Transparent Information Flow Research Articles

State responses to counter disinformation in USA, Greece and Republic of Moldova

In several countries, there are voices that ask for government to take steps to restrict information falseness, reduce the news that misrepresent reality and restore people’s trust in media. In USA, legislation is introduced regarding political advertisement, public’s protection from deceptive practices and audience manipulation. Greece endeavors for digital transformation across the spectrum of the public sector, which will promote to have eventually more valid and transparent information flow. The Republic of Moldova is making legislation reforms to modernize its policies and create a more stable environment that potentially brings her closer to the European reforms. In this article, we focus on public policies against disinformation in three different countries including United States, Greece and Moldova. Each state applies its own approach in order to deal with the problem

An Approach to Advance Circular Practices in the Maritime Industry through a Database as a Bridging Solution

The concept of maritime circularity has gained increasing attention to address challenges arising from the net-zero targets of the maritime industry. The circular economy provides potential solutions to address these challenges through reuse, remanufacturing, and recycling practices. However, the industry faces complex challenges, including inefficient reverse supply chains, a lack of awareness about circular economy principles, standardisation issues, and the need for digital infrastructure to provide vital information in the sector. These challenges prevent the implementation of circularity practices, as access to crucial data throughout the vessel’s life cycle is obstructed. This novel research aims to create a robust first-of-its-kind database solution specifically designed to support the industry’s shift towards circularity. The database will facilitate fast and transparent information flow between the stakeholders, providing foundations for asset tracking and a robust reverse supply chain. A case study was conducted to show that a database could help extract higher financial value from end-of-life ships by over 80%. The ageing fleet increases the urgency of utilising such a database, which could be a pivotal strategy for a sustainable and circular industry. This digital solution offers significant benefits to all industry stakeholders and allows holistic resource management, influencing maritime operations’ sustainability, resilience, and profitability.

Education and learning trajectories in Physiotherapy and Rehabilitation Sciences

In higher education, a sequence of course units ensures that students have acquired the predefined competences (core competences of the program). To properly align these building blocks, learning clusters or trajectories were introduced in the curriculum of Physiotherapy and Rehabilitation Sciences at the University of Antwerp and coordinators were appointed. Learning pathway coordinators assure the gradual build-up of competence acquisition. Everything the student learns during the course can be linked back to the three professional roles the student will later hold as a physiotherapist: the roles of caregiver, scientist and care manager. Ten clusters or learning trajectories were defined within our educational program and 8 coordinators were assigned. Six monthly meetings bring together teachers within the same teaching trajectory and discuss the alignment of contents and final competences, coordinate the study material and the forms of work and evaluation used and roll out new projects within and beyond the learning trajectories.
 This offers multiple advantages:
 By clustering learning content into different learning trajectories, we reduce complexity and increase transparency.
 New colleagues situate their courses and program components in the wider context of the curriculum thanks to a clear system. Hereby we think critically about the curriculum constantly and can assess one’s own position within that curriculum.
 A visual representation of learning trajectories can ensure a transparent flow of information to various external stakeholders.
 A system of learning trajectories offers the possibility to make well-considered decisions with regard to the sequence in which program components are taught and the interconnection of components throughout the years (e.g. basics in communication in 2nd bachelor year and professional communication in the 3rd bachelor year).
 It creates common ground, improves collegiality and stimulates new innovative ideas to help students and colleagues within the educational program. (e.g. use of an observation list which is partly introduced in year one and built on and elaborated towards the master years, similar books, digital platforms).
 
 Some ground rules and tips:
 Main aspects, the different learning trajectories and the coordinators must be visible for both students and staff. Continuity of learning trajectory meetings and coordination is important so bi-annual meetings are advised.
 Invite all colleagues, guest lecturers and even colleagues with a very small educational assignment.
 Be sure to have a feedback loop in the educational board and educational commission.
 Assure that meetings between the different learning trajectories/clusters (between the coordinators) take place.
 Have respect for the heavy work-load of teaching staff and always think of facilitators for the work stream and avoid administrative burden.
 Learning trajectories should always be open to change and improvement. The entire learning trajectory and all clusters must be seen as a slowly evolving dynamic entity.
 Try to create bottom-up initiatives within these learning trajectories.

Smart Fashion Economy through a Data-Driven Circular Ecosystem: A Case Study

While Circular Economy (CE) strategies have been discussed as solutions for negative environmental impacts, companies are facing various challenges in applying CE strategies and redefining their business models. Recent research articulates that to achieve the CE goals, businesses should collaborate with each other within an ecosystem in which values are equally captured among all the stakeholders by governing and managing data flows. In this ecosystem, all the actors and stakeholders can share data, information and solutions regarding to CE to help each other through the path and co-create CE values. Regardless of the transition towards CE, fashion and textile industry is still following the linear economy model (take, make, use, dispose), where only less than 1% of the recycled clothes get back to use cycle. For textile and fashion industry, data plays a key role in providing transparent flow of information on product’s lifecycle, from circular material resources and design all the way to the recycling and waste management. In this regard, a data-driven ecosystem in which various stakeholders can access the source of right data, can ensure the success of circularity of the entire supply chain. A data-driven strategy can help to engage and train all organizations to build a data-literacy ecosystem towards a common goal. The purpose of this paper is to identify the important role of a data-driven CE ecosystem in fashion industry within the case study of the circularity. ID® a solution developed by-circular fashion.

FİNANSAL HALKLA İLİŞKİLERDE WEB SİTESİ KULLANIMI: BORSA İSTANBUL 30 (BIST 30) ŞİRKETLERİNE YÖNELİK BİR ARAŞTIRMA

Halkla açık şirketlerin hisse değerlerini artırmak, finansal konumlarını güçlendirmek, finansal hedef kitleleri ile güvene dayalı ilişkiler tesis ederek bu kitleleri bilgilendirmek gibi amaçları elde etmek üzere yapılandırdığı finansal halkla ilişkiler çalışmaları günümüz rekabet ortamında büyük önem taşımaktadır. Söz konusu amaçların elde edilmesinde ise web siteleri etkili bir halkla ilişkiler aracı olarak kullanılmaktadır. Kuruluşlar web siteleri aracılığıyla finansal hedef kitlelerine zamanında ve hızlı bir şekilde bilgileri ulaştırabilmekte ve bu bilgiler aracılığıyla güveni oluşturabilmektedir. Finansal hedef kitlelerle ilişkiler kuruluşların web sitelerinde “yatırımcı ilişkileri” başlığı altında yer almaktadır. Bu çalışmanın amacı Borsa İstanbul 30 (BIST30) Endeksinde işlem gören şirketlerin web sitelerinde yer alan yatırımcı ilişkileri bölümlerini inceleyerek finansal halkla ilişkiler açısından değerlendirmektir. Nitel araştırma desenlerinden durum çalışması desenine göre yürütülen bu çalışmada veri toplama tekniği olarak doküman incelemesi ve verilerin analizi için de içerik analizi yöntemi kullanılmıştır. BIST30 Endeksinde işlem gören şirketlerin web sitelerinde yatırımcı ilişkileri bölümlerinde yer alan bilgiler içerik analizi yöntemi kullanılarak “erişim”, “açıklık”, “içerik”, “yatırımcı desteği”, “teknoloji” kategorileri altında incelenmiştir. Analiz sonucunda erişim kategorisinde 11, açıklık kategorisinde 3, içerik kategorisinde 17, yatırımcı desteği kategorisinde 1, teknoloji kategorisinde 11 şirketin tam puan aldığı görülmüştür.

Co-creation and User Perspectives for Upper Limb Prosthetics.

People who either use an upper limb prosthesis and/or have used services provided by a prosthetic rehabilitation centre, experience limitations of currently available prosthetic devices. Collaboration between academia and a broad range of stakeholders, can lead to the development of solutions that address peoples' needs. By doing so, the rate of prosthetic device abandonment can decrease. Co-creation is an approach that can enable collaboration of this nature to occur throughout the research process. We present findings of a co-creation project that gained user perspectives from a user survey, and a subsequent workshop involving: people who use an upper limb prosthesis and/or have experienced care services (users), academics, industry experts, charity executives, and clinicians. The survey invited users to prioritise six themes, which academia, clinicians, and industry should focus on over the next decade. The prioritisation of the themes concluded in the following order, with the first as the most important: function, psychology, aesthetics, clinical service, collaboration, and media. Within five multi-stakeholder groups, the workshop participants discussed challenges and collaborative opportunities for each theme. Workshop groups prioritised the themes based on their discussions, to highlight opportunities for further development. Two groups chose function, one group chose clinical service, one group chose collaboration, and another group chose media. The identified opportunities are presented within the context of the prioritised themes, including the importance of transparent information flow between all stakeholders; user involvement throughout research studies; and routes to informing healthcare policy through collaboration. As the field of upper limb prosthetics moves toward in-home research, we present co-creation as an approach that can facilitate user involvement throughout the duration of such studies.

System Dynamics Analysis of Sugarcane Supply Chain in Indian Sugar Industry

Presently, there is high turbulence in the Indian sugar industry. The misalignment of the incentives of major stakeholders is leading the industry to a vicious downslide. Hence, it becomes important to study the current situation, its dynamics and future trends under different circumstances. In this paper, we have established the relationship between different variables and parameters using the systems dynamic approach to model the dynamics of sustainability of the sugar industry in Uttar Pradesh (UP), India. Our study revealed that to achieve sustainable development, the sugar industry must improve on resource utilization, operating cost, better supply chain coordination and transparent information flow. Based on our analysis, operational and policy level recommendations have been suggested to help the industry achieve sustainable development and improve performance.

KINERJA SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT GLASS EEL (BENIH SIDAT) UNTUK MENUNJANG INDUSTRI PEMBESARAN SIDAT DI PALABUHANRATU

The utilization of glass eel (eel seeds) in the Cimandiri River Palabuhanratu has a very important role to support the supply chain for the eel culture industry. The purpose of this study was to estimate the amount of glass eel catch, describe the glass eel eel supply chain system, and measure the performance of the supply chain in eel culture. The research method uses quantitative methods through direct observation and interviews, as well as case studies of supply chain actors. The results showed that the highest catch of glass eel in 2019 was in June at an average of 14,859 grams (14.9 kg). The highest catch of glass eel occurred in the dry season (June - August), with a total catch of 21,884 grams (21.8 kg). The glass eel supply chain mechanism consists of supply chain flow pattern on the product flow, a good and transparent flow of information on each link, and the distribution of two payment systems, namely cash and credit payments. The supply chain performance in the eel culture industry obtained a performance value of 82.63 which indicates that the achievement of the company's supply chain performance is in the good category, and improvements need to be made especially on the deliver process performance indicators with a value of 2.70.
 Keywords: : glass eel, supply chain, eel, Cimandiri River

BLOCKCHAIN APPLICATION FOR CONTRACT SCHEMES IN THE CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY

The proposed research aims at illustrating how Blockchain technology can support the contract execution optimizing and assuring a transparent information flow during the phases of the construction process. The traditional approach, chased in the industry, is indeed more hierarchical than networked, resulting in a high fragmentation of contracts and the break of companies in numerous tiers. This context prevents effective collaboration, hindering the achievement of the project objectives. The recent digital transition, guided by Building Information Modeling (BIM), has promised the creation of a shared environment for the information created and exchanged during the entire process, in favor of collaboration and reduction of critical issues typical related to the sector. Despite the initial promises, the use of BIM has shown problems related to trust and transparency of information, not encouraging participants to collaborate in meeting common goals. For these reasons, the study aims to investigate the potential of Blockchain technology in the management of the information flow to ensure transparency and stability of the process. The research proposes four frameworks showing how Blockchain can be integrated with the construction contract to support the execution of each phase, highlighting the improvement of information sharing, traceability of each activity or service and support for collaboration.

Agility assessment using fuzzy logic approach: a case of healthcare dispensary

BackgroundAgile concepts are not only beneficial for manufacturing sector but also for service sector such as healthcare. However, assessment of agility has been predominantly done in manufacturing enterprises. This study demonstrates a means to measure agility of a healthcare organization by assessing agility of a university dispensary. Its contribution to the knowledge base is twofold. First, it proposes a means to measure the agility of a healthcare organization and second, it identifies the attributes that prevent agile performance and outlines the suggestive measure to enhance its agile capabilities.MethodA case study approach has been adopted and fuzzy logic has been employed to measure the agility of the case dispensary. At first, the measures of assessment which include four enablers, fifteen criteria and forty-five attributes have been identified from the literature and rated by the experts indicating the importance of the measures in the assessment. Then, the case dispensary has been assessed on those measures by collecting observed performance rating from decision makers. At last, Fuzzy logic has been applied on the performance rating data to analyze and interpret the agile capability of the dispensary.ResultsThe findings suggest that transparent information flow, adequate salary and bonuses for caregivers, reading error in medical descriptions, in house/nearby pathology laboratory services, technical up-gradation of dispensary equipments and facilities, minimization of patient throughput time and adequate training programme for safety practices are the attributes that weakens agile capability of the University dispensary. The current agility of the dispensary was found to be ‘Agile’ which is average in relation to the agility labels.ConclusionAttributes such as transparent information flow, adequate salary and bonuses for caregivers, elimination of reading error in medical descriptions, in house/nearby pathology laboratory services, technical up-gradation of dispensary equipments and facilities, minimization of patient throughput time and adequate training programme for safety practices are extremely crucial for enhancing agile capability of a healthcare organization.

French Politicians on Facebook and Twitter. Revitalizing political representation?

In contrast to the previous contribution, this paper tackles the issue of transparency and social media with a more national perspective. By looking at French deputies posts on Facebook and Twitter, but also by directly inquiring how French citizens assess the issue of political transparency on social media, this analysis aims at providing new insights into the issue as to whether the presence of politicians on social media can affect power relations between citizens and politicians. The underlying rationale is to find out whether this form of transparency ultimately enhances representative democracy. Over the last decades transparency has often been depicted as the ultimate remedy for various political, economic and societal problems. Stiglitz (1999; 2000; 2002) outlines the significance of transparency for averting market failures and enhancing public financing. Similarly, Lindstedt and Naurin (2010) investigate the capacity of transparency to reduce corruption and achieve fairer and more efficient governance, while Schultz and Kenneth (1998) analyse how better means of communication and transparency can diminish risks of war and international conflicts. Recent cases and scandals have added fuel to debates about transparency. The Luxleaks affair revealed the need for more transparency with regard to existing tax schemes for multinational companies (Gotev, 2015). The opacity of the TTIP negotiations has made experts and citizens suspicious regarding the content of this trading agreement and signal the risk of lowering safety standards and endangering customers’ safety. If we turn to the realm of politics, we quickly notice that the relationship between transparency and democracy has provoked intense and convoluted debates. Is transparency of governments a necessary feature of democratic regimes? Or, is transparency a political key for better governance? In his succinct definition of democracy, Schumpeter (1942) did not yet consider transparency as an inherent and essential characteristic of democratic regimes. Democracy, he argues, is only determined by the electoral competition and free elections. By contrast, Dahl (1971) - with his famous concept of Poliarchy – places transparency at the core of the democratic framework. As he claims, a democratic regime is not only a regime in which electors have the right to freely vote for their future representatives and governments, it is also a system that allows its citizens to be fully informed - by different and independent sources of information - before they cast their ballot. This implies a free and transparent flow of information.

A Review of Problems Faced by ERP Consultancy and Client Organizations in China

Enterprise resource planning (ERP) is a system designed to bring processes and resource together by sharing data and information across functional areas. The use of ERP consultancy is becoming essential to the enterprises in China. However, many issues have risen in the process of ERP implementation. This paper aims to investigate the major obstacles in the way of ERP implementation among ERP consultancy and client organisations. It has found that the quality of Chinese consultancy is far from that expected as leading ERP products were not widely mastered by consulting firms. Efficient information system is essential for companies to stay in the competition. However, transparent information flow across functional areas is hard to achieve in China. A good understanding of ERP system and business processes can help Chinese enterprises to ease unrealistic expectations from ERP implementation.

Wiki-Leaks-An Enigma of Information Sensation Sans Accountability: A Case Study of India

The world of academics and the media professionals looked at the WikiLeaks as a greater champion of freedom of expression (Sifry M 2011). No deeper academic study/discourse has emerged as yet on this positing. Questions arise whether mere reproduction of cables as free and transparent flow of information will lead to any agenda setting as do the conventional media within the meaning of media theories or will it only tend to herald an era of global disorder and chaos. Given the questions raised on the subjectivity involved in the drafting of these cables emanating from the US consulates across the globe, the present study shows how India had already overcome the crisis that WikiLeaks temporarily created in the sub-continent. The study, which has adapted content analysis of the WikiLeaks published in The Hindu , leading English news daily under a tie-up with the WikiLeaks since March 15, 2011 to April 30, 2011, revealed that WikiLeaks failed to generate any effect on Indian public represented by its political representatives in the Parliament, let alone an agenda setting. Keywords: WikiLeaks, The Hindu, Freedom of expression, Response of Political Establishment, Agenda Setting, Subjectivity of the Cables, etc.

Neon

Modern organizations face increasingly complex information management requirements. A combination of commercial needs, legal liability and regulatory imperatives has created a patchwork of mandated policies. Among these, personally identifying customer records must be carefully access-controlled, sensitive files must be encrypted on mobile computers to guard against physical theft, and intellectual property must be protected from both exposure and "poisoning." However, enforcing such policies can be quite difficult in practice since users routinely share data over networks and derive new files from these inputs--incidentally laundering any policy restrictions. In this paper, we describe a virtual machine monitor system called Neon that transparently labels derived data using byte-level "tints" and tracks these labels end to end across commodity applications, operating systems and networks. Our goal with Neon is to explore the viability and utility of transparent information flow tracking within conventional networked systems when used in the manner in which they were intended. We demonstrate that this mechanism allows the enforcement of a variety of data management policies, including data-dependent confinement, mandatory I/O encryption, and intellectual property management.