Undelivered risk: A counter-factual analysis of the biosecurity risk avoided by inspecting international mail articles

International mail articles present an important potential vector for biosecurity and other regulatory risk. Border intervention is a key element in Australia’s biosecurity strategy. Arriving international mail articles are inspected and those that are intercepted with biosecurity risk material are documented, including the address to which the article was to be delivered. Knowledge about patterns in the intended destinations of mail article permits more detailed biosecurity intervention. We used geo-location software to identify the delivery address of mail articles intercepted with biosecurity risk material from 2008–2011. We matched these addresses with demographic data that were recorded at a regional level from the Australian Bureau of Statistics 2011 Census and used random forest statistical analyses to correlate various demographic fields at the regional level with the counts of seized mail articles. The analysis of the seizure counts against demographic characteristics suggests a high correlation between having higher numbers of university students that speak a particular language in a region and higher quantities of intercepted mail articles destined for that region. We also explore metropolitan and regional patterns in the destinations of seized materials. These results can be used to provide information on policy and operational actions to try to reduce the rate at which mail articles that contain biosecurity risk material are sent to Australia

The Rise of Russian Soft Power : A media frame analysis of the Russia-based channel RT

In the information age, media has come to be recognized as a credible mean and foreign policy tool to pursue soft power. Authoritarian states like Russia are competing in the realm of ideas through state-funded news outlets such as Russia Today (RT). This by reaching out to global and foreign public spheres and by reporting on an alternative reality of events, issues and problems. This thesis studies the role of the media news outlet RT as a mean to promote Russian soft power. This with a focus on how the channel attempts to persuade and attract an international audience based on the construction of a compelling narrative. To approach this theme empirically, a media frame analysis is conducted utilizing five news frames including; morality, human interest, responsibility, conflict and economic consequences. The overall results suggest that RT attracts and persuades largely by providing an alternative Russian perspective on events, issues or problems. It attracts by appealing both in the direction of the western- and eastern world. It appeals to the west by emphasizing how the West needs Russia to find answers to the pressing issues in global politics. It appeals to the east by suggesting an alternative model of development. RT attempts to persuade are made through the construction of counter-narratives which delegitimizes the Western approach in international affairs. The channel devotes efforts to boost these narratives by selective news porting and handpicking statements made by intellectuals from the perceived “other” western camp

Resistance towards the European Union in mutiple dimensions : A statistical study of which values that drives EU-sceptical opinion in Europe

The purpose of this study is to investigate to what extent skeptical attitudes towards the European Union is driven by materialistic-, postmaterialist values and populism in different parts of Europe. To achieve this aim, the study is based on multivariate regression analysis with data utilized from the European Social survey 2014. The findings show that cultural questions associated with TAN values, such as a nationalistic resistance towards immigration, have the best ability to predict EU-skepticism over economic questions related with a subjective placement on the political left-right scale, or populism associated with a lack of trust in the state of political governance. These findings suggest that the subjective left-right scale do not structure attitudes toward the European Union to a great extent. Instead, the results of this study are in line with scholars that argue that the TAN-GAL scale as well as populism have grown in importance, as these axes of competition are both more linked with opinions on EU. These results hold for all regions in Europe that are examined in this study, although particular strong effects are found in Germany, where populism and TAN values shape attitudes towards EU to the greatest extent

Språkets gränser är förståelsens gränser - en studie om mellanchefens utsatta roll under en organisationsförändring

This study aimed at generating psychological knowledge regarding how the middle manager experiences his/her communicative role during an organizational change. For this purpose, qualitative interviews with several middle managers were conducted at a company located in the south of Sweden. This company had recently gone through an organizational change in which they had merged two different business units into one. The results of the study displayed how the middle managers perceived that both the top management and the subordinates expected them to act several different, and often competing, roles simultaneously during the organizational change. Having to regularly choose where to put their loyalty, this turned out to be challenging for them. Furthermore, the results showed that two separate discourses had developed within the organization, which further complicated the communication, especially during the organizational change. Finally, a discussion regarding possible solutions, such as the consultant, and a democratic leadership style was brought to light. The conclusion was that these means could contribute to a successfully conducted organizational change

The Swype Input MethodDegree Project in Computer Science

Typing is probably always going to be an contemporary topic, with the absolute goal of transferring text between the user and a technical device freely. This report means to examine a typing technique, where user drawn continuous lines on a virtual keyboard get transfered into words, also known as swype. The report concludes that using a fairly simple algorithm combined with a few optimizations, it is possible to implement a swype accurate enough to be considered a realistic alternative to current typing methods on devices with touch screens.Textinmatning kommer troligtvis alltid vara ett aktuellt ämne, där målet är att användaren skall kunna förmedla text till teknisk apparatur obehindrat. Denna rapport undersöker en textinmatningsmetod där kontinuerliga streck på ett tangentbord översätts till ord, även känt som swype . Rapporten finner att det med en förållandevis enkel algoritm och ett fåtal optimeringar är fullt möjligt implementera ett swype tillräckligt nogrannt för att vara ett realistiskt alternativ till nuvarande inmatningsmetoder för enheter med pekskärm

Revised Indicators of Community Vulnerability and Adaptive Capacity Across the Murray-Darling Basin: A Focus on Irrigation in Agriculture

Changes are occurring in rural and regional communities in the Murray-Darling Basin as a result of climate change, water availability, water trading, global markets, population movements and ongoing social change. Impacts of these issues and responses to them by Basin communities will be mediated by their adaptive capacity, resilience and vulnerability to change. The Murray-Darling Basin Authority (MDBA) commissioned this project to measure the vulnerability, resilience and adaptive capacity of Basin communities to changes in water availability - due to a range of factors - in order to inform MDBA planning and decision-making. The aim of the project was to increase understanding of community socioeconomic circumstances in the Murray-Darling Basin and to provide a readily accessible metric with which to compare the vulnerability of communities across the Basin. A set of measures of community vulnerability to changes in water availability was developed, drawing on and adapting the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change framework (Allen Consulting 2005). Composite indices were derived to spatially examine differences across regions and communities and these were mapped for the Basin. The project reports on community vulnerability in two ways. First, community vulnerability before exposure to any water policy intervention (community vulnerability 'before exposure'); and second, exposure to a 2800 gigalitre sustainable diversion limit (SDL) water recovery scenario assuming 2005-06 commodity prices (community vulnerability 'after exposure')