Episode Details

Few topics generate more debate than elections. But long before voters head to the polls, important decisions have already been made about how communities are grouped into districts and how representation is structured.

While redistricting is often discussed as a political issue, it's also a fascinating operations research problem – one involving competing objectives and complex constraints such as geography, population, representation, and legal requirements, as well as competing definitions of fairness.

My guest today, Ian Ludden, Assistant Professor of Computer Science and Software Engineering at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, will share how computational methods and OR/MS are helping researchers evaluate district maps and better understand the choices that shape our democracy.

We'll explore questions of fairness, representation, and how data-driven approaches can help us better understand one of the most consequential – and often controversial – processes in American democracy.