Existing Policy Measures Research Articles

Interstate outmigration in India and the COVID-19 pandemic: Challenges and emerging perspectives

Interstate migrants from less developed states seek better livelihoods in more developed ones, yet encounter challenges such as loss of state benefits and workplace mistreatment. Drawing data from the Indian Census of 1991, 2001, and 2011, this paper examines interstate outmigration in India and the challenges faced by migrants in their destination areas. The results revealed that low-income states such as Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Rajasthan, and Odisha are among the top migratory states in the country. This result aligns with developmental theories, which believe that migration helps both sources and destination areas through optimal allocation of factors of production. Further, an analysis of female outmigration for economic reasons revealed disparities between the top female outmigratory states and total outmigratory states. Hence, it can be inferred that female interstate migration for economic reasons is not simply an association with their male counterparts. The paper then highlights common problems faced by migrants at destination points and underscores the 2020 migrant crises that the country experienced due to lockdowns amid the COVID-19 pandemic. In conclusion, by analyzing the existing policy measures of the government, the study proposes short-term (also to address current migrant crises) and long-term policy measures to mitigate challenges associated with outmigration.

Exploring Innovation and Public Health Priorities Within the Realm of Medical Sociology of India During COVID-19 Pandemic

In the context of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the Indian medical innovation ecosystem confronted substantial challenges in meeting the pressing healthcare requirements of the nation. These challenges demand a comprehensive examination to discern the critical issues in Indian Medical Sociology about medical innovations. The primary objective of this study is to assess the intricate interplay between the approaches employed in drug and vaccine development and their consequential effects on affordability and accessibility. Concurrently, it aims to evaluate the efficacy of the existing policy measures affecting social divisions that have emerged because the supply-driven health system has exacerbated. A qualitative research methodology has been adopted for this inquiry, utilising thematic analysis to dissect the intricacies of the Indian medical innovation ecosystem. The study unfurls the following noteworthy discoveries that contribute to a nuanced understanding of the landscape: (a) it becomes evident that the predominant focus within the Indian medical innovation ecosystem revolves around creating affordable medical technologies and pharmaceuticals, often overshadowing the pursuit of cutting-edge advancements. (b) The strategies employed in developing drugs and vaccines exhibit a conspicuous inclination towards products that promise higher profits, subsequently giving rise to issues associated with affordability and accessibility. (c) While policy measures have been implemented with the intent of addressing the concern of affordability, their actual efficacy in ensuring equitable access to medical innovations raises significant doubts. (d) A discernible imbalance emerges between India's industrial and public health priorities, with economic growth overshadowing the imperative of bridging the existing social disparities. These insights collectively underline the imperative for strategic policy interventions, a more balanced approach to development, and establishing a multi-institutional framework. These actions are essential to confront the challenges related to affordability, accessibility and the aggravated social divisions that persist within the ecosystem. The study brings out the indispensable importance of cultivating a socially responsible and all-encompassing medical innovation ecosystem, not only as a means to address the prevailing healthcare challenges but also to foster an environment that guarantees equitable access to transformative medical innovations for all segments of society.

Impact of policy measures on smallholders’ livelihood resilience: Evidence from Hehuang Valley, Tibetan Plateau

Enhancing livelihood resilience is an effective approach for smallholders to cope with climate change in which governments play an important role. Nevertheless, few studies have investigated the impact of policy measures on smallholders’ livelihood resilience (SLR), especially for the case of vulnerable Tibetan Plateau. Based on a longitudinal survey of 321 households in the semiagricultural and semipastoral region of Hehuang Valley during 2017–2022, this study assesses the changes in SLR. By adopting the multinomial logistic model, the impact of policy measures on SLR was been further explored. The results show that SLR in the focal area increased from 0.100 in 2017 to 0.122 in 2022. Policy measures of low-interest loans, irrigation facilities, improved seed and information sharing play a significant positive role in enhancing SLR, whereas training on skills and subsidies have no significant influence on SLR. In addition, the coverage of irrigation facilities and the promotion of training on skills need to be improved. The results not only help local government understand the effectiveness of existing policy measures on SLR but also provide recommendations for improving SLR.

Walkability and colonialism: The divergent impact of colonial planning practices on spatial segregation in East Africa

Colonialism's lasting impact on contemporary African cities has been firmly established – yet the ways in which colonial planning practices affected walkability, in particular urban permeability in contemporary morphologies, have been largely unexplored. High urban permeability supports livelihoods, particularly for the urban poor, and is needed for a transition towards more walkable cities. Through the mapping of three cities in East Africa, this paper demonstrates that cities in which indigenous planning practices were able to resist colonial planning practices, the emergent urban form has smaller urban blocks and higher urban permeability. As existing policy measures on walkability largely avert improvement of urban permeability, this study suggest a reassessment of those policies.

Evading text based emotion detection mechanism via adversarial attacks

Textual Emotion Analysis (TEA) seeks to extract and assess the emotional states of users from the text. Various Deep Learning (DL) algorithms have emerged rapidly and demonstrated success in numerous disciplines, including audio, image, and natural language processing. Thetrend has shifted a growing number of researchers from standard machine learning to DL for scientific study. Using DL approaches, we offer an overview of TEA in this paper. After introducing the background for emotion analysis, including the definition of emotion, emotion classification methods, and application domains of emotion analysis, we demonstrated that, despite the immense success of deep learning models in NLP-related tasks, they are susceptible to adversarial attacks, which can lead to incorrect emotion classification. An adversarial text is constructed by altering a few words or characters so as to keep the overall semantic similarity of emotion for a human reader while tricking the machine into making erroneous predictions. This study demonstrates the vulnerability of emotion categorization by generating adversarial text using a variety of cutting-edge attack techniques. Comprehensive experiments are performed to assess the effectiveness of the attack methods against several widely-used models, such as Word-CNN, Bi-LSTM, and four powerful transformer models, namely BERT, DistilBERT, ALBERT, and RoBERTa. These models were trained on an emotion dataset utilized for the purpose of emotion classification. We evaluated and analyzed the behavior of different models under a variety of attack conditions to determine which is the most and least vulnerable. Also, we determine which perturbation technique affects transformer models the most. Using Attack Success Rates (ASR) as our evaluation metric, we have assessed the potential outcomes. The findings reveal that methodologies for classifying emotion predictioncan be circumvented, which has implications for existing policy measures.

HOMOCHAR: A novel adversarial attack framework for exposing the vulnerability of text based neural sentiment classifiers

State-of-the-art deep learning algorithms have demonstrated remarkable proficiency in the task of text classification. Despite the widespread use of deep learning-based language models, there remains much work to be done in order to improve the security of these models. This is particularly concerning for their growing use in sensitive applications, such as sentiment analysis. This study demonstrates that language models possess inherent susceptibility to textual adversarial attacks, wherein a small number of words or characters are modified to produce an adversarial text that deceives the machine into producing erroneous predictions while maintaining its true meaning for human readers. The current study offers HOMOCHAR, a novel textual adversarial attack that operates within a black box setting. The proposed method generates more robust adversarial examples by considering the task of perturbing a text input with transformations at the character level. The objective is to deceive a target NLP model while adhering to specific linguistic constraints in a way such that the perturbations are imperceptible to humans. Comprehensive experiments are performed to assess the effectiveness of the proposed attack method against several popular models, including Word-CNN, Word-LSTM along with five powerful transformer models on two benchmark datasets, i.e., MR & IMDB utilized for sentiment analysis task. Empirical findings indicate that the proposed attack model consistently attains significantly greater attack success rates (ASR) and generates high-quality adversarial examples when compared to conventional methods. The results indicate that text-based sentiment prediction techniques can be circumvented, leading to potential consequences for existing policy measures.

The Analysis of State Agrarian Policy, Support Programs, Laws and Legislative Acts Regulating Viticulture in RA: Existing Problems and Their Solutions

This article presents a comprehensive analysis of the state agrarian policy, laws, and legislative acts regulating the viticulture sector of RA. An analysis of the strategic documents, legislative documents regulating the sector, laws, normative legal acts, and other documents related to state policy was conducted. Obtaining results led to the conclusion that the legislative acts regulating the sector need to be updated and, in some cases, amended․ In addition, the control mechanisms of the sector have gaps in law enforcement. There is no strategic document aimed at viticulture development, and existing policy measures and programs are not properly implemented and are ineffective. The article concludes with recommendations aimed at alleviating the issues revealed by this research.

Credit Consumption and Financial Risk Among Danish Households— A Register-Based Study of the Distribution of Bank and Credit Card Debt

This article discusses the distribution of widely used consumer loans in Denmark in the light of the “risk position” in which this places Danish households. Denmark has the highest debt-to-income ratio of all OECD countries, yet the high level of consumer debt has received relatively little political attention in Denmark and the social and legal protection of citizens with debt problems is limited. This article presents findings from an empirical study that investigated the distribution of consumer loans in Denmark. Drawing on the notion of “risk position,” the article challenges the idea that only socially marginal groups are at risk of getting into debt problems. The empirical study analysed the sociodemographic distribution of two common types of loan in Denmark (bank loans and credit card debt) based on the administrative register data of a full population of individuals. Register-based data provide much more reliable measures of debt than self-reported surveys, because of non-response problems in surveys. The results show not only high debt levels among hitherto known vulnerable social groups, but also highlight groups of middle- and higher-income wage earners with very high levels of debt. We frame the results in the light of existing policy measures in Denmark and suggest the need for a better balance between deregulation of credit markets and individualization of debt problems on the one hand and the need for political protection of individual loan takers on the other.

Energy policy and conservation planning in Sweden: a longitudinal evaluation

PurposeSweden, like other countries, has set ambitious national targets for both energy efficiency and conservation of heritage values in the built environment. However, how these policies are implemented on a local level and how they affect each other is not known. This study aims to argue that extensive energy-saving policies can have unintentional impacts not just on the built environment but also on conservation practice.Design/methodology/approachBy using a longitudinal approach, the aim is to investigate the possibilities of conserving the built environment when policies for increased energy efficiency are implemented in existing urban areas. The methodology used is qualitative, applying a combination of study of public records, policy documents, interviews with public officials and ocular investigation of buildings in three areas located in two different municipalities.FindingsThe study suggests that extensive refurbishments not only have effects on the character of an area, but in extension, affect how urban planners and local authorities approach the development in the same area. Urban areas affected by extensive retrofits in the past seem to be managed in less detail, leaving existing policy measures on both energy and heritage untapped.Research limitations/implicationsThis is a study concerning two Swedish municipalities. Furthermore, it is limited to one specific policy measure, energy-saving subsidies provided in the 1970s and 1980s. The generalisability of the findings may, therefore, be limited. Despite this, the findings provide an important indication of the relationship between energy-saving policies in the past and urban planning practice of existing urban areas today, as well as the importance of alignment between policy-making and implementation.Practical implicationsPolicy instruments for the building stock and the practice of conservation planning have not worked well together. Due to local practice, energy subsidies provided in the 1970s and 1980s still today have a negative effect on both heritage conservation and energy efficiency in existing areas.Social implicationsThere is a discrepancy between expectations and outcome of policy measures. National decision-makers overestimate the possibilities to control the development on a local level, for both energy efficiency and heritage values. By examining an innovative set of sources, acknowledging long-term effects and entanglements of policies and practice, this study contributes to a better understanding of the complexity of different values in the built environment.Originality/valueBy comparing the share of approved applications, as well as completed energy retrofits, this study demonstrates that the effects of the national energy subsidy policy differed significantly between urban areas. Areas with a high degree of approved subsidies also had a high degree of retrofits, suggesting that the policy had intended effects. In these areas, the number of retrofits were also significantly higher than the number of subsidies. This was not the case where energy subsidies were fewer, which indicates that energy retrofits are performative, meaning that they accelerate further retrofits in the same area.

Small Cities, Big Needs: Citizen Participation in Urban and Transport Planning

PDS 64: Health impact assessment and environmental justice, Johan Friso Foyer, Floor 1, August 26, 2019, 1:30 PM - 3:00 PM Background: Current research encourages citizen participation in policy-making processes. Yet, the interface between citizens and urban transport planning remains under-studied in developing countries. The paper assesses urban transport planning policies of a middle-income country and determines whether the goals of existing policy measures meet self-reported citizens’ needs. We detect association between needs and population indicators to better assess whether needs are unevenly expressed across population groups. Methods: We assess the alignment of three policy measures with citizens needs in Mauritius by using mixed-methods. The policy document was reviewed using qualitative content analysis in order to select and analyse relevant measures. Citizen needs were obtained with a nationwide survey. Quantitative logistic regression models were run for each need and to detect associations with population indicators. Findings Three policy measures were selected for assessment: light metro rail system, bus modernization scheme and road decongestion program. Citizen needs were extracted from 1523 surveys. At least one measure addressed the improvement of public spaces, construction of new buildings, centralization of hawkers at main bus stations, and preference for less active travel modes (ex: own private vehicle). None of the measures addressed (1) improvement of sidewalks, (2) green spaces increase, (3) pedestrianizing of strategic areas, (4) regulation of private vehicle entry in town and (5) preference for more active travel modes (ex:foot, bicycle). Three unmet needs were expressed by vulnerable population groups. Conclusion: We successfully exposed gaps between citizen needs and three urban transport planning measures in Mauritius. The study shows that citizen participation enable a subtler understanding of the social and economic environment in which transport measures take place. Finally, we propose that using participation within wider frameworks such as health impact assessment (HIA) provides a unique opportunity to reform urban transport planning policies towards more healthy, sustainable and equitable outcomes.

Evolution in the Enabling Factors for Transformational Change in Forestry and Land Use Policy Processes: The Case Of Redd+ in Cameroon

To mitigate climate change through forestry and land use, countries are expected to shift away from policies and practices that drive deforestation to ones that reduce forest loss. This paper draws on political economy concepts to assess the evolution in the enabling measures for transformational change in forestry and land use policy processes in Cameroon. The findings indicate that actors have diverse stances on the capacity of existing policy measures to guarantee transformational change. The policy environment has evolved with proposals on institutional arrangements and policy reforms that are far from concrete reforms as expected. There is significant room for fine-tuning proposed policy and institutional reforms to enable Cameroon respond to its international emission reduction commitments. For example, putting forward clear-cut incentive and regulatory mechanisms; enhance and create new anti-deforestation coalitions; generate concrete specific/tailored sector ideas and information; and enhance negotiations between sectoral interests. However, these can only be achieved in the long-term with continuous support.

Competitive balance and medal distributions at the Summer Olympic Games 1992–2016: overall and gender-specific analyses

ABSTRACTThis article examines competitive balance at the Summer Olympic Games between 1992 and 2016 by measuring the distribution of gold medals, medals and medal points amongst nations, for overall and male and female competitions. The key findings are overall; there has been no improvement in competitive balance since the 1992 Olympics. There is some evidence that competitive balance has improved in male competitions, as shown by decreased HHIN, CV and CR4 values. The analysis of female competitions suggests that competitive balance has remained largely unchanged. However, the CV Gold indicator provides evidence of a significant decline in competitive balance. The findings facilitate a more evidence-based evaluation of existing policy measures and strategies, and their refinement where appropriate. Policy suggestions are proffered for the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and various International Federations (IFs), and non-major nations to promote a more balanced development and competition particularly for women.

Enablers and constraints of localized climate financing: The case of a second-tier city in the Philippines

This paper aimed to identify the most pressing concerns in attaining financing readiness for climate compatible development in Cagayan de Oro City, a second-tier city in the Philippines. It employed a participatory methodology that incorporated local expertise, stakeholders’ experiences and perceptions, preconditions for ensuring an effective design of climate change compatible development measures in Cagayan de Oro City. Specifically, it adopted the science-based stakeholder (SBS) method involving all relevant stakeholders throughout the stages of the research. Despite the existence of strategic plans, existing policy measures and financing schemes to address climate change compatible development in the city, the existing gaps between the types of projects needed by the city and the ability to access funds resulted to a limited or lack of implementation of these plans and improvement of the existing measures. At the local government level, there are several constraints in financing a more programmatic climate change compatible development in the city. Nonetheless, there are new emerging initiatives by government agencies, non-government and private institutions in the city that are currently being promoted

Setting course for demand response in the service sector

The increasing share of renewable energies in electricity generation is within the scope of the energy transition and will lead to a more volatile generation of electricity. A more flexible energy demand could contribute to handling the resulting challenges in electricity grid management. The service sector is one of the target groups for utilizing flexible demand, also called demand response (DR). Supermarkets, hotels, and office buildings can be found in regions throughout Germany. This could be an advantage regarding the compensation of grid instability in any region, compared to more locally focused industrial enterprises. First estimations point out considerable unused DR potentials for the service sector. However, currently, there is less knowledge about flexibility options in the service sector than in industry. Moreover, market barriers, such as a missing adequate regulatory framework offering attractive incentives prevent that the potentials are tapped. Therefore, in this paper, we first analyze survey data from 1.000 enterprises of the service sector in Germany to identify subsectors that have a high share of flexible cross-sectoral technologies in electricity consumption. Data indicates that the subsectors trade, restaurants, and hotels as well as office-like buildings are the most promising subsectors of the service sector regarding demand response potential, since they have a high stock in flexible cooling appliances, air conditioning, and ventilation. In a second step, we conducted stakeholder interviews, to find specific barriers, drivers, and possible starting points in each of the identified subsectors. Still unapt or missing regulatory framework conditions, low profitability, and a lack of knowledge regarding flexibility potentials and marketing mechanisms seem to be the main barriers. However, framework conditions promoting demand response measures are improving, e.g., technical standards and latest regulatory revisions. This indicates that in order to tap the existing demand response potentials in the service sector, the value of flexibility in demand needs to be appreciated, e.g., by facilitating market participation or by creating offers resp. rewarding the enterprises’ flexibility of demand. In addition, addressing demand response issues in already existing policy measures, such as energy audits could raise awareness and knowledge.

Addressing farmer-perceptions and legal constraints to promote agroforestry in Germany

Agroforestry is receiving increasing attention in Germany because of its capacity to address some of the negative consequences of intensive agriculture. However the actual uptake and maintenance of agroforestry by farmers remains low. The aim of this study was to identify the opportunities and obstacles to agroforestry in Germany and to identify potential measures which could address the obstacles and increase agroforestry adoption. Qualitative interviews with 32 farmers indicated that the legal framework and administrative burden associated with agroforestry in Germany was a major obstacle. The farmers recognised that agroforestry provided environmental benefits, but these do not always increase farm profitability. Agroforestry was identified as a viable alternative to conventional farming systems, especially in less productive areas, not profitable when managed in a conventional way. To enhance the implementation of agroforestry the simplification of the legal framework is crucial. Modern agroforestry should be better recognized by existing policy measures providing payments for environmentally friendly farming. Ultimately, an integrated approach for environmental benefits and production objectives is required, which is based on rewarding farmers for providing ecosystem services (ESs) and a stronger public involvement in sustainable land use practices. Rewarding farmers for ESs could increase the interest in agroforestry in highly productive areas, enhancing sustainable land use in the long term.

Policy Measures to Support Palliative Care at Home: A Cross-Country Case Comparison in Three European Countries

ContextThe proportion of people in need of palliative care worldwide is rising, and the majority wish to receive this care at home. Many countries have created policy measures to support palliative care at home. ObjectiveTo list and compare existing policy measures designed to support palliative care at home in addition to available primary care services in Belgium, France, and Germany. MethodsA cross-country case comparison based on expert consultation, governmental policy documents, and relevant scientific literature. ResultsAll three countries have policy measures that allow informal caregivers to adapt their working patterns or take leave of absence to provide care without losing employee rights; however, only Belgium offers specific paid palliative care leave. All three countries offer various allowances to people who are dying at home and their caregivers. Cost-reductions for out-of-pocket expenses are available, based on the level of care dependency in Germany and on prognosis in Belgium, but are not provided in France. Mobile home support teams exist in all three countries and are free of charge for patients and caregivers; but only in Belgium and Germany, there are specialist multidisciplinary palliative home care teams. Belgium and Germany provide respite care for palliative patients. ConclusionEuropean countries with similar contextual characteristics offer comparable policy measures to support palliative care at home in addition to the available primary care services. However, important differences exist in the criteria for access and the extent of what is offered.

Health Without Care? Vulnerability, Medical Brain Drain, and Health Worker Responsibilities in Underserved Contexts

There is a consensus that the effects of medical brain drain, especially in the Sub-Saharan African countries, ought to be perceived as more than a simple misfortune. Temporary restrictions on the emigration of health workers from the region is one of the already existing policy measures to tackle the issue—while such a restrictive measure brings about the need for quite a justificatory work. A recent normative contribution to the debate by Gillian Brock provides a fruitful starting point. In the first step of her defence of emigration restrictions, Brock provides three reasons why skilled workers themselves would hold responsibilities to assist with respect to vital needs of their compatriots. These are fair reciprocity, duty to support vital institutions, and attending to the unintended harmful consequences of one’s actions. While the first two are explained and also largely discussed in the literature, the third requires an explication on how and on which basis skilled workers would have a responsibility as such. In this article, I offer a vulnerability approach with its dependency aspect that may account for why the health workers in underserved contexts would have a responsibility to attend to the unintended side effects of their actions that may lead to a vital risk of harm for the population. I discuss HIV/AIDS care in Zimbabwe as a case in point in order to show that local health workers may have responsibilities to assist the population who are vulnerable to their mobility.

PAH contamination in Beijing's topsoil: A unique indicator of the megacity's evolving energy consumption and overall environmental quality.

To improve its air quality, Beijing, the capital of China, has implemented high-cost pollution control measures mainly focused on shifting its energy mix. However, the effectiveness of these measures has long been questioned, especially given the recent problem of severe haze. The main study objectives are to achieve independent, although indirect, information on Beijing’s air pollution by measuring the level of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH) contamination in topsoil and to examine how soil contamination reflects energy consumption. Soil sampling data from two years, 2004 and 2013, were used. The key findings are as follows: 1) although the total PAH content in the topsoil did not significantly decrease from 2004 to 2013, the composition changed considerably; 2) as of 2013, vehicle emissions replaced coal combustion as the leading source of soil PAHs, which validates the existing policy measures regarding vehicle purchasing and traffic volume; 3) the regional transport of atmospheric pollutants, as indicated by the contribution of coking sources in 2013, is not negligible; and 4) appropriate policy measures are needed to control the growing practice of burning biomass. Overall, this study demonstrates that the PAH contamination in topsoil represents an informative indicator of Beijing’s energy consumption and overall environmental quality.

Spatiotemporal Analysis of the Controlling Factors of Forest Cover Change in the Romanian Carpathian Mountains

Forest cover change is driven by complex processes that depend on political, conservation, and biophysical conditions. At present, mountain areas worldwide are undergoing intense forest cover change. Local-scale studies exist, but policy makers lack reliable and consistent information at the regional scale about long-term trends, controlling factors, and the success of existing policy measures. Long-term forest cover change data based on advanced image preprocessing procedures have recently become available. This study explores the potential of such data for a regional-scale analysis of forest cover change in mountain areas by analyzing forest cover change in the Romanian Carpathian Ecoregion (about 107,000 km2) between 1985 and 2010. It shows that (1) extrapolations from local to regional scale are inaccurate, (2) European forest protection policies have been unsuccessful, and (3) the Romanian Carpathians are greening due to land abandonment in remote areas.

A Review of Comparative Vehicle Cost Analysis

A meta-analysis of 44 studies that conduct a private, external and/or total social cost comparison among conventional and electric vehicles shows that, independent of the studies' goals, the results are often misleading. This distortion occurs because of the omission of one or more relevant cost components and/or the impact of divergent and often unspecified assumptions, which is demonstrated through three detailed examples. Although 30 studies compared private costs, one-third only considered purchase and fuel costs and ignored other costs. Charging infrastructure and residual value were only considered in four and eight studies, respectively. Thirty-five authors performed an external cost evaluation, of which 12 were expressed in monetary terms. The majority of the non-monetary studies only consider one external polluting factor, which is generally CO2/GHG, whereas the monetary studies generally evaluate four or more polluting factors. Furthermore, this article drafts a methodological checklist that (1) defines the preferred evaluation methods according to the study goals, (2) includes all private and external costs in the production, acquisition, usage and disposal stages as well as the existing policy measures and (3) lists the general assumptions that should be specified. This checklist enhances consistent comparability among various social cost studies of different vehicle types, and it supports policy-makers in drafting evidence-based transportation policy conclusions.