Hamburg 2015

Business Meeting, Report of the Proceedings

August 6, 2015, Hamburg, Germany

Kaisa Miettinen chaired the meeting. (The number of members of the Society attending the meeting was about 65).

Members and Directory

Prof. Kaisa Miettinen, the President of the Society, informed the participants about the domain of the society and mentioned that there are currently 2189 members. The members of the Society were also asked to keep their e-mail addresses up-to-date and contact the secretary for changes at secretary@mcdmsociety.org. Prof. Kaisa Miettinen informed that the Society has no membership fees and invited nonmember participants to become members of the Society. Prof. Kaisa Miettinen also mentioned that the discussion list MCDM-Discussion is independent from the membership and requires a separate application to join.

Amendments to the Bylaws

Prof. Kaisa Miettinen informed of the proposals of amendments to the Bylaws of the Society. According to the procedure for amendments described in the current bylaws, the proposals were initially presented to the membership of the Society at the MCDM2013 Conference, where the proposed amendments were approved. Then, they were prepared and made available to all the members of the Society by the secretary (both at the website of the Society and by email from the President of the Society). Finally, the amendments were presented for final approval in this conference. All proposed amendments were approved by a clear majority of the voting members of the Society present. Thus, the revised bylaws came into effect.

The following proposals were presented and approved:

  • In Article III, Section 1 (about the Executive Committee), it is decided that the Editor-In-Chief of the Journal of Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis is a member of the Executive Committee.

    "The Executive Committee consists of the President of the Society, President-Elect, Immediate Past-President, Vice-President of Finance, Newsletter Editor, Chairman of the Awards Committee, Editor-In-Chief of the Journal of Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis and eight other members. In addition, the Executive Committee includes two other ex officio members: the Chairmen of the last and next scheduled International Conferences of the Society. There may be three such members of the Executive Committee, if the Chairman of the subsequent International Conference has already been named. In addition, the Executive Committee may invite Past-Presidents to serve on the Committee."

  • In Article III, Section 5 (about the Secretary), it is decided to add that the term of the Secretary shall be four years, allowing renewal:

    "The Secretary shall keep, or cause to be kept, a book of minutes of all meetings of the Executive Committee and the Society. He/she shall conduct necessary correspondence with members of the Society and others. The Executive Committee will appoint the Secretary. The term of the Secretary will be 4 years, with a possibility for renewal."

  • It is decided to add a new Section in Article III, about the MCDM Doctoral Dissertation Competition Committee:

    "The MCDM Doctoral Dissertation Award Committee is responsible for soliciting the applications and designating the finalists and the recipient of the MCDM Doctoral Dissertation Award. The Executive Committee shall appoint the Chair of the MCDM Doctoral Dissertation Award Committee among the members of the Executive Committee for a two year term. The Chair shall propose and the Executive Committee shall appoint a maximum of four other members of the Committee and their term will be till the next International Conference. The MCDM Doctoral Dissertation Award Committee shall designate up to four finalists before each International Conference. The finalists shall have their registration fees for the Conference waived. The award recipient shall be decided by the Committee and the award presented at International Conferences. The amount of the award shall be decided by the Executive Committee and granted by the Society."

  • In Article VIII, Section (about the Procedure for Amendments), it is decided that the Secretary shall prepare and make available the proposed amendments within 30 days after the Business Meeting where the amendments have been approved:

    "Proposals for adoption of new Bylaws, or repeal, or amendment of these Bylaws shall be presented to the membership of the Society at a Business Meeting. On approval by a majority of the voting members of the Society present, the Secretary shall prepare and make available the proposed amendments within 30 days after the Business Meeting. A majority of the members of the Society voting shall be necessary for adoption of the changes to the Bylaws. The form of the ballot will be decided by the Executive Committee."

 

The next MCDM conference

In its meeting on Tuesday, August 4, 2015, the Executive Committee accepted the proposal to organize the next MCDM conference in Ottawa, Canada from July 10th to July 14th, 2017, chaired by Sarah Ben Amor. Further details about the dates and other issues will appear in the webpage of the conference, which will be available soon.

The proposal to organize MCDM conference in 2019 in Istanbul, Turkey by Ilker Topcu was also accepted by the Executive Committee. The dates will be announced later.

Officers of the Society

Prof. Kaisa Miettinen informed about the following decisions of the Executive Committee related to the officers of the Society:

  • Banu Lokman has been appointed as the new Secretary of the Society.
  • The Chairman of MCDM Doctoral Dissertation Award Committee will be appointed after the new Executive Committee is formed.
  • Johannes Siebert will continue as the Newsletter Editor.

 

Elections related to President-Elect, Vice-President of Finance and four open positions in the Executive Committee

Prof. Kaisa Miettinen chaired the Elections Committee. Candidates to open offices were nominated by both the Elections Committee and members. There are three candidates as President-Elect (in alphabetical order): Matthias Ehrgott, Kathrin Klamroth, José Rui Figueira.

Birsen Karpak was the only candidate as Vice-President of Finance and, thus, she was re-elected for the term 2015-2019.

There are eight candidates for the four vacancies in the Executive Committee: (in alphabetical order) Jussi Hakanen (Finland), Dylan Jones (UK), Alessio Ishizaka (UK), Silvia Poles (Italy), Adiel Teixeira de Almeida (Brazil), Jyrki Wallenius (Finland), Margaret Wiecek (USA), and Constantin Zopounidis (Greece).

The voting will be electronic. The members of the Society will receive further information about the voting procedure by email before the elections, which will start at the beginning of September and the voting period will be around three weeks. All those who were members of the Society before the conference or joined by August 20, 2015, can vote. The voting will be an approval voting.

MCDA/M Summer School

Prof. Kaisa Miettinen informed that the 12th MCDA/M Summer School 2015 will be organized in Recife, Pernambuco, Brazil from July 18th to 29th, 2016. More information can be found in the webpage: http://cdsid.org.br/mc-summer-school2016/. All members are encouraged to advertise this summer school.

Electronic Newsletter of the Society

Prof. Kaisa Miettinen informed that the Electronic Newsletter of the International Society on MCDM is published twice a year, and made available to all members of the Society. The editor of the newsletter is Johannes Siebert, who welcomes contributions from all members. In particular, doctoral students are encouraged to write in the Newsletter or join the editorial team. The Newsletter Editor can be reached at newsletter@mcdmsociety.org.

Journal of Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis

Theodor Stewart, editor-in-chief of the Journal of Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis, reported that the number of accepted papers has been dropping. To be more precise, the number of submissions remains similar, but the acceptance rate is going down. Therefore, he wishes to encourage the members of the Society to look at the journal and consider it for future publications.

Awards

Theo Stewart, as chairman of Awards Committee, proposed a change in the definition of the awards of the Society. He suggested opening a discussion with the members of the Society before making the final decision. His proposals were:

  • The MCDM Gold Medal. This is the highest honour that the International Society on Multiple Criteria Decision Making bestows upon a scholar who, over a distinguished career, has markedly contributed to the theory, methodology, practice and professional development of MCDM.
  • The Edgeworth-Pareto Award. This is the highest distinction that the International Society on Multiple Criteria Decision Making bestows upon a researcher or practitioner of MCDM who has demonstrated a high level of creativity in developing novel areas of application of MCDM and associated methodology, markedly influencing the form of MCDM practice.
  • The Georg Cantor Award. This is the highest form of recognition that the International Society on Multiple Criteria Decision Making bestows upon a researcher who has personified the spirit of independent inquiry in developing innovative ideas in the theory and methodology of MCDM, significantly expanding the tools available to MCDM practice.

 

Other Issues

Every now and then the Executive Committee has discussed whether it still is necessary to print the book of abstracts or whether an electronic one would be enough. An informal voting was carried out and roughly 6/7 of people present preferred not to have a printed book of abstracts in the future. This information will be given the next executive committee and organizers of future conferences for consideration.

Closing

Kaisa Miettinen closed the meeting by thanking all who had taken part in it.