BCS 100 Module 8: Stewardship of Resources & Sustainable Development

This module will give you a brief overview of renewable and non-renewable resources, resource exploitation and stewardship challenges. It is important to focus on analytical concepts and approaches to problem solving because it will enable you to gain an essential understanding of how to manage resource extraction and resource use and the resulting environmental effects. We will also use an interdisciplinary approach in presenting the concepts in this module. That is to say, we use many different disciplines to explain resource extraction and management. The module begins by briefly explaining the distinction between renewable and non-renewable natural resources in the context of common property, and the differences in how resources are managed. The module then examines three different resource management models, international cooperation, and constraints to implementing international policy at the local level

The impact of level of documentation on the accessibility and affordability of new drugs in Norway

Introduction: Over the preceding decade, an increasing number of drugs have been approved by the European Medicines Agency (EMA) with limited knowledge of their relative efficacy. This is due to the utilization of non-randomized, single-arm studies, surrogate endpoints, and shorter follow-up time. The impact of this trend on the accessibility and affordability of newly approved drugs in Europe remains uncertain. The primary objective of this study is to provide insights into the issues of accessibility and affordability of new drugs in the Norwegian healthcare system.Method: The presented study entails an analysis of all reimbursement decisions for hospital drugs in Norway spanning 2021–2022. The included drugs were approved by the EMA between 2014 and 2022, with the majority (91%) receiving approval between 2018 and 2022. The drugs were categorized based on the level of documentation of relative efficacy. Approval rates and costs (confidential net-prices) were compared.Results: A total of 35% (70/199) of the reimbursement decisions were characterized by limited certainty regarding relative efficacy and as a consequence the Norwegian Health Technology Assessment (HTA) body did not present an incremental cost-effectiveness ratio (ICER) in the HTA report. Within this category, a lower percentage of drugs (47%) gained reimbursement approval compared to those with a higher certainty level, which were presented with an ICER (58%). On average, drugs with an established relative efficacy were accepted with a 4.4-fold higher cost (confidential net-prices). These trends persisted when specifically examining oncology drugs.Conclusion: Our study underscores that a substantial number of recently introduced drugs receive reimbursement regardless of the level of certainty concerning relative efficacy. However, the results suggest that payers prioritize documented over potential efficacy. Given that updated information on relative efficacy may emerge post-market access, a potential solution to address challenges related to accessibility and affordability in Europe could involve an increased adoption of market entry agreements. These agreements could allow for price adjustments after the presentation of new knowledge regarding relative efficacy, potentially resolving some of the current challenges

FORSKJELLER I FORSKRIVNING AV LEGEMIDLER UNDER FORETRUKKET LEGEMIDDELORDNING : En helseøkonomisk analyse av forskrivninger av annengenerasjons antishistaminer

1. mai 2006 ble foretrukket legemiddelordning innført på terapiområdene allergi og elveblest, og ordningen inkluderte alle annengenerasjons antihistaminer i tablettform. Ordningen ble innført som en reaksjon på store forskjeller i pris, og samtidig små forskjeller i kliniske effekter mellom de ulike preparatene. I to omganger etter at ordningen var innført foretok NAV Helsetjenesteforvaltningen to blåreseptkontroller for å undersøke etterlevelsen av det nye reglementet. Kontrollene viste skuffende resultater, og i den første rapporten var refusjonsvilkårene ikke oppfylt i 89 % av tilfellene. Den andre rapporten viste liten bedring, men refusjonsvilkårene var fortsatt ikke oppfylt i 77 % av tilfellene. Målet med denne oppgaven var å undersøke om det finnes ulike karakteristika ved forskriver, pasient eller forskrivningssituasjon som øker sannsynligheten for at en forskrivning ikke overholder refusjonsvilkårene. Oppgaven undersøkte pasient og forskrivers kjønn og alder, i tillegg til forskrivningshistorikk, om ordinasjonen gjaldt forskrivning til fastlegens egen listepasient, og om forskriver opplevde pasientknapphet. I bakgrunnsrapporten ble forskning gjort på fastlegeordningen belyst, og denne viser at fastleger har økonomiske insentiver til å bli populære og således skaffe seg flere pasienter på sin pasientliste. Det kommer også frem at flere leger på grunn av dette i større grad forsøker å unngå konfliktsituasjoner med sine pasienter. En sentral hypotese som testes i denne oppgaven er hvorvidt leger med pasientknapphet i større grad en leger uten pasientknapphet forskriver et ikke-foretrukket legemiddel på blå resept. Dette fordi mange pasienter før innføring av ordningen opplevde god behandling av et legemiddel som etter innføringen av ordningen, ikke ble blant de foretrukne preparater. Resultater fra regresjonsanalyser med forskrivning av et ikke-foretrukket legemiddel på blå resept som avhengig variabel, tyder på at forskrivningshistorikk er en av de viktigste enkeltfaktorene som påvirker sannsynligheten for å forskrive et ikke foretrukket legemiddel på blå resept, med en oddsrate på 17. Disse resultatene var i overensstemmelse med det vi forventet å finne. I tillegg tyder resultatene fra regresjonsanalysene på at leger med pasientknapphet hadde en signifikant høyere odds for å forskrive et ikke-foretrukket legemiddel på blå resept, sammenliknet med leger som ikke opplevde pasientknapphet. Dette var også et funn som kunne forventes ut i fra bakgrunnslitteratur. Det ble også funnet signifikante resultater når det gjelder pasientens kjønn og alder i tillegg til hvorvidt ordinasjonen gjaldt forskrivning til en av legens egne listepasienter eller ikke

Fra forsker til fredsforkjemper: Fridtjof Nansens syn på krig og fred

Denne avhandlingen er en empirisk analyse av Fridtjof Nansens syn på krig og fred. Med utgangspunkt i problemstillingen «endrer Fridtjof Nansen syn på både krig og fred?», tar oppgaven sikte på å avdekke utviklingen i Nansens syn på krig og fred i løpet av livet. Det analytiske verktøyet er kildekritikken, og ved hjelp av denne, undersøker jeg Nansens artikler, brev, taler og utdrag fra dagbøker i søken etter Nansens krigs og fredsforståelse før, under og etter første verdenskrig. Med tre hypoteser som drivkraft, avdekker analysen en nokså kraftig endring i Nansens syn på krig, og finner tendenser til endring i synet på fred fra en negativ til en mer positiv fredsdefinisjon. Flere forfattere hevder at Fridtjof Nansen har et sosialdarwinistisk verdenssyn. Derfor benytter jeg et kontinuum med Friedrich von Bernhardi og Norman Angell som ytterpunkter for å nyansere bildet av Nansen og hans syn på krig og fred

A Farewell to Conventional Weapons? A case study of the Government Pension Fund Global’s investments in conventional arms industry.

The Norwegian Government Pension Fund Global (GPFG) is the largest sovereign welfare fund in the world, invested in more than 9,000 companies globally. Because GPFG is owned by the Norwegian state, overlapping consensus is an important pillar in the Fund’s standard. However, GPFG’s investments in conventional arms producing companies have received criticism from media and NGOs for the last two years, accusing the investments of not reflecting Norwegian values, or for being in accordance with international agreements and the Fund’s ethical guidelines. The aim of the thesis is therefore to disclose whether the investments in arms industry weakens the Fund’s overlapping consensus. Therefore, this thesis research question is “Does the GPFG’s investments in arms producing companies weaken the overlapping consensus between the Fund and Norwegian citizens, the Funds ultimate owners, by violating national law, international agreements and/or ethical codes of conduct?” Drawing on CSR and SRI-literature, organisational theory and theoretical perspectives on how state-ownership influence corporate behaviour, I develop five expectations to guide the thesis’ analysis. To gather data I use triangulation, combining semi-structured interviews and document analysis, with GPFG serving as the only case. However, I draw comparative lines to Norwegian private funds. The paper concludes that the overlapping consensus is weakened by investing in international arms industry, but not because GPFG is violating institutional framework. It is weakened because the institutional framework lacks clarity and does not reflect Norwegian values. I suggest that the ethical guidelines should be changed in accordance with the Norwegian export control system and remove all room for interpretation

Innvandreres holdninger i politiske saker og deres partivalg: En kvantitativ studie av hvordan innvandrere i Norge sine holdninger i noen politiske saker kan forklare deres tendens til å stemme på partier på venstresiden i norsk politikk.

Hensikten med denne oppgaven er å undersøke og få innsikt i innvandreres stemmemønster og forsøke å avdekke hvorvidt holdninger til politiske spørsmål og i ideologiske dimensjoner forklarer dette. Vi starter med problemstillingen: Har innvandrere andre holdninger enn etniske nordmenn, og forklarer dette at innvandrere tenderer til å stemme på partiene på venstresiden i norsk politikk i større grad enn etniske nordmenn? For å svare på problemstillingen gjennomfører vi lineære regresjonsanalyser som belyser innvandreres posisjon i politiske spørsmål sammenlignet med etniske nordmenn, samt hvorvidt innvandreres holdninger er årsak til at de er mer tilbøyelige til å stemme på venstrepartier enn etniske nordmenn. Analysen bygger på datasett fra European Social Survey, samt teori innenfor saksstemmegiving (issue voting), tidligere forskning innenfor feltet og ideologiske dimensjoner i Norge. Det konkluderes med at innvandrere og etniske nordmenns holdninger skiller seg fra hverandre i alle de politiske sakene som undersøkes, men at holdninger til politiske saker kun kan forklare deler av innvandreres stemmemønster og at det trolig er andre faktorer som har større forklaringskraft. En analyse av holdninger til politiske saker kan på denne måten bidra til å avdekke politiske sakers rolle i velgeres, spesielt innvandrere i Norge sitt partivalg. Videre pekes det på hvordan noen saker kan ha større betydning for partivalg enn andre, samt diskuteres teorien om nærhetsstemmings forklaringskraft i en norsk sammenheng

New priorities – different decisions? How would the new prioritization guidelines proposed by the Norheim committee affect decision making when financing drugs in Norway?

Abstract Background: The set of prioritization criteria in the Norwegian health care is about to be changed again. This master thesis set forth to elaborate what would happen if some of the new proposed changes to prioritization suggested by the Norheim report replace the existing guidelines on decision-making in relation to the financing of drugs. Which types of drugs would or would not gain public reimbursement, and why? Methods: By looking at economic evaluations and decisions for six drugs, I try to show trends and consequences that might come as a result for future decisions by following some of the concrete suggested changes in the Norheim report. I investigate proposed changes to discounting, severity and thresholds. The reports produced by NoMA are detailed and by also accessing the underlying material for the analysis, I were able to make quite precise changes to former economic evaluations. Results: Based on the recalculation and reevaluation, I expected the recommendation of public financing of the drugs to change in one of the cases, and possibly change for two of the drugs, depending of interpretation and practical use of Norheim. Changing the discount rate from 4 % to 0 % for health effects reduced the ICER in all of the six cases. The analysis showed that when comparing the ranking of the six drugs in regards to severity, absolute shortfall was closer to health loss, than was proportional shortfall. Conclusions: By these six cases, I believe that changing from existing prioritization criteria and operationalization to Norheim’s proposals could have some implications. Whether these implications are desirable or not, needs to be debated

Why follow norms? : a pluralist approach to justification

In this thesis I try to develop a partial theory of normativity and justification. In the first part of the thesis I try to explore the possibility of what I call ’normative pluralism’, a position which holds that there exists a plurality of fundamental normative concepts. I argue that this plurality arises because all oughts and reasons are necessarily relative to some normative standard, and there exists a plurality of these normative standards. Examples of such standards are morality and prudence, but there could be many more. Each of these standards is genuinely normative and consists of criteria that contribute to determine what one ought. These standards are also held to be incommensurable. Throughout the thesis I also argue against the common monistic view of normativity which holds that there is only one fundamental normative concept (usually the concept of ’ought-all-things-considered’). This view is represented by the writings of John Broome, Ralph Wedgwood, and Niko Kolodny. I argue that this view is forced to make some difficult trade-offs with regard to the question of what considerations are normative, and that it therefore has unintuitive consequences. Against the concern over how well the theory I defend would encompass practical reasoning, I try to work out an alternative conception of practical reasoning based on an account given by Joseph Raz. In the last part of the thesis I examine normative pluralism’s implications for justification. I argue that there are many types of justification, and that the standard of morality does not need some extramoral justification, as externalists about moral reasons believe. This means that moral norms are internally justified, and that the question of ‘why follow moral norms?’ should be answered on specifically moral grounds

Procedural Generation of a 3D Terrain Model Based on a Predefined Road Mesh

This thesis studies procedural generation as a method for generating a realistic terrain model, that will be used as a part of a virtual environment for testing the cameras of autonomous vehicles. The project was done in collaboration with Volvo Cars, and resulted in software that was able to generate a terrain model with only a mesh representing a road as input according to the customer’s requirements. Specifically, the purpose of the thesis was to develop software that was able to fit the generated terrain model to a road, place ditches alongside it, make the terrain model surrounding the road resemble a hilly landscape, and decide what type of terrain each mesh should represent. The functionality to base the look of the terrain model on real world height data was also implemented. Radial basis function interpolation was used to fit the terrain model to the road, and Perlin noise, Simplex noise, and Worley noise were used to modify the topography of the terrain model. The ditches were created by projecting parts of the terrain model to fit a cylindrical shape, and the type of terrain a mesh should represent is based on the distance between the mesh and the road. The end result shows that it is possible to use procedural generation to create realistic terrain models, and the generated models can be used as a part of virtual testing environments. However, the software is more a proof of concept than a finished solution, and there are several areas in need of improvement such as implementing support for more terrain types, being able to use more than one noise map, and improving how the ditches interact with noise. For future research Volvo Cars has expressed interest in expanding the scope of the product to allow for generation of suburban areas, as well as mountains and include support for tunnels

Virtuella strukturer : Hur påverkar digitala verktyg förutsättningarna för intern kommunikation och ledarskap?

Syfte: Syftet med studien är att identifiera organisationers virtuella strukturer och hur de används i organisationerna, för att skapa en förståelse för vilken betydelse digitala verktyg har för organisationers interna kommunikation. Dessutom vill vi också öka förståelsen för hur implementeringen av dessa digitala verktyg för intern kommunikation i organisationer påverkar förutsättningarna för hur ledarskap kan bedrivas. Metod: Uppsatsen är en kvalitativ studie, där intervjuer med sex respondenter från sex olika organisationer ligger som grund för det empiriska materialet. Resultat: Vi fann att den virtuella strukturen i organisationer är av stor betydelse för den interna kommunikationen. Den virtuella strukturen består av flera olika komponenter, och de viktigaste är E-mail, intranät och Lync och organisationerna bedriver största delen av sin kommunikation med hjälp av den virtuella strukturen. Ledare har goda förutsättningar att använda de olika verktygen för att kommunicera och den virtuella strukturen ger framförallt förutsättningar som möjliggör ett kommunikativt och transformativt ledarskap. Det är viktigt att man planerar strategiskt för och integrerar den virtuella strukturen, precis som man planerar för den interna kommunikationen på ett strategiskt plan. Vi konstaterar att en organisations interna kommunikation påverkas positivt av en väl implementerad virtuell struktur. The purpose of this study is to identify the virtual structures in organisations, and how they are being applied in order to create an understanding of the level of importance these digital tools have for the organizations internal communication. We also want to increase the understanding concerning how this implementation of digital tools affects the conditions for how leadership can be conducted. This essay is a qualitative study, where six different interviews, with six different organisations, lay the foundation for our material. The result showed that the virtual structure is of great importance for the internal communication. The virtual structure consists of many different components, where the most important ones are e-mail, intranet and Lync and the organisations internal communication is mostly build by this virtual structure. The leaders of the organisations have good conditions for using these different tools for communication, and the virtual structure provides them with tools for developing a communicative and transformal leadership. It is important to strategically plan and integrate the virtual structure, just like you plan for the internal communication on a strategic level. We state that an organisations internal communication is positivily affected by implementing a virtual structure.