Modelling Agent Societies: Co-ordination Frameworks and Institutions

Organisations can be defined as a set of entities regulated by mechanisms of social order and created by more or less autonomous actors to achieve common goals. Multi-agent systems are a natural choice to design organisational systems due to the proactive and autonomous behaviour of agents. However, in business environments it is necessary to consider the behaviour of the global system and the collective aspects of the domain. In this paper, we argue that multi-agent systems should be designed around organisational co-ordination frameworks that reflect the co-ordination structures of the particular organisation. As in human societies, we argue that norms and institutions are a way for agent societies to cope with the challenge of social order. Through institutions, conventions and interaction patterns for the co-ordination of agents can be specified, monitored and managed.