6,356 research outputs found

    On the Generation of Realistic and Robust Counterfactual Explanations for Algorithmic Recourse

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    This recent widespread deployment of machine learning algorithms presents many new challenges. Machine learning algorithms are usually opaque and can be particularly difficult to interpret. When humans are involved, algorithmic and automated decisions can negatively impact people’s lives. Therefore, end users would like to be insured against potential harm. One popular way to achieve this is to provide end users access to algorithmic recourse, which gives end users negatively affected by algorithmic decisions the opportunity to reverse unfavorable decisions, e.g., from a loan denial to a loan acceptance. In this thesis, we design recourse algorithms to meet various end user needs. First, we propose methods for the generation of realistic recourses. We use generative models to suggest recourses likely to occur under the data distribution. To this end, we shift the recourse action from the input space to the generative model’s latent space, allowing to generate counterfactuals that lie in regions with data support. Second, we observe that small changes applied to the recourses prescribed to end users likely invalidate the suggested recourse after being nosily implemented in practice. Motivated by this observation, we design methods for the generation of robust recourses and for assessing the robustness of recourse algorithms to data deletion requests. Third, the lack of a commonly used code-base for counterfactual explanation and algorithmic recourse algorithms and the vast array of evaluation measures in literature make it difficult to compare the per formance of different algorithms. To solve this problem, we provide an open source benchmarking library that streamlines the evaluation process and can be used for benchmarking, rapidly developing new methods, and setting up new experiments. In summary, our work contributes to a more reliable interaction of end users and machine learned models by covering fundamental aspects of the recourse process and suggests new solutions towards generating realistic and robust counterfactual explanations for algorithmic recourse

    Organizing sustainable development

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    The role and meaning of sustainable development have been recognized in the scientific literature for decades. However, there has recently been a dynamic increase in interest in the subject, which results in numerous, in-depth scientific research and publications with an interdisciplinary dimension. This edited volume is a compendium of theoretical knowledge on sustainable development. The context analysed in the publication includes a multi-level and multi-aspect analysis starting from the historical and legal conditions, through elements of the macro level and the micro level, inside the organization. Organizing Sustainable Development offers a systematic and comprehensive theoretical analysis of sustainable development supplemented with practical examples, which will allow obtaining comprehensive knowledge about the meaning and its multi-context application in practice. It shows the latest state of knowledge on the topic and will be of interest to students at an advanced level, academics and reflective practitioners in the fields of sustainable development, management studies, organizational studies and corporate social responsibility

    How do patients and providers navigate the “corruption complex” in mixed health systems? The case of Abuja, Nigeria.

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    INTRODUCTION: Over the last decades, scholars have sought to investigate the causes, manifestations, and impacts of corruption in healthcare. Most of this scholarship has focused on corruption as it occurs in public health facilities. However, in Nigeria, in which most residents attend private health facilities for at least some of their care needs, this focus is incomplete. In such contexts, it is important to understand corruption as it occurs across both public and private settings, and in the interactions between them. This study seeks to address this gap. It aims to examine how corruption is experienced by, and impacts upon, patients and providers as they navigate the “corruption complex” in the mixed health system of Abuja, Nigeria. OBJECTIVES: This over-arching aim is addressed via three interrelated objectives, as follows: 1.To investigate the experiences of patients and providers concerning the causes, manifestations, and impacts of corruption in public health facilities, in Abuja, Nigeria. 2.To investigate patients / provider experiences of corruption as they relate to private health facilities in Abuja, Nigeria. 3.To investigate how, and the extent to which, corruption is enabled by the co-existence of and interactions between public and private health facilities in the context of the mixed health system of Nigeria – and of Abuja in particular. METHODS: All three objectives are addressed via a qualitative exploratory study. Data was collected in Abuja, Nigeria’s Federal Capital Territory (between October 2021 to May 2022) through: (i) in-depth interviews with 53 key informants, representing a range of patient and provider types, and policymakers; and (ii) participant observation over eight months of fieldwork. The research took place in three secondary-level public health facilities (Gwarinpa, Kubwa, and Wuse General hospital) and three equivalent-sized private health facilities (Nissa, Garki, and King's Care Hospital) in Abuja. The empirical data was analysed using Braun and Clarke's (2006) reflexive thematic analysis approach and presented in a narrative form. Abuja was selected as the research setting, as the city is representative of the mixed health system structures that exist in Nigeria, especially in the country’s larger urban areas. RESULTS: Objective 1: Corruption in public health facilities is driven by a shortage of resources, low salaries, commercialisation of health and relationships between patients and providers, and weak accountability structures. Corruption takes various forms which include: bribery, informal payments, theft, influence- activities associated with nepotism, and pressure from informal rules. Impacts include erosion of the right to health care and patient dignity, alongside increased barriers to access, including financial barriers, especially for poorer patients. Objective 2: Corruption in private health facilities is driven by incentives aimed at profit maximisation, poor regulation, and lack of oversight. Corruption takes various forms which include: inappropriate or unnecessary prescriptions (often driven by the potential for kickbacks), forging of medical reports, over-invoicing, and other related types of fraud, and under/over-treatment of patients. Impacts include reductions to the quality of care provided and exacerbation of financial risks to patients. Objective 3: The nature of public-private sector interactions creates scope for several forms of corruption. For example, these interactions contribute to the causes of corruption in the public sector - especially the problem of scarcity of resources. Related manifestations include dual practice, absenteeism, and theft (e.g., diversion of patients, medical supplies, and equipment from public to private facilities). The impacts of such practices include inequities of access, for example, due to delays in and denials of needed services and additional financial barriers encountered in public facilities, alongside reductions to quality of care, pricing transparency and financial protection in private facilities. CONCLUSION: Patients experience corruption in both public and private health facilities in Abuja, Nigeria. The causes, manifestations and impacts of corruption differ across these settings. In the public sector, corruption creates financial and non-financial barriers to care – aggravating inequities of access. In the private health sector, corruption undermines quality of care and exacerbates financial risks. The public-private mix is itself implicated in the problem – giving rise to new opportunities for corruption, to the detriment of patients’ health and welfare. For policymakers in Nigeria to address the problem of corruption, a cross-sectoral approach - inclusive of the full range of providers within the mixed health system – will be required

    UMSL Bulletin 2023-2024

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    The 2023-2024 Bulletin and Course Catalog for the University of Missouri St. Louis.https://irl.umsl.edu/bulletin/1088/thumbnail.jp

    Infrastructuring educational genomics:Associations, architectures and apparatuses

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    Technoscientific transformations in molecular genomics have begun to influence knowledge production in education. Interdisciplinary scientific consortia are seeking to identify ‘genetic influences’ on ‘educationally relevant’ traits, behaviors, and outcomes. This article examines the emerging ‘knowledge infrastructure’ of educational genomics, attending to the assembly and choreography of organizational associations, epistemic architecture, and technoscientific apparatuses implicated in the generation of genomic understandings from masses of bioinformation. As an infrastructure of datafied knowledge production, educational genomics is embedded in data-centered epistemologies and practices which recast educational problems in terms of molecular genetic associations—insights about which are deemed discoverable from digital bioinformation and potentially open to genetically informed interventions in policy and practice. While scientists claim to be ‘opening the black box of the genome’ and its association with educational outcomes, we open the black box of educational genomics itself as a source of emerging scientific authority. Data-intensive educational genomics does not straightforwardly ‘discover’ the biological bases of educationally relevant behaviors and outcomes. Rather, this knowledge infrastructure is also an experimental ‘ontological infrastructure’ supporting particular ways of knowing, understanding, explaining, and intervening in education, and recasting the human subjects of education as being surveyable and predictable through the algorithmic processing of bioinformation

    Online Network Source Optimization with Graph-Kernel MAB

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    We propose Grab-UCB, a graph-kernel multi-arms bandit algorithm to learn online the optimal source placement in large scale networks, such that the reward obtained from a priori unknown network processes is maximized. The uncertainty calls for online learning, which suffers however from the curse of dimensionality. To achieve sample efficiency, we describe the network processes with an adaptive graph dictionary model, which typically leads to sparse spectral representations. This enables a data-efficient learning framework, whose learning rate scales with the dimension of the spectral representation model instead of the one of the network. We then propose Grab-UCB, an online sequential decision strategy that learns the parameters of the spectral representation while optimizing the action strategy. We derive the performance guarantees that depend on network parameters, which further influence the learning curve of the sequential decision strategy We introduce a computationally simplified solving method, Grab-arm-Light, an algorithm that walks along the edges of the polytope representing the objective function. Simulations results show that the proposed online learning algorithm outperforms baseline offline methods that typically separate the learning phase from the testing one. The results confirm the theoretical findings, and further highlight the gain of the proposed online learning strategy in terms of cumulative regret, sample efficiency and computational complexity

    The Developer's Dilemma

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    This book explores this developer’s dilemma or ‘Kuznetsian tension’ between structural transformation and income inequality. Developing countries are seeking economic development—that is, structural transformation—which is inclusive in the sense that it is broad-based and raises the income of all, especially the poor. Thus, inclusive economic growth requires steady, or even falling, income inequality if it is to maximize the growth of incomes at the lower end of the distribution. Yet, this is at odds with Simon Kuznets hypothesis that economic development tends to put upward pressure on income inequality, at least initially and in the absence of countervailing policies. The book asks: what are the types or ‘varieties’ of structural transformation that have been experienced in developing countries? What inequality dynamics are associated with each variety of structural transformation? And what policies have been utilized to manage trade-offs between structural transformation, income inequality, and inclusive growth? The book answers these questions using a comparative case study approach, contrasting nine developing countries while employing a common analytical framework and a set of common datasets across the case studies. The intended intellectual contribution of the book is to provide a comparative analysis of the relationship between structural transformation, income inequality, and inclusive growth; to do so empirically at a regional and national level; and to draw conclusions from the cases on the varieties of structural transformation, their inequality dynamics, and the policies that have been employed to mediate the developer’s dilemma

    Innovation in Energy Security and Long-Term Energy Efficiency Ⅱ

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    The sustainable development of our planet depends on the use of energy. The increasing world population inevitably causes an increase in the demand for energy, which, on the one hand, threatens us with the potential to encounter a shortage of energy supply, and, on the other hand, causes the deterioration of the environment. Therefore, our task is to reduce this demand through different innovative solutions (i.e., both technological and social). Social marketing and economic policies can also play their role by affecting the behavior of households and companies and by causing behavioral change oriented to energy stewardship, with an overall switch to renewable energy resources. This reprint provides a platform for the exchange of a wide range of ideas, which, ultimately, would facilitate driving societies toward long-term energy efficiency

    Acceptability of speed limits and other policy measures in German cities

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    An increasing number of German cities currently demand the Federal Government to empower cities to implement 30 kph speed limits at their own discretion. Setting area-wide 30 kph as the maximum speed, as already installed in many other European cities, could therefore soon become a viable policy option in Germany. This thesis conducts a stated choice (SC) experiment to determine the acceptability of such area-wide standard 30 kph speed limits compared to the acceptability of the expansion of shared space zones, costs for inner-city on-street car parking and public transport ticket fares. Combining the policies as attributes in an unlabeled experiment allows to juxtapose the policies in terms of their relative importance for the respondents’ choice decision. 129 adults from German cities with more than 100,000 inhabitants participated in an online survey during September 2022. The results show that respondents evaluate the introduction of standard 30 kph speed limit in the city center as utility increasing compared to the prevalent status quo with standard 50 kph. Setting a standard 30 kph speed limit in the whole city also has a positive parameter in the base model, but does not significantly influence the respondents’ utility. The expansion of shared space seems to have no relevant effect on the choice decision of respondents. Higher ticket fares for public transport show to be utility decreasing for respondents of this study, whereas an increase in car parking costs is assessed positively. Clear differences in the policy assessment of different subgroups of respondents can be observed. In line with literature, city-wide implementation of a standard 30 kph speed limit shows low acceptability among the group of frequent car users. In turn, voters of mayoral candidates for the Green Party (BĂŒndnis 90/Die GrĂŒnen) or Left Party (Die Linke) expect a positive effect on their personal utility when a standard 30 kph speed limit is established in the whole city or in the city center only. Respondents’ gender does not seem to affect the assessment of 30 kph speed limit policy

    Transforming electrical energy systems towards sustainability in a complex world: the cases of Ontario and Costa Rica

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    Electrical energy systems have been major contributors to sustainability-associated effects, positive and negative, and therefore are considered as key components in pursuing overall sustainability objectives. Conventional electrical energy systems have delivered essential services for human well-being and can play a key role in tackling ongoing threats including growing poverty, climate change effects, and the long-term impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. At the same time, some participants in electrical energy systems at national and local scales have stressed that the conventional design of electrical energy systems requires change to ensure the positive contributions and to reduce socioeconomic and environmental risks. Continuing negative trends including significant contributions to climate change, rising energy costs, deepening inequities, and long-term environmental degradation, have raised concerns and prompted calls for transforming conventional electrical energy systems rapidly and safely. However, due in part to the complexity of electrical energy systems, national and local authorities have struggled to steer their systems towards delivering more consistently positive sustainability-associated effects. Usual approaches to electrical energy system management have sought to improve efficiency, reliability and capacity to meet anticipated demand. They have seldom treated electrical energy systems as potentially important contributors to overall sustainability in principle and in practice. Doing so would entail recognizing electrical energy systems as complex systems with interlinked effects and aiming to maximize the systems’ positive and transformative effects to deliver multiple, mutually reinforcing and overall sustainability gains. The research reported here considered whether and how sustainability-based assessments can be useful tools to fill this gap and advance sustainability objectives in particular plans, projects, and initiatives carried out in electrical energy systems. To aid in responding the main research questions, this dissertation builds and proposes a sustainability-based assessment framework for electrical energy systems that is suitable for application with further specification to the context of different jurisdictions. Use of the framework is illustrated and tested through two case applications – to the electrical energy systems of Ontario and Costa Rica. Building the proposed framework involved a literature review and synthesis of three foundational bodies of knowledge: sustainability in complexity, electrical energy systems and sustainability, and transformations towards sustainability. Further specifying and applying the framework to the context of the two case studies involved carrying out document research and semi-structured interviews with key participants in the electrical energy systems of the two jurisdictions. The resulting sustainability-based assessment framework from this dissertation proposes six main criteria categories that are mutually reinforcing and emphasize minimizing trade-offs scenarios. These are divided into a set of criteria for specification and application to electrical energy system-related projects, plans, and initiatives in different regions. The proposed criteria categories are 1) Climate safety and social-ecological integrity; 2) Intra- and inter-generational equity, accessibility, reliability, and affordability; 3) Cost-effectiveness, resource efficiency and conservation; 4) Democratic and participatory governance; 5) Precaution, modularity and resiliency; and 6) Transformation, integration of multiple positive effects, and minimization of adverse effects. Ontario’s electrical energy system has significant sustainability-related challenges to overcome. The case study has shown that there is little provincial interest in following national net-zero commitments and authorities have removed official requirements for long-term energy planning to pursue climate goals and related sustainability objectives. Rising electricity prices have also raised concerns for many years and have been accompanied by limited willingness to engage in democratic and participatory processes for public review of electrical energy system undertakings. Additionally, recent commitments to highly expensive and risky options can further aggravate long-term socioeconomic and environmental negative impacts. In the Costa Rica case, adopting technocentric approaches to electrical energy system management led to a path dependency on large hydroelectricity development. This background of development of large hydroelectricity projects, without public consultation, has also created a sustained context of tension between governments, Indigenous groups and local communities, and private actors. Since the country is expected to experience changes in natural systems’ patterns including intensified periods of hurricane, storm, flood, and drought, the strong reliance on hydroelectricity has at the same time raised concerns regarding the reliability of the national electrical energy system. Both Ontario and Costa Rica have electrical energy systems that require rapid responses to contribute more positively to sustainability, and to help to reduce and reverse ongoing social and environmental crises. The two cases are also suitably contrasting venues for specification and application of the sustainability-based assessment framework developed in this work. The findings showed that while Ontario and Costa Rica have different contextual characteristics (e.g., geographical, socioeconomic, and political), overall lessons can be learned for best designing electrical energy systems in different jurisdictions. The findings also revealed that context-specific sustainability approaches do not necessarily undermine the viability for comparing multiple cases. In fact, specification to context can support comparisons by facilitating the identification of similarities and differences that are closely tied to contextual characteristics. Overall, the study of the two cases indicates significant potential for future works that focus on the specification to context and application of sustainability-based assessments specified to electrical energy systems that seek for barriers and opportunities for unlocking transformative effects. Three key learnings were revealed by building, specifying to context, and applying the sustainability-based assessment framework in a comparative analysis of the electrical energy systems of Ontario and Costa Rica. First, the two jurisdictions require implementation of more effective options to minimize costs in electrical energy system operations and avoid economic risks that undermine the capacity of the system to provide affordable electricity for all. Second, efforts to meet democratic and participatory governance requirements have been insufficient in Ontario and Costa Rica. Both jurisdictions need to demonstrate the capacity to respect official processes for public approval and to ensure adequate representation of different actors’ interests. Particularly, Indigenous people, local communities, and other groups with limited influence need more meaningful inclusion in official decision-making. Third, the two jurisdictions would benefit from implementing strategies to identify and assess possible combinations of policy and technical pathways that could help to unlock an existing dependency on options that support system rigidity. The core overall conclusion is that application of the proposed sustainability-based assessment framework can inform better design electrical energy systems to deliver broader sustainability-related effects and advance transformations towards sustainability. However, the framework could be further developed by including insights from more key participants in electrical energy systems. The criteria set can be honed with specification to context and application to different jurisdictions, and to more particular initiatives that reflect evolving energy scenarios. Inclusion of transformation, integration of multiple positive effects, and minimization of adverse effects as a criteria category has been helpful to recognize political contexts, promote just transitions, and emphasize the interlinked effects of applying the rest of the criteria. Since this is a new component in sustainability-based assessment frameworks, the transformation criteria category will require particular attention in future applications. Among other matters, further work in the field of electrical energy systems transformation towards sustainability should also address continuing and emerging phenomena, including adverse political trends such as right-wing populism and post-truth politics, that would maintain gaps between current practices and the steps needed for progress towards sustainability. Generally, however, while there are many needs and opportunities for more applications of the framework and additional research into the barriers to and openings for energy system transition and transformation, the sustainability-based assessment framework proposed and tested in this dissertation research should be a useful tool for directing change in complex electrical energy systems towards broader contributions to sustainability
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