Provision Of Safeguards Research Articles

How Platform Exchange and Safeguards Matter: The Case of Sexual Risk in Airbnb and Couchsurfing

Recent work in CHI and CSCW has devoted increasing attention to how the design of network hospitality platforms shapes user experiences and relational outcomes. In this article, I interrogate how different risk factors emerge based on the type of exchanges these platforms facilitate. To do so, I juxtapose two prominent network hospitality platforms-one facilitating negotiated exchange (i.e., Airbnb) with another facilitating reciprocal exchange (i.e., Couchsurfing). Homing in on sexual risk, an underexplored form of platform danger, and drawing on interviews with 40 female dual-platform users, I argue that Airbnb's provision of binding negotiated exchange and institutional safeguards reduces risk through three mechanisms: casting initial guest-host relation into a buyer-seller arrangement, stabilizing interactional scripts, and formalizing sexual violence recourse. Conversely, Couchsurfing's focus on reciprocal exchange and lack of safeguards increase sexual precarity for users both on- and off-platform. This study demonstrates how platforms with strong prosocial motivations can jeopardize sociality and concludes with design implications for protecting vulnerable user populations.

Investing in IT: a new method for improving the efficiency of contract governance in interfirm relationships

PurposeThis study aims to enhance our understanding of how advanced IT improves the efficiency of contract governance in mitigating partners' opportunistic behaviors in interfirm cooperation and the moderating effects of boundary spanners' personal relationships and cooperative orientation.Design/methodology/approachContract governance is divided into two subdimensions: contract completeness and contract execution safeguards. Then, the hypotheses are examined using partial least squares–based structural equation modeling based on survey data collected from manufacturers in supply chain relationships.FindingsThe results first demonstrate that advanced IT can improve efficiency in both the design of complete contracts and the provision of contract execution safeguards. Second, the results also show that both the personal relationships between boundary spanners and the cooperative orientation of the firm have different moderating effects. Finally, contract execution safeguards are effective in mitigating partners' opportunistic behaviors, whereas contract completeness is not.Originality/valueThis study enriches the contract governance literature in two ways. First, it unveils how advanced IT improves the efficiency of contract governance and the effects of two contingent factors (i.e. personal relationships and cooperative orientation), thus extending the research on contract governance. Second, it reveals the different effects of contract completeness and contract execution safeguards on partners' opportunistic behaviors, thus deepening our understanding of the role of contracts in interfirm cooperation.

Good practices in provision of nuclear safeguards and security training courses at the Integrated Support Center for Nuclear Nonproliferation and Nuclear Security

More than five years have passed since the Integrated Support Center for Nuclear Nonproliferation and Nuclear Security (ISCN) was established under the Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA) in December 2010 and started its activities, in response to the commitment of Japan at the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington D.C.. The ISCN has been vigorously involved in capacity building assistance on nuclear nonproliferation (safeguards) and nuclear security, mainly in the Asian region. It has provided 105 training courses to 2901 participants in total as of August 2016. The ISCN plays a major role in strengthening nuclear nonproliferation and nuclear security in the region, and this can be considered one of the great results of the Nuclear Security Summit process. The ISCN has cooperated with the US Department of Energy/National Nuclear Security Administration (DOE/NNSA) and Sandia National Laboratories (SNL) to establish a base of instructors, particularly for the Center's flagship two-week courses, the Regional Training Course on Physical Protection of Nuclear Material and Facilities (RTC on PP) and the Regional Training Course on State Systems of Accounting for and Control of Nuclear Material (RTC on SSAC). Furthermore, the ISCN has provided training courses for experts in Japan, making the best use of the Center's knowledge and experience of organizing international courses. The ISCN has also started joint synchronized training with the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission (EC JRC) on nuclear safeguards. This paper describes the good practices at the ISCN through its five years of activities, focusing on its progress in nuclear safeguards and nuclear security training.

Rethinking Business Rescue in Nigeria: Borrowing Virtues from Chapter 11 of the US Bankruptcy Code

As human and commercial intercourse in society and market transactions increased, the need for credit and the latitude for suspended payments have also increased. But something else also increased- the tendency of default by the debtor in making good the promise to repay. The predominant trend had been to liquidate or wind up the business, pay up (as much as possible) the creditors of the business and then the “owners” of the business (residual claimants) may have the remainder (if any) for themselves. This in itself was a result of some refinement from the very hostile disposition by different societies to insolvent persons whether in business or otherwise. In more recent times however, the emphasis appears to be shifting and the considerations also now seems to go beyond just the creditors but also to include other interests in the decision of what to do with an insolvent business. The growing attitude is to ask: “is the business better alive than dead”? “Will saving or rescuing the business not be more beneficial than allowing it wither away?” If there is some agreement that more benefits inure to the system by keeping an otherwise viable business alive, this will very well need the imprimatur of law.Nigeria is an emerging economy and presently “wears the garb” of Africa’s largest economy. The implication of this is that businesses ranging from corporations to MSMEs are setting up shop and seeking to corner their share of the market. The prospects of the economy notwithstanding, the lack of certain fundamentals may militate against the chances of many a business and one does not need to be a fortune teller or soothsayer to predict that such businesses will sooner or later be faced with illiquidity or cash flow challenges. Again, the question to be asked is whether to have such businesses go through the path of liquidation, leaving all other unsatisfied stakeholders to go home and cry. Or should the law provide a means of effecting the rescue of such businesses?This thesis aims to characterize the business rescue regime in Nigeria in the light of its inadequacy and the lack of a concrete policy of the law as presently constituted to rescue ailing businesses. It points out that although there exists some business rescue provisions in the relevant statutes, their practical relevance have been called into question. A case is therefore made for the adoption of tools provided for in Chapter 11 of the US Bankruptcy Act (as against those of the English law) considered to be pertinent in the quest for a business rescue regime for Nigeria. The thesis proposes the provision of a sweeping moratorium from creditor enforcement (automatic stay), the adoption of the principle of debtor-in-possession, and the legislative incentivizing of post insolvency financing for the distressed business by way of creating a super-priority position for the financer. In cases where the business has several creditors, creditor classification and voting will be key in achieving a successful re-organization plan and what to do with dissenting impaired creditors will arise. Hence the thesis explores the provision of necessary safeguards for the “impaired minority” in the imposition of the “will of the majority” in the interest of rescuing the business. The adaptation of these measures are proposed without losing sight of their applicability, especially in view of idiosyncratic differences that exist between both jurisdictions, the difference in societal sophistication and the comparable English law provisions.

Securing Defence Rights in Transnational Proceedings

This paper identifies and analyses problems and weaknesses standing in the way of the provision of an effective defence in transnational criminal proceedings. Drawing upon some key findings of the Euroneeds study, it extrapolates results from that examination of eu criminal justice as valid for all transnational justice settings. It is argued that the failure to recognise legally the difference between national and transnational proceedings leads to a lacuna. Transnational criminal law and justice mechanisms are recognised as developed, above all, as tools of repressive criminal procedure leaving individuals facing them stripped of their constitutional identities and corresponding protective rights. It is argued that those creating transnational criminal law and justice mechanisms must recognise and provide for a more balanced system to avoid such contexts acting as constitutional loop-holes and to ensure the provision of defence rights and procedural safeguards in such proceedings.

Mandatory Predispute Consumer Arbitration, Structural Bias, and Incentivizing Procedural Safeguards

Within the past several decades, there has been an explosion in the creation, institutionalization and use of “alternative” dispute resolution procedures. Mandatory predispute arbitration has generated the most controversy because it appears beset with structural bias. The recent cases of AT&T Mobility LLC v. Concepcion and Compucredit Corp. v. Greenwood have raised additional concerns as the Supreme Court has announced that corporations can force consumers to arbitrate their private and statutory claims and give up their rights to pursue class relief. This Article begins by arguing that the Supreme Court’s enthusiastic embrace of mandatory predispute arbitration should be understood primarily as institutional self-help, as an opportunistic search for the funding and personnel that courts need to conduct fact-finding and decision-making in cases that the courts perceive as routine. By permitting corporations to impose class waivers on consumers, the Supreme Court is incentivizing the corporations to provide and fund a national private small claims court. If the Court is incentivizing in this way, however, this Article urges that it should demand more in return for class waiver. Specifically, it should demand evidence that the arbitration procedure is sufficiently attractive to consumers so that they will pursue their claims, as well as evidence that the procedure is sufficiently fair. One difficulty in making these demands, however, is that courts are obligated to use very limited grounds and a deferential standard of review for arbitral awards. Second, therefore, this Article urges courts to mine past experience in other legal contexts that involve privatized judicial functions, a deferential standard of judicial review, and the incentivizing of procedural safeguards. For guidance, this Article examines MetLife v. Glenn and the evolution of the deferential standards of review that courts apply to ERISA plan benefit denials by private claims administrators, particularly when such administrators operate in a conflicted decision-making context. In this context, the Supreme Court has managed to acknowledge the existence of structural bias and make it a relevant and important factor to be considered as part of deferential judicial review. Further, the Supreme Court has provided guidance to lower courts regarding the weight to be given to structural bias and has provided examples of the information required to assess such weight. Structural bias has been given the stature of tiebreaker in close cases. Finally and most important for the purposes of this Article, the Supreme Court has also incentivized the provision of structural and procedural safeguards (as well as discovery into the existence and operation of such safeguards) in order to reduce the potency of the structural incentives that encourage biased decision-making. In other words, the Supreme Court has incentivized the provision of safeguards that will enhance the likelihood of accurate decision-making -- all while maintaining a deferential standard of review. Glenn and its progeny thus offer procedural safeguards that the Supreme Court could -- and should -- import into its arbitration jurisprudence. These, at the very least, are the sorts of safeguards that the valuable bargaining chip of class waiver should be able to buy.

Protecting Vulnerable Research Subjects in Critical Care Trials: Enhancing the Informed Consent Process and Recommendations for Safeguards

Although critically ill patients represent a vulnerable group of individuals, guidelines in research ethics assert that ethically acceptable research may proceed with such vulnerable subjects if additional safeguards are in place to minimize the risk of harm and exploitation. Such safeguards include the proper obtainment of informed consent that avoids the presence of the therapeutic misconception and the assessment of decisional capacity in critically ill patients recruited for research. Also discussed in this review are additional safeguards for such vulnerable subjects, as well as the issues involved with proxy consent. Heightened awareness to principles of ethics and provision of additional safeguards to enhance protections of vulnerable subjects would help to maintain the public trust in the research endeavor.

'Ethics Hotlines' in Transnational Companies: A Comparative Study

This empirical study explores the characteristics and degree of implementation of so-called ethics hotlines in transnational companies (TNCs), which allow employees to present allegations of wrongdoing and ethical dilemmas, as well as to report concerns. Ethics hotlines have not received much attention in literature; therefore, this paper aims to fill that gap. Through the analysis of conduct/ethics codes and the compliance programs of the top 150 transnational companies ranked by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) (2007), we carry out a descriptive and taxonomic study of these companies’ ethics hotlines. We analyze: (1) the basic characteristics of the mechanism, (2) the degree of exigency and the provision of safeguards, (3) the matters reported and the systems for reporting, and (4) the relationships between hotlines and economic characteristics of the firm. Our study compares financial and nonfinancial TNCs as well as North American and European TNCs. Our results show that many firms (especially from North America) have established these procedures. We also find some disparities between European and North American ethics hotlines that suggest differences in the orientation of the procedures.

Recent Developments in the Reform of English Law on Assisted Suicide

Assisted suicide remains a deeply contested issue in the U.K. Recently three Assisted Dying for the Terminally Ill Bills were introduced in a three year period, all of which failed. Despite the provision of clear and precise safeguards, at each reading the House of Lords fixed largely on the traditional slippery slope and sanctity of life positions; a disproportionate reliance on theological determinism in particular prevented informed rational debate. People are living longer often with chronic, incurable diseases and palliative care is frequently of poor quality or even unavailable in the U.K. and it is unacceptable that individuals 'suffering unbearably' in their final days have no available domestic alternative. Yet the courts have consistently declined to prosecute in cases where friends and relatives have accompanied terminally ill persons abroad to die, against the provisions of the 1961 Suicide Act s2(1). This article critically assesses recent developments in English law on assisted dying and considers the implications for a more inclusive and reasoned debate in the future.

New York City’s Initiatives on Diabetes and HIV/AIDS: Implications for Patient Care, Public Health, and Medical Professionalism

Two recent New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene initiatives expanded the mission and scope of public health, with implications for both New York and the nation. The programs target diabetes and HIV/AIDS for greater systemic and expanded reporting, surveillance, and intervention. These initiatives do not balance heightened surveillance and intervention with the provision of meaningful safeguards or resources for prevention and treatment. The programs intrude on the doctor-patient relationship and may alienate the very patients and health professionals they aim to serve. Better models are available to achieve their intended goals. These initiatives should be reconsidered so that such an expansion of public health authority in New York City does not become part of a national trend.

Transparency issues in NAFTA: concerns and directions for free trade in an open environment

For any bilateral or multilateral trade agreement to be effective, it is imperative that transparency and good governance form the mainstay for achieving parity and trust amongst the partners. This article highlights pressing issues facing the partners of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), analyzes some of the current areas of conflict and suggests action to reduce tensions and promote harmony, goodwill and cooperation. The legal framework for transparency and governance needs to be seen as fair in addition to providing a mechanism for the airing of grievances and resolving conflicts. The requirements include: disclosure of relevant information, reasons for appropriate policy enactment and application and provision of investor protection safeguards. Of special import is the dire need to deal with issues of corruption at all levels. It is recommended that a conference be held to discuss issues of transparency and accountability as an initial endeavour in understanding the dynamics involved.

Questioning the "big assumptions". Part II: recognizing organizational contradictions that impede institutional change.

Well-designed medical curriculum reforms can fall short of their primary objectives during implementation when unanticipated or unaddressed organizational resistance surfaces. This typically occurs if the agents for change ignore faculty concerns during the planning stage or when the provision of essential institutional safeguards to support new behaviors are neglected. Disappointing outcomes in curriculum reforms then result in the perpetuation of or reversion to the status quo despite the loftiest of goals. Institutional resistance to change, much like that observed during personal development, does not necessarily indicate a communal lack of commitment to the organization's newly stated goals. It may reflect the existence of competing organizational objectives that must be addressed before substantive advances in a new direction can be accomplished. The authors describe how the Big Assumptions process (see previous article) was adapted and applied at the institutional level during a school of medicine's curriculum reform. Reform leaders encouraged faculty participants to articulate their reservations about considered changes to provided insights into the organization's competing commitments. The line of discussion provided an opportunity for faculty to appreciate the gridlock that existed until appropriate test of the school's long held Big Assumptions could be conducted. The Big Assumptions process proved useful in moving faculty groups to recognize and questions the validity of unchallenged institutional beliefs that were likely to undermine efforts toward change. The process also allowed the organization to put essential institutional safeguards in place that ultimately insured that substantive reforms could be sustained.

The honest society: Stability and policy considerations

The social level of honesty is a public good that determines the feasibility of ventures subject to opportunism and the amount of resources devoted to safeguarding such activities. This paper examines equilibrium honesty in an evolutionary model where safeguards exhibit diminishing returns. The analysis shows that honesty-promoting policies, such as public provision and subsidization of safeguards, financed by uniform taxes, increase social welfare. By contrast, sharply increased safeguard costs, e.g. soaring litigation costs, may initiate a process of disintegration of honesty in society. Furthermore, hysteresis makes re-establishing honesty likely to be very costly.

JOY v. NEWS OF THE WORLD

May 12, 1972 Factory — Provision of fencing or other safeguards — To be kept in position while machine in motion or use — Meaning of “in motion or use” — Factories Act, 1961 (9 &10 Eliz. II, c.34),s. 16.

Caste in Modern India

IT IS my aim in this essay' to marshal evidence to show that during the last century or more, the institution of caste has found new fields of activity. The manner in which the British transferred political power to the Indians enabled caste to assume political functions. In independent India, the provision of constitutional safeguards to the backward sections of the population, especially the Scheduled Castes and Tribes, has given a new lease of life to caste. It is hardly necessary to add that this contrasts with the aim of bringing about a casteless and classless society which most political parties, including the Indian National Congress, profess. The political system of pre-British India was characterized by clear territorial cleavages marking off the territory of one chieftain or raja from the territories of others. Usually, above the chieftain or the raja, there was the viceroy of an emperor or the emperor himself, and below the chief were the headmen of single villages. The boundaries of a chief's or raja's domain were mobile, being subject to expansion or contraction depending upon the military prowess of the chief vis-a-vis other chiefs, and also upon the firmness with which the viceroy or emperor exercised his control. However, while the boundaries were mobile over a period of time, at any single moment they constituted effective barriers between people living in different chiefdoms. Such a political system naturally imposed severe limits on the horizontal extension of caste ties. In short, political frontiers determined the effective, if not the maximum, social space of each caste living within them.2 The fact that over a period of time the boundaries were mobile meant that cultural ties frequently cut across the existing political boundaries. The coincidence of the cultural and political frontiers, a principle which is explicitly recognized in the Report of the States Reorganization Commission, is, on the whole, a new event in Indian history. A natural consequence of the territorial limits imposed by the political system on the horizontal tendency of castes was the stimulus it gave to castes living in an area to co-operate with each other. Occupational specialization stressed this

The life testing of cathode-ray tubes

The principal requirement of cathode-ray-tube life-testing equipment is that it shall give an accurate description of the life performance of any type of cathode-ray tube in the shortest possible time. This object is achieved only after due consideration of all the factors involved, which include the safety of personnel from electric shock and mechanical implosion, the flexibility and reliability of apparatus and methods of arriving at an estimate of life before failure actually occurs. The paper describes how the problem has been approached and concludes that the desired flexibility in the apparatus can best be achieved in an open-bench type of equipment. This entails the provision of electrical safeguards to protect the operator.