen Marsh
Jeremy Pitt
Wolfgang Reif
License Creative Commons BY 3.0 Unported license
© Jan-Philipp Steghöfer, Ada Diaconescu, Stephen Marsh, Jeremy Pitt, and Wolfgang Reif
There are two exciting trends in computing that motivated this seminar. On the one hand,
large-scale self-organising systems gain traction in real-world settings, e.g., in the autonomous
control of the power grid or in personal transportation scenarios. On the other hand, our
lives are more and more pervaded by socio-technical systems that rely on the interaction
of existing, complex social systems and technical systems that in many ways mirror and
form the social relationships of their users. The seminar brought together researchers from
a variety of domains to discuss the technical, legal, and social issues these trends incur.
One focus was how social concepts can be formalised and implemented to make technical
Except where otherwise noted, content of this report is licensed
under a Creative Commons BY 3.0 Unported license
Social Concepts in Self-organising Systems, Dagstuhl Reports, Vol. 5, Issue 11, pp. 127–150
Editors: Ada Diaconescu, Stephen Marsh, Jeremy Pitt, Wolfgang Reif, and Jan-Philipp Steghöfer
Dagstuhl Reports
Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik, Dagstuhl Publishing, Germany