Four Reference Models for Transparency Requirements in Information Systems

Transparency is a key emerging requirement in modern businesses and their information systems. Transparency refers to the information which flows amongst stakeholders for the purpose of informed decision-making and taking the right action. Transparency is generally associated with positive connotations such as trust and accountability. However, it has been shown that it could have adverse effects such as information overload and affecting decisions objectiveness. This calls for systematic approaches for transparency to ensure its cost-effectiveness and avoid such adverse side effects. This is especially true considering that the relatively few works in the literature on transparency requirements have focused mainly on making information available and accessible and have paid little focus on the information receivers’ side and making it meaningful for them. In this paper, we reflect on our previous research on transparency and its multi-faceted constructs and review multi-disciplinary conceptualisation and propose four reference models which are meant to form a holistic conceptual baseline for transparency require- ments in information systems. These reference models cover transparency actors, transparency meaningfulness, transparency usefulness, and information quality in transparency. We also discuss the interdependencies amongst these four reference models and their implications for requirements engineers and information system analysts. As a proof of concept, we analyse a mainstream transparency document, the United Kingdom Freedom of Information Act, in the light of our reference models and demonstrate the need to consider transparency more holistically and the need to include the information receiver’s perspective and the inter-relations amongst various properties and constituents of transparency as well. We then highlight areas of improvement informed by our analysis

An analysis of the requirements traceability problem

In this paper1, we investigate and discuss the underlying nature of the requirements traceability problem. Our work is based on empirical studies, involving over 100 practitioners, and an evaluation of current support. We introduce the distinction between pre-requirements specification (pre-RS) traceability and post-requirements specification (post-RS) traceability, to demonstrate why an all-encompassing solution to the problem is unlikely, and to provide a framework through which to understand its multifaceted nature. We report how the majority of the problems attributed to poor requirements traceability are due to inadequate pre-RS traceability and show the fundamental need for improvements here. In the remainder of the paper, we present an analysis of the main barriers confronting such improvements in practice, identify relevant areas in which advances have been (or can be) made, and make recommendations for research

The Utilization of Normalized Difference Vegetation Index to Map Habitat Quality in Turin (Italy)

The integration of ecosystem service mapping in decision-making is crucial to place effective urban design and sustainable planning solutions. Nonetheless, often ecosystem service maps are the product of different data inputs that influences the final modeling output thus affecting final decisions, especially when a finer and site-specific assessment is required to design practical and effective solutions. In this work, the city of Turin (Northwest Italy) was selected as a test site for an empirical experiment of ecosystem service mapping using the software Integrated Valuation of Ecosystem Services and Tradeoffs (InVEST): two habitat quality models of the city were compared in a Geographic Information System environment, the first using the “traditional” sensitivity employed during the LIFE SAM4CP European research while the second using the natural difference vegetation index to re-assign the sensitivity scores. Results demonstrate that the integration of site-specific information in the habitat quality input model generates a different result, which is capable of differentiating all those dense built-up areas of the dense settlement system that provide ecosystem supporting functions at the city-level. These differences were analyzed to define new green hotspots in the compact city while furnishing a new perspective for sustainable city planning

Legal linked data ecosystems and the rule of law

This chapter introduces the notions of meta-rule of law and socio-legal ecosystems to both foster and regulate linked democracy. It explores the way of stimulating innovative regulations and building a regulatory quadrant for the rule of law. The chapter summarises briefly (i) the notions of responsive, better and smart regulation; (ii) requirements for legal interchange languages (legal interoperability); (iii) and cognitive ecology approaches. It shows how the protections of the substantive rule of law can be embedded into the semantic languages of the web of data and reflects on the conditions that make possible their enactment and implementation as a socio-legal ecosystem. The chapter suggests in the end a reusable multi-levelled meta-model and four notions of legal validity: positive, composite, formal, and ecological

Bridging diversity: a deliberative approach to organizing and application of usability guidelines

Designing interaction for the global society entails addressing multiple issues and challenges, ranging from the technical and economic to the legal and ethical. Usability guidelines recommend or prescribe courses of action and thus play a significant role in designing universally usable systems. Approaches to organizing and applying usability guidelines need to support processes of deliberation and tradeoff, especially when designing for bridging diversity in shared interaction contexts. This paper describes a deliberative approach to addressing some of these design challenges in a rational way. It argues for organizing guidelines by using concepts from Habermas’s discourse theory and Toulmin’s model of argumentation. Application of the approach is illustrated through a set of research-based Web design and usability guidelines. This paper contributes to the HCI literature by providing a theory-based approach to managing and deliberating on many usability guidelines and related usability issues

Stylized Facts as an Instrument for Literature Review and Cumulative Information Systems Research

The accumulation of scientific knowledge is an important objective of information systems (IS) research. Although different review approaches exist in the continuum between narrative reviews and meta-analyses, most reviews in IS are narrative or descriptive—with all related drawbacks concerning objectivity and reliability—because available under¬lying sources in IS do typically not fulfil the requirements of formal approaches such as meta-analyses. To discuss how cumulative IS research can be effectively advanced using a more formalized approach fitting the current situation in IS research, in this paper, we point out the potential of stylized facts (SFs). SFs are interesting, sometimes counterintuitive patterns in empirical data that focus on the most relevant aspects of observable phenomena by abstracting from details (stylization). SFs originate from the field of economics and have been successfully used in different fields of research for years. In this paper, we discuss their potential and challenges for literature reviews in IS. We supplement our argumentation with an application example reporting our experience with SFs. Because SFs show considerable potential for cumulative research, they seem to be a promising instrument for literature reviews and especially for theory development in IS

Software is Scholarship

This Article provides the first systematic account and justification of software applications as works of scholarship. Software is scholarship to the extent that software functionality is derived from scholarly research, software is used as a means to develop scholarship, or software is used as a medium to communicate scholarly ideas. Software applications are superior to articles and books for communicating scholarly ideas because software is not limited by the constraints of traditional written works. Software can communicate using a wide variety of textual components, graphical elements, and programmable interactivity that significantly enhance the ability to communicate scholarly concepts, arguments, and findings. This Article identifies four methods for software applications to enhance scholarly communication: app-ified argumentation that provides theoretical clarity, interactive toolkits that create rich qualitative studies, data visualizations that persuade using data, and policy tech that improves the ability to enact social change. Interactive software applications can enhance research agendas in the humanities and social sciences by making traditional, prose scholarship more thorough, persuasive, and analytically precise. Due to recent innovations, developing software for scholarly purposes is accessible to those that work in the humanities. Platforms for developing software have grown so sophisticated that they no longer require creators to write code to develop powerful, data rich, and well-designed interactive applications. Scholars should accordingly use and develop software to better communicate their ideas. By providing a framework for developing software as works of scholarship, this Article contributes to the field of digital humanities. To better understand this Article’s concept of scholarly software, I apply my conceptualization of scholarly software to legal scholarship and legal technology and discuss three case studies: LegalTech toolkits, voice recognition for automated contract drafting, and court data visualizations. Law is a fertile ground for the development of scholarly software because the core of legal reasoning consists of a formalistic, computational structure that is well-expressed through programmable applications. This Article contributes to legal scholarship by identifying how it can be enhanced through the creation of software applications

Envisioning Digital Europe 2030: Scenarios for ICT in Future Governance and Policy Modelling

The report Envisioning Digital Europe 2030 is the result of research conducted by the Information Society Unit of IPTS as part of the CROSSROAD Project - A Participative Roadmap on ICT research on Electronic Governance and Policy Modelling (www.crossroad-eu.net ). After outlining the purpose and scope of the report and the methodological approach followed, the report presents the results of a systematic analysis of societal, policy and research trends in the governance and policy modelling domain in Europe. These analyses are considered central for understanding and roadmapping future research on ICT for governance and policy modelling. The study further illustrates the scenario design framework, analysing current and future challenges in ICT for governance and policy modelling, and identifying the key impact dimensions to be considered. It then presents the scenarios developed at the horizon 2030, including the illustrative storyboards representative of each scenario and the prospective opportunities and risks identified for each of them. The scenarios developed are internally consistent views of what the European governance and policy making system could have become by 2030 and of what the resulting implications for citizens, business and public services would be. Finally, the report draws conclusions and presents the proposed shared vision for Digital Europe 2030, offering also a summary of the main elements to be considered as an input for the future development of the research roadmap on ICT for governance and policy modelling.JRC.DDG.J.4-Information Societ

Mobilising Uncertainties in Air Pollution Science in Copenhagen

In this short article we discuss three different ways of measuring air pollution in Copenhagen, Denmark, in relation to the potential for using technoscientific tools and expertise to influence public policymaking meant to curb pollution. Based upon a mix of data ranging from scientific literature and public reports to interviews with scientific and lay stakeholders, we outline how the introduction of Google’s Project Air View, in combination with an increase in citizen engagement in air pollution, has come to play a key role in the re-invigoration of local concerns over air pollution. Previously, expertise on the city’s air pollution has been the domain of established scientists operating fixed monitoring stations, but this recently stable relation between science and policy is currently being replaced by an assemblage of contrasting views on air pollutants. Our analysis suggests that the measurements of emerging pollutants by Google’s project and by citizens themselves have impelled policymakers in Copenhagen to accept, to engage with and act upon new scientific uncertainties. We see this as giving rise to a degree of humility where emerging modes of knowing air pollution are treated as complementary with established ones