CALL FOR PAPERS

              Logic Journal of the IGPL

Special issue on "Normative Multiagent Systems"

It follows two other special issues on the same topic:

"Special issue of Computational & Mathematical Organization Theory on Normative Multiagent Systems"

"Special issue of Journal of Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems on Normative Multiagent Systems"

Norms play a central role in many social phenomena such as coordination, cooperation, decision-making, and so on.  Norms provide an essential basis for modeling, engineering, and understanding systems of artificial or human agents.  Norms yield structure and predictability in systems that are other loosely structured and support the autonomy of the participants.

The study of norms in multiagent systems combines theories and frameworks for normative systems with those of multiagent systems. The study of norms in multiagent systems is a prime example of the use of sociological theories in multiagent systems, and therefore of the relation between agent theory and the social sciences, broadly construed to include sociology, philosophy, economics, legal science, among others.

Particular topics of interest include (but are not limited to):

    * Multiagent or society level:
          o balancing dynamics and statics at the agent (micro) and agent society (macro) level
          o coordination based on normative multiagent systems
          o emergence of conventions, norms, roles, and normative multiagent systems
          o combining conventions with regulative, permissive, constitutive and other types of norms
          o relation between NorMAS and contracts, security, and (electronic) institutions
          o commitments, organizations, and norms
          o commitments, protocols and Agent Communication Languages
    * Agent level:
          o alternatives to and extensions of the homo economicus and BDI logics
          o extending logical frameworks to encompass norms in agent decision making
          o how to implement theories of norms in artificial agents
          o policies and commitments
    * Applications of NorMAS:
          o multiagent social simulation models containing norms
          o mixing artificial and human agents in hybrid social systems

We welcome both theoretical work (formal models, representations, specifications, logics, verification) and implementation-oriented work (architectures, programming languages, design models, simulations, prototype systems) on these specific topics.

All submissions will be peer reviewed with respect to the usual journal criteria. Authors are invited to submit original, previously unpublished, research papers written in English.

Submissions should be and formatted to fit within a text area of 16cm wide by 22cm high with 11pt Times font and an interline spacing of 15pt. There is no a-priori set page limit, but please avoid overlong papers. The deadline for submissions is

December 8, 2008 EXTENDED DEADLINE November 30, 2008

Authors should submit their papers electronically using the website: http://www.easychair.org/conferences/?conf=normas08sp

The Journal will publish the special issue as soon as camera ready versions will be ready at the end of the review process.

If you intend to submit a paper for this special issue, please notify us about your intention by email.

If you have additional questions, please do not hesitate to contact the editors of the special issue.

Further information on the Logic Journal of the IGPL is available at <http://jigpal.oxfordjournals.org/>


URL of the CFP: http://www.di.unito.it/~guido/normas09sp-cfp.html


Guido Boella (guido@di.unito.it)

Gabriella Pigozzi (gabriella.pigozzi@uni.lu)

Munindar Singh (singh@ncsu.edu)

Harko Verhagen (verhagen@dsv.su.se)