OR Forum - Blotto Politics

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Washburn, Alan
• 署名单位: United States Department of Defense; United States Navy; Naval Postgraduate School
• 刊物名称: OPERATIONS RESEARCH
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0030-364X
• DOI: 10.1287/opre.1120.1142
• 发表日期: 2013
• 页码: 532-543
• 关键词: lagrange-multiplier method; colonel-blotto; allocation; play

摘要

This paper considers abstract election games motivated by the United States Electoral College. There are two political parties, and the electoral votes in each state go to the party that spends the most money there, with an adjustment for a head start that one party or the other may have in that state. The states have unequal numbers of electoral votes, and elections are decided by majority rules. Each party has a known budget, and much depends on the information that informs how that budget is spent. Three situations are considered: (1) one party's spending plan is known to the other, (2) spending is gradually revealed as the parties spend continuously in time, and (3) neither side knows anything about the other's spending. The last situation resembles a Blotto game, hence the title.