Information-based agency

Successful negotiators look beyond a purely utilitarian view. We propose a new agent architecture that integrates the utilitarian, information, and semantic views allowing the definition of strategies that take these three dimensions into account. Information-based agency values the information in dialogues in the context of a communication language based on a structured ontology and on the notion of commitment. This abstraction unifies measures such as trust, reputation, and reliability in a single framework

Overcoming restrictive technologies in police call centres: A human agency perspective

Call centres in the police force are restrictive information systems which tend to present call operators with constraints that they need to overcome using their experience in order to offer better services to the public. This paper is looking at how elements of human agency come in to play and help users’ enactment against restrictive technologies. Information systems research on human agency has been mainly focused on the examination of whether agency lies within human or machines or both while in this paper we take a different approach and we clearly describe how human agency is enacted in practice. We use empirical data from contact centres and operational rooms of five UK police forces. After extensive observations we present how police call handlers manipulate digital information efficiently through human agency. The theoretical framework is based on the three elements of agency theory (iteration, projectivity and practical evaluation) The research findings assert that call handlers overcome the restrictions of the system by forming human-digital networks and using mental structures from their past experience in order to cope with the task at hand. The paper concludes by drawing implications for theory and practice and suggests future research directions

The Cost of Rational Agency

The rational agency assumption limits systems to domains of application that have never been observed. Moreover, representing agents as being rational in the sense of maximising utility subject to some well specified constraints renders software systems virtually unscalable. These properties of the rational agency assumption are shown to be unnecessary in representations or analogies of markets. The demonstration starts with an analysis of how the rational agency assumption limits the applicability and scalability of the IBM information filetering economy. An unrestricted specification of the information filtering economy is developed from an analysis of the properties of markets as systems and the implementation of a model based on intelligent agents. This extended information filtering economy modelis used to test the analytical results on the scope for agents to act as intermediaries between human users and information sources

Endogenous Information Structures in Conservation Contracting

Landowners are commonly not only better informed about their private cost of conservation than conservation agencies, but also frequently in a position to spend resources on improving their knowledge about contract-relevant parameters before signing a contract on offer. We extend and generalize the literature on conservation contracting by endogenizing the information structure in a setting where the conservation agency is both asymmetrically informed about the efficiency of the landowner and unable to observe whether the landowner collects information after being offered the contract and before signing it. In this setting, we study the optimal contract the conservation agency should offer to the landowner conditional on the cost of information collection. This contract needs to balance moral hazard and adverse selection problems since by encouraging a landowner to collect information, the conservation agency simultaneously increases the landowner's incentive to misreport his 'type'. We term this the 'information rent effect'. Due to its presence, the terms of conservation contracts have to be significantly altered relative to a contract offered based on exogenous information structure or a contract based purely on information collection.

Evidence-Based Practice and the Use of Information in State Agency Decision-Making

The contemporary policy environment makes persistent demands on agency officials to use the best information available when making decisions about policies, programs, and practices. State and federal legislation calls on agencies to incorporate evidence-based practices in their programs. Using data from a 2008 survey of state agency administrators, we examine the extent to which state government agencies draw upon various sources of information to guide their decisions about programmatic operations. Our findings reveal the extent to which agencies rely on, or weight, scientific studies and formal evaluations compared to other sources. The paper offers new insights into the use of information, particularly scientific evidence, in state agency decision-making, offering the first systematic look at how widely such information is used.

Preserving a combat commander’s moral agency: The Vincennes Incident as a Chinese Room

We argue that a command and control system can undermine a commander’s moral agency if it causes him/her to process information in a purely syntactic manner, or if it precludes him/her from ascertaining the truth of that information. Our case is based on the resemblance between a commander’s circumstances and the protagonist in Searle’s Chinese Room, together with a careful reading of Aristotle’s notions of ‘compulsory’ and ‘ignorance’. We further substantiate our case by considering the Vincennes Incident, when the crew of a warship mistakenly shot down a civilian airliner. To support a combat commander’s moral agency, designers should strive for systems that help commanders and command teams to think and manipulate information at the level of meaning. ‘Down conversions’ of information from meaning to symbols must be adequately recovered by ‘up conversions’, and commanders must be able to check that their sensors are working and are being used correctly. Meanwhile ethicists should establish a mechanism that tracks the potential moral implications of choices in a system’s design and intended operation. Finally we highlight a gap in normative ethics, in that we have ways to deny moral agency, but not to affirm it

Using Kaplan – Meier curves for preliminary evaluation the duration of unemployment spells

In this study we present the results of basic data analysis of the duration of unemployment spells in Gorj County using Kaplan – Meier curves The database includes individual information about all the subjects registered at the county agency of Gorj county during January 1st, 2002- August 31st, 2006. The database has individual information about all the subjects registered at NAE during January 1, 2002 - August 31, 2006. Statistical data analysis as part of the ASO project “The role of education for duration of unemployment”, is based on data offered by the National Agency for Employment of Romania (NAE) and was made with SPSS for Windows V. 10. 0.5.

The structures and the role of an international agency for the control of satellites

Legal questions involved in the liability of a proposed agency which would control internationally owned satellites for monitoring worldwide compliance with arms control agreements are discussed. Difficulties in acquiring the signed consent of all the relevant nations, and guaranteeing satisfactory compliance with the terms of such an agreement are noted. Additional problems to be solved comprise the construction of the ground based facilities and the satellites, the funding for the venture, and the reconciliation of the functions of the proposed agency with the sovereignty of individual states. The agency would gather, treat, and format data for signatories of arms control agreements and provide technical assistance in crisis conditions. It is concluded that the existence and functioning of the agency would reduce the amount of classified information and would consequently reduce the level of international tensions