The Automated Administrative State: A Crisis of Legitimacy

The legitimacy of the administrative state is premised on our faith in agency expertise. Despite their extra-constitutional structure, administrative agencies have been on firm footing for a long time in reverence to their critical role in governing a complex, evolving society. They are delegated enormous power because they respond expertly and nimbly to evolving conditions. In recent decades, state and federal agencies have embraced a novel mode of operation: automation. Agencies rely more and more on software and algorithms in carrying out their delegated responsibilities. The automated administrative state, however, is demonstrably riddled with concerns. Legal challenges regarding the denial of benefits and rights from travel to disability-have revealed a pernicious pattern of bizarre and unintelligible outcomes. Scholarship to date has explored the pitfalls of automation with a particular frame, asking how we might ensure that automation honors existing legal commitments such as due process. Missing from the conversation are broader, structural critiques of the legitimacy of agencies that automate. Automation abdicates the expertise and nimbleness that justify the administrative state, undermining the very case for the existence and authority of agencies. Yet the answer is not to deny agencies access to technology that other twenty-first century institutions reply upon. This Article points toward a positive vision of the administrative state that adopts tools only when they enhance, rather than undermine, the underpinnings of agency legitimacy

The Automated Administrative State: A Crisis of Legitimacy

The legitimacy of the administrative state is premised on our faith in agency expertise. Despite their extra-constitutional structure, administrative agencies have been on firm footing for a long time in reverence to their critical role in governing a complex, evolving society. They are delegated enormous power because they respond expertly and nimbly to evolving conditions.In recent decades, state and federal agencies have embraced a novel mode of operation: automation. Agencies rely more and more on software and algorithms in carrying out their delegated responsibilities. The automated administrative state, however, is demonstrably riddled with concerns. Legal challenges regarding the denial of benefits and rights—from travel to disability—have revealed a pernicious pattern of bizarre and unintelligible outcomes.Scholarship to date has explored the pitfalls of automation with a particular frame, asking how we might ensure that automation honors existing legal commitments such as due process. Missing from the conversation are broader, structural critiques of the legitimacy of agencies that automate. Automation throws away the expertise and nimbleness that justify the administrative state, undermining the very case for the existence and authority of agencies.Yet the answer is not to deny agencies access to technology. This article points toward a positive vision of the administrative state that adopts tools only when they enhance, rather than undermine, the underpinnings of agency legitimacy

MMAS Project Synthesis: A Chapter in the MMAS Final Report to the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation

One chapter of the Marine Managed Area Science (MMAS) Final Narrative Report. This document is a technical summary and synthesis of lessons learned under MMAS in its initial five years, under a grant from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation. MMAS encompassed the efforts of 100+ senior investigators working on about 50 related and sometimes overlapping projects. The program evolved gradually as individual projects were sequentially brought on line and woven together over the 5 years. Many MMAS participants saw the program through the eyes of their individual interests. Admittedly, few remained aware of the overarching goals and synthesis objectives of MMAS all the while that they were participants.For that reason, with the close of the grant, this document is part of a series of products that provide an integrated glimpse of the MMAS program, and the insights that it has begun to yiel

A Proposal of a Real Time Economic Sentiment Indicator Based on Twitter and Google Trends for the Spanish Economy

The main aim of this paper is to build a real time economic sentiment indicator (RT-ESI) for Spain, based on text mining and deep learning from Twitter and Google Trends, that can anticipate GDP and household consumer behaviour. This work contributes to the literature, firstly by carrying out a sentiment analysis with a set of selected keywords that are related to emotions and expectations, then we apply a factor analysis to create the composite indi cator, next we use a descriptive analysis to highlight the main associations between indexes, and finally we employ fractional integration and cointegration techniques (ARFIMA and FCVAR) to assess the RT-ESI behaviour against the European Commission´s consumer confidence indicator and the GDP. The results show that the GDP (YoY) presents the same behaviour as ourleading indicator, finding mean reversion. The behaviour of the CCI series differs from the others.post-print288 K

AI, digital identities, biometrics, blockchain: A primer on the use of technology in migration management. Bertelsmann Stiftung Migration Strategy Group on International Cooperation and Development June 2020.

Digitalization and technological change are rapidly transforming every aspect of our societies and economies, and the migration and refugee policy space is no exception. Technology is already affecting migrants, refugees, and people on the move in many ways, but policymakers have yet to systematically address the different uses of technology in the migration management field. The COVID-19 pandemic is likely to accelerate these digitalization processes, making fast policy adaptation crucial. Technological changes range from broader developments, such as increasing digital connectivity in general — via smart or mobile phones, messaging services and web-based applications, or app-based systems — to more tech-centered applications: Karim the Chatbot X2AI i has provided virtual psychotherapy to Syrians in Zaatari refugee camp; AI-powered Free Robot Lawyers is offering legal help to migrants and refugees; and the non-profit REFUNITE (with more than 1 million registered users) helps refugees to find missing family members via mobile phone or a computer. Digital connectivity is providing new options for migrants and refugees to gain access to training or education via online learning platforms and Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), or to services delivered virtually by NGOs, international organizations, or governments. Combined with the global spread of social media use, this connectivity has also created new (dis)information ecosystems in the migration space that policy makers must grapple with