Does computerisation reduce PDS leakage? Lessons from Karnataka

Silvia Masiero discusses recent research into how computerisation can detect and prevent leakage from the Public Distribution System, which is used to dispense rations allocated under the National Food Security Act. She writes that although the system has helped to disincentivise cheating among ration dealers, problems remain. Firstly, technology prevents erroneous inclusion, but can do little towards the exclusion of the needful. Secondly, it monitors ration dealers’ behaviour but it cannot remove the incentive to divert rations in a scenario of non-profitability

Jan Dhan Yojana, Aadhaar, mobile platforms: an anti-poverty system in peril?

Silvia Masiero discusses the usage of the JAM trinity (Jan Dhan Yojana, Aadhaar, and mobile platforms) in the prospected move from existing anti-poverty programmes to a system based on cash transfers

Food security and the politics of service computerisation in Karnataka

Silvia Masiero explores the computerisation of the Public Distribution System (PDS) in Karnataka, and details the assumptions and food security policy that is being advanced by the adoption of technology

Industrial policy for development? Causes, mechanisms and consequences of industrial policy across the world

Dr Silvia Masiero, Research Fellow in the Department of International Development, writes on the 2015 Development Debate featuring Professor Robert Wade and Professor Francesco Caselli

Demonetisation and information poverty: insights from slum areas in Bangalore and Mumbai

Drawing on her ongoing fieldwork in slum areas of Bangalore and Mumbai, Silvia Masiero argues that information poverty increases hardship for the poor and vulnerable facing demonetisation. She observes, however, that the unbanked poor are those who hold the most valuable information about the real effects of the Government’s move towards a cashless economy

UID/Aadhar and the PDS: what new technologies mean for India’s food security system

Silvia Masiero examines how the introduction of UID/Aadhar will enable the substitution of India’s Public Distribution System with a market-regulated network, and what that means for food security

Digital Humanitarianism: A Critical Discourse Analysis

Early works in the field of Information and Communication Technology for Development (ICT4D) saw the state as central in designing and implementing development policy. Over time, this assumption has been questioned by recognition of the role played by non-state actors, private and supranational, in building and enacting development schemes. In the sub-domain of digital humanitarianism, private entities – especially, technology vendors partnering with national and supranational bodies – shape the implementation of humanitarian programmes in substantial ways. To understand the objectives informing private vendors’ action in digital humanitarianism, this paper conducts Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) on a dataset of public sources (2019-2023) from vendors of biometric technologies that moved into humanitarianism. Identifying the discourses of mapping, providing and empowering as central to vendors’ narratives, the paper illuminates how private technology vendors participate in digital humanitarianism, and provides the basis for problematising the vendors’ discourse

Transforming state-citizen relations in food security schemes : the computerized ration card management system in Kerala

In this paper we look at the application of ICTs to the improvement of state-citizen relations in a developing country context. Our argument is that, to maximise responsiveness of the government, ICTs need to target the structural problems in state-citizen relations, from which unresponsiveness of the state to citizens is generated. Failure, as portrayed here, arises from the fact that ICTs, rather than being used for tackling the causes of issues in government responsiveness, tend to be conceived and utilised primarily as a means for acquiring political consensus. This argument is illustrated through a case study of computerisation of the ration card procedure in the southern Indian state of Kerala, where a typical problem of state unresponsiveness – mirrored by a burgeoning amount of unattended ration card applications – is matched by a typical e-government solution, i.e. digitalisation of the process of document release. Our case study reveals that, while the structural problems of the process of ration card delivery in Kerala lie within two crucial nodes, namely poverty status determination and verification of applications, the digital solution devised by the government addresses predominantly the front-end, politically appealing node constituted by citizen application for a ration card. This strategy, which leaves untouched the crucial nodes of state unresponsiveness, turns out in citizen dissatisfaction on the long run. Implications are both theoretical, as a cause for failure is identified and deconstructed in the domain of ICT4D, and practical, as an orientation to structural problems is recommended for policymakers that engage in ICT-based government reform. Keywords: e-governance; food security; public distribution system; ration card; computerization; Kerala JEl Classification: O20, O33; O3

R. K. Luneburg's approach to Geometrical Optics

openLa tesi discute l'approccio di R. K. Luneburg all'ottica geometrica. In particolare, vengono ricavate l'equazione che descrive l'evoluzione di un campo elettromagnetico nello spazio e l'equazione iconale.In this work it is treated the R. K. Luneburg's approach to geometrical optics. In particular, the equation which describes the evolution of an electromagnetic field in space and the eikonal equation are derived

Digital Identity Platforms: A Data Justice Perspective

Digital identity platforms, designed to enable secure and unique authentication of users, are widely depicted as a means to strengthen public service systems. Yet, this vision is questioned by studies illuminating how digital authentication results in exclusions, data violations and other forms of harm generated on users. This paper contributes a vision of digital identity inspired by the concept of data justice, which views data in terms of the fairness with which users are seen, represented and treated. Drawing on a data justice framework, we study a dataset of web sources (2021-2022) in terms of the legal, informational and design-related forms of injustice stemming from digital identification. By doing so we contribute to the emerging literature on digital identity, offering a conceptual lens to understand and ultimately combat the injustice generated through it