Outside Options in Probabilistic Coalition Situations

In this paper, we introduce an extension of (TU) games with a coalition structure. Taking a situation where all coalitions are already established is not reasonable in order to forecast the reality; there is not only one possible coalition, there are several. We consider situations where coalitions are not established yet and take into account the likelihood of each possible coalition. This leads to a generalized, probabilistic setting for coalition structures. Probabilistic versions of known axioms as efficiency, symmetry or the null player axiom are introduced as well as new probabilistic axioms, the probabilistic influence axioms. The focus is on a generalization of the outside-option-sensitive χ-value in the new setting and an axiomatic characterization of it. The problematic of the impossibility of a direct axiomatization via deterministic pendants is discussed: As an example for a direct characterization we introduce and characterize a probabilistic version of the outside-option-insensitive pendant of the χ-value, the component restricted Shapley value. As another example for an outside-option-sensitive value without direct characterization we introduce a probabilistic version of the Owen value and show that a direct characterization is not possible; we link this to the problem of component decomposability.