Objectivity and subjectivity in thedecision making process

Classical Operations Research assumed objectivity. Operations researchers hardly botheredto ask the decision maker about his or her preferences, assuming that a well-defined singleobjective function was an adequate representation of the decision problem. Many multi-criteriadecision methods began in response to this failure of Operations Research. Othermethods took a totally different and more subjective point of view. In this paper, we discussobjective and subjective descriptions, their interpretation and use in decision making. In thecenter of the ability to distinguish between these objective and subjective components standscientific methods and scientists. We argue that it is possible and necessary to understandwhere and how objective measures should be replaced by subjective measures and judgementin the decision making process.