Editing Steven Brams

{{Short description|American mathematician (born 1940)}}
{{Infobox scientist
| name              = Steven J. Brams
| image             = StevenBrams.jpg
| image_size        = 
| caption           = Brams in 2006
| birth_date        = {{Birth date and age|1940|11|28|mf=yes}}
| birth_place       = [[Concord, New Hampshire|Concord]], [[New Hampshire]]
| death_date        = 
| death_place       = 
| residence         = 
| citizenship       = 
| nationality       = [[United States|American]]
| ethnicity         = 
| fields            = [[Political science]]
| workplaces        = [[Syracuse University]]<br>[[New York University]]
| alma_mater        = [[Massachusetts Institute of Technology]]<br>[[Northwestern University]]
| doctoral_advisor  = 
| academic_advisors = 
| doctoral_students = 
| notable_students  = 
| known_for         = Independent discoverer of [[approval voting]]<br>Solved the problem of [[envy-free cake-cutting]]<br>Has applied [[game theory]] to a wide range of strategic situations
| author_abbrev_bot = 
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| influences        = 
| influenced        = 
| awards            = 
| religion          = 
| signature         = <!--(filename only)-->
| birth_name        = Steven J. Brams
}}

'''Steven J. Brams''' (born November 28, 1940) is an American game theorist and political scientist at the [[New York University]] Department of Politics. Brams is best known for using the techniques of [[game theory]], [[public choice theory]], and [[social choice theory]] to analyze [[voting systems]] and [[fair division]]. He is one of the independent discoverers of [[approval voting]],<ref>{{cite journal | last1=Brams | first1=Steven J. | last2=Fishburn | first2=Peter C. | title=Approval Voting | journal=American Political Science Review | publisher=Cambridge University Press (CUP) | volume=72 | issue=3 | year=1978 | issn=0003-0554 | doi=10.2307/1955105 | pages=831–847 |jstor=1955105| s2cid=154191938 }}</ref> as well as extensions of approval voting to multiple-winner elections to give proportional representation of different interests.<ref>{{cite journal | last1=Brams | first1=Steven J. | last2=Kilgour | first2=D. Marc | last3=Potthoff | first3=Richard F. | title=Multiwinner approval voting: an apportionment approach | journal=Public Choice | publisher=Springer Science and Business Media LLC | volume=178 | issue=1–2 | date=2018-10-05 | issn=0048-5829 | doi=10.1007/s11127-018-0609-2 | pages=67–93 |jstor=48703347 | s2cid=254934379 |url=https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/77931/1/MPRA_paper_77931.pdf}}</ref>

Brams was a co-discoverer, with [[Alan D. Taylor|Alan Taylor]], of the first [[envy-free cake-cutting]] solution for ''n'' people.<ref>{{cite journal | last1=Brams | first1=Steven J. | last2=Taylor | first2=Alan D. | title=An Envy-Free Cake Division Protocol | journal=The American Mathematical Monthly | publisher=Mathematical Association of America | volume=102 | issue=1 | year=1995 | issn=1930-0972| jstor=2974850 | pages=9–18 | doi=10.2307/2974850}}</ref>
Previous to the [[Brams-Taylor procedure]], the cake-cutting problem had been one of the most important open problems in contemporary mathematics.<ref>
{{cite journal
 |author=Will Hively
 |title=Dividing the spoils - Steven Brams, Alan Taylor devise procedure to divide anything equitably
 |journal=Discover Magazine |date=March 1995 | url=http://discovermagazine.com/1995/mar/dividingthespoil479/ | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070410122312/http://discovermagazine.com/1995/mar/dividingthespoil479/ | archive-date=2007-04-10 | url-status=dead}}
</ref> He is co-inventor with Taylor of the fair-division procedure, adjusted winner,<ref>{{cite web | title=Adjusted Winner Website | website=NYU | url=https://pages.nyu.edu/adjustedwinner/}}</ref> which was patented by New York University in 1999 (# 5,983,205).<ref>{{cite patent |country=US |status=patent |number=5983205 |title=Computer-based method for the fair division of ownership of goods}}</ref>

Brams has applied game theory to a wide variety of strategic situations, from the Bible<ref>{{cite book | last=Brams | first=S.J. | title=Biblical Games: Game Theory and the Hebrew Bible | publisher=MIT Press | year=2003 | isbn=978-0-262-52332-5 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book | last=Brams | first=S.J. | title=Game Theory and the Humanities: Bridging Two Worlds | publisher=MIT Press  | year=2011 | isbn=978-0-262-01522-6 }}</ref> and theology <ref>{{cite book | last=Brams | first=S.J. | title=Divine Games: Game Theory and the Undecidability of a Superior Being | publisher=MIT Press | year=2018 | isbn=978-0-262-03833-1 }}</ref> to international relations <ref>{{cite book | last=Brams | first=S.J. | title=Superpower Games: Applying Game Theory to Superpower Conflict | publisher=Yale University Press | year=1985 | isbn=978-0-300-23640-8 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book | last1=Brams | first1=S. | last2=Kilgour | first2=D.M. | title=Game Theory and National Security | publisher=Wiley | year=1991 | isbn=978-1-55786-003-3 }}</ref> to sports.<ref>{{cite journal | last1=Brams | first1=Steven J. | last2=Ismail | first2=Mehmet S. | title=Making the Rules of Sports Fairer | journal=SIAM Review | publisher=Society for Industrial & Applied Mathematics (SIAM) | volume=60 | issue=1 | year=2018 | issn=0036-1445 | doi=10.1137/16m1074540 | pages=181–202 |doi-access=free}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | last1=Brams | first1=Steven J. | last2=Ismail | first2=Mehmet S. | last3=Kilgour | first3=D. Marc | last4=Stromquist | first4=Walter | title=Catch-Up: A Rule That Makes Service Sports More Competitive | journal=The American Mathematical Monthly | publisher=Informa UK Limited | volume=125 | issue=9 | date=2018-10-21 | issn=0002-9890 | doi=10.1080/00029890.2018.1502544 | pages=771–796 |arxiv=1808.06922| s2cid=4691445 }}</ref>

==Education==
Brams earned his [[Bachelor of Science|B.S.]] at [[Massachusetts Institute of Technology]] in Politics, Economics, and Science in 1962. In 1966, he earned his [[Doctor of Philosophy|Ph.D.]] in [[Political Science]] at [[Northwestern University]].

==Career==
Brams worked briefly in U.S. federal government positions and for the [[Institute for Defense Analyses]] before taking an assistant professor position at [[Syracuse University]] in 1967. He moved to [[New York University]] in 1969, where he is professor in the Department of Politics. He has been a visiting professor at the [[University of Rochester]], the [[University of Michigan]], the [[University of California, Irvine]], the [[University of Pennsylvania]], and [[Yale University]].

In 1990–1991 he was president of the Peace Science Society (International);<ref>{{cite web | title=Peace Science Society (International): Home | website=pss.la.psu.edu | date=1998-12-05 | url=http://pss.la.psu.edu/ | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110413215748/http://pss.la.psu.edu/ | archive-date=2011-04-13 | url-status=dead }}</ref> in 2004–2006, he was president of the Public Choice Society.<ref>{{cite web | title=About Us - Past Presidents | website=Public Choice Society | url=http://www.publicchoicesociety.org/webpages.asp?wpid=2#presidents | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121202015157/http://www.publicchoicesociety.org/webpages.asp?wpid=2#presidents | archive-date=2012-12-02 | url-status=dead }}</ref>
He is a [[Guggenheim Fellow]] (1986–87), an [[American Association for the Advancement of Science]] Fellow (1992), and was a [[Russell Sage Foundation]] Visiting Scholar (1998–99).

==Bibliography==

* ''Game Theory and Politics.'' New York: Free Press, 1975. Rev. ed., 2004 (Dover).
* ''Paradoxes in Politics: An Introduction to the Nonobvious in Political Science.'' New York: Free Press, 1976.
* ''The Presidential Election Game.'' New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1978. Rev. ed., 2008 (A K Peters).
* Co-edited with A. Schotter and G. Schwödiauer, ''Applied Game Theory: Proceedings of a Conference,'' Vienna, 1978. Würzburg, Germany: Physica-Verlag, 1979.
* ''Biblical Games: Game Theory and the Hebrew Bible.'' Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1980. Rev. ed., 2003 (MIT Press). Japanese and Russian translations, 2006.
* Co-edited with William F. Lucas and Philip D. Straffin, Jr., ''Modules in Applied Mathematics: Political and Related Models,'' vol. 2. New York: Springer-Verlag, 1983.
* Co-authored with Peter C. Fishburn, ''Approval Voting.'' Cambridge, MA: Birkhäuser Boston, 1983. Rev. ed., 2007 (Springer).
* ''Superior Beings: If They Exist, How Would We Know? Game-Theoretic Implications of Omniscience, Omnipotence, Immortality, and Incomprehensibility.'' New York: Springer-Verlag, 1983. Rev. ed., 2007 (Springer).
* ''Superpower Games: Applying Game Theory to Superpower Conflict.'' New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1985.
* ''Rational Politics: Decisions, Games, and Strategy.'' Washington, DC: CQ Press, 1985. Reprinted by Academic Press, 1989.
* Co-authored with D. Marc Kilgour, ''Game Theory and National Security.'' New York: Basil Blackwell, 1988. Spanish translation, 1989.
* ''Negotiation Games: Applying Game Theory to Bargaining and Arbitration.'' New York: Routledge, 1990. Rev. ed., 2003.
* ''Theory of Moves.'' Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1994.
* Co-authored with Alan D. Taylor, ''Fair Division: From Cake-Cutting to Dispute Resolution.'' Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1996.
* Co-authored with Alan D. Taylor, ''The Win-Win Solution: Guaranteeing Fair Shares to Everybody.'' New York: W. W. Norton, 1999. Japanese, Portuguese, and Spanish translations, 2000; Chinese, Korean, and Russian translations, 2002.
* ''Mathematics and Democracy: Designing Better Voting and Fair-Division Procedures.'' Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2008.
* Co-edited with William V. Gehrlein and Fred S. Roberts. ''The Mathematics of Preference, Choice, and Order: Essays in Honor of Peter C. Fishburn.'' Berlin: Springer, 2009.
* ''Game Theory and the Humanities:  Bridging Two Worlds.'' Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2011.
* ''Divine Games: Game Theory and the Undecidability of a Superior Being.'' Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2018

==References==
{{reflist|30em}}

==External links==
* [http://as.nyu.edu/politics/directory.steven-brams.html Steven Brams - NYU]
* [https://blogs.wsj.com/numbersguy/numbers-guy-interview-steven-brams-340/tab/article/ Interview with the ''Wall Street Journal'' ]
* [http://video.mit.edu/watch/how-democracy-resolves-conflict-in-difficult-games-9363/ Video of Lecture at MIT]
* [http://bigthink.com/ideas/18723 Video of Big Think interview]

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Brams, Steven}}
[[Category:1940 births]]
[[Category:Living people]]
[[Category:American political scientists]]
[[Category:Voting theorists]]
[[Category:20th-century American mathematicians]]
[[Category:21st-century American mathematicians]]
[[Category:American game theorists]]
[[Category:Fair division researchers]]
[[Category:University of Michigan staff]]
[[Category:People from Concord, New Hampshire]]
[[Category:Mathematicians from New Hampshire]]
[[Category:Massachusetts Institute of Technology alumni]]