Modelling Coalitions: From Concept Formation to Tailoring Empirical Explanations

Gonzalez

et al. 2023

AAC

We present a novel argumentation-based method for finding and analyzing communities in social media on the Web, where a community is regarded as a set of supported opinions that might be in conflict. Based on their stance, we identify argumentative coalitions to define them; then, we apply a similarity-based evaluation method over the set of arguments in the coalition to determine the level of cohesion inherent to each community, classifying them appropriately. Introducing conflict points and attacks between coalitions based on argumentative (dis)similarities to model the interaction between communities leads to considering a meta-argumentation framework where the set of coalitions plays the role of the set of arguments and where the attack relation between the coalitions is assigned a particular strength which is inherited from the arguments belonging to the coalition. Various semantics are introduced to consider attacks’ strength to particularize the effect of the new perspective. Finally, we analyze a case study where all the elements of the formal construction of the formalism are exercised.

Section: Budán Et Al / Strength In Coalitions: Community Detection Th...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Strength in coalitions: Community detection through argument similarity

Gonzalez

et al. 2023

AAC

“… 9 For a complete review of coalition models, see Lenine 2020. For a discussion of Fearon’s model, see Lenine 2019. …”

Section: Notesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Models, Conceptual and Predictive: A Response to Johnson’s Models-as-Fables

Dowding¹,

Lenine²

2021

Perspect. polit.

Self Cite

James Johnson argues that formal models are best conceived as fables which provide lessons about empirical phenomena and the “standard rationale” of testing model predictions fails. Without justifying the “standard rationale” as such, we argue that models produce scientific predictions. These predictions come at different levels or granularity of description and in different forms each bearing some degree of uncertainty, but still give conditions for the existence of political phenomena. Models and their predictions require projection onto the world, and that projection involves interpretation. Tests utilize inference to the best explanation, and it is the conceptual or theoretical aspect of models that make them explanatory. We discuss the extent to which our characterisation of models and their explanatory form versus that of Johnson constitutes a verbal or substantive dispute.

Structural Stability of Coalitions: A Formal Model Highlighting the Role of Participants Positioned between Members and Neutral Actors

Monsuur

Janssen

2022

Games

Given a fixed network that links various actors, we introduce a formal model that describes the structural stability of coalitions. To this end, we used the partition of the set of all actors in three distinct positions: members, i.e., those who are central to a coalition; participants, i.e., those who are not actively engaged with the issues at hand; neutral actors, i.e., non-members, those who are not party to any interests and outside the coalition. Using the language of networks, we formulated three assumptions that may be used to characterize the stability of this partition. We paid particular attention to the role of participants as they facilitate or complicate extensions of a given coalition. Given the fixed network, we (1) illustrate the verification of the stability of a coalition, (2) provide existence results of stable coalitions, and (3) set the limits to their credible extensions. Our three formal assumptions may serve as a platform for discussions regarding the stability of coalitions.