Ungovernable Ships at the End of their Lives and the Response of the Hong Kong Convention: A Critical Appraisal of the Treaty on Ship-breaking from the Perspective of South Asian Ship-breaking Nations

Ungovernable Ships at the End of their Lives and the Response of the Hong Kong Convention: A Critical Appraisal of the Treaty on Ship-breaking from the Perspective of South Asian Ship-breaking Nation

The Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and Their Disposal: A Legal Misfit in Global Ship Recycling Jurisprudence

The Basel Convention has tempted developed nations into the practice of exporting hazardous waste into undeveloped nations’ territories simply for money in the name of recycling. Being extremely business unfriendly, particularly for the recycling industry, this convention has not been welcomed by many developing nations, leading to serious policy and legal uncertainty in those jurisdictions. However, in the absence of any dedicated, enforceable international legal instrument, the Basel Convention currently remains the foundation of ship-recycling jurisprudence in the domestic courts of all dominant, ship-recycling states and the rest of the world, and the basis for curbing the movement of end-of-life ships proceeding to undeveloped states for recycling. Considerable debate exists amongst major stakeholders about the Basel Convention’s application to end-of-life ships. Stakeholders associated with global shipping and the ship-recycling industry, including the governments of ship-owning states, firmly maintain that the Convention does not apply to the cross-border movement of end-of-life ships. On the other side, environmental activists strongly argue that the Convention should regulate end-of-life ships as hazardous waste. Through a doctrinal analysis breaking down key terms and provisions, this article seeks to address the contentious questions on the Basel Convention’s relevance to end-of-life ships and their movement

Application of New Materials and Innovative Detailing for Reinforced Concrete Structures

Confinement enhances mechanical properties of concrete sections specifically its strain capacity thus results is higher displacement capacity for reinforced concrete members. Even though the behavior of concrete confined with external jackets has been extensively investigated in previous studies, the use of rubber-based material as an external confinement is new, and was investigated for the first time in the present study. Thirty concrete cylinders were tested under uniaxial compression to investigate mechanical properties of rubber confined concrete. It was found that rubber does not increase the strength of confined concrete. However, the strain capacity of rubber confined concrete was more than 10%, equal to or higher than reinforcing steel bar tensile strain capacity. This unique property may make this type of confinement a viable retrofit or rehabilitation method to increase the ductility of low ductile members and structures in high seismic regions. Repair of ductile components is often inevitable under strong earthquakes mainly because of concrete failure, significant yielding of reinforcement, or large residual lateral deformations. In this case, the structure needs to be demolished and reconstructed as the repair of reinforced concrete (RC) structures is complex when longitudinal reinforcement of ductile member fractures. External reinforcing bars are capable to increase energy dissipation of rocking columns and frames. Deformed reinforcing steel bars without any reduction of the section enclosed in steel pipes was proposed as external energy dissipaters, entitled as buckling restrained reinforcement (BRR) in the present study. The test results showed that the compressive strain of BRR at the peak stress can exceed 5%, which will be sufficient in most practical cases since the strain of compressive reinforcement in a concrete section is usually controlled by the core concrete strains. Experimental and analytical investigations were carried out on RC beamcolumn specimen under cyclic loading. A nine-story RC building was analyzed and designed as special moment resisting frame (SMRF). A half-scale exterior beamcolumn joint of the first floor of the prototype frame was tested to investigate the seismic behavior of the specimen. The test result showed that the column longitudinal and transverse reinforcement did not yield under the cyclic loading and the damage of column was insignificant. Almost all cracks were formed in the beam and more cracks were observed after drift ratio of 1.46%. The beam longitudinal reinforcing bars yielded then fractured at a high drift ratio (3.5%). The beam-column specimen showed 75% higher lateral drift capacity than the ASCE allowable drift ratio, which was 2% for this building. The test results confirmed that the modern seismic design codes ensure large displacement capacities for SMRF without any premature failure

Gandhi, Guattari and the Decolonization of the Anthropocene

This article examines the relevance of Guattari’s ecosophy and Gandhi’s ecophilosophy to provide an ontological response to environmental (in)justice in the Indian subcontinent in the context of Anthropogenic climate change. Considering what it signifies to live in the Anthropocene, it engages with the Guattarian idea of emancipation and the Gandhian concept of swaraj to understand the ethics of justice in the new climate regime. Through these intellectual encounters, this article develops an ontological framework for addressing the question of human agency in the Anthropocene considering the long history of decolonization in South Asia which was largely shaped by Gandhi’s idea of swaraj. To facilitate engagement across diverse philosophical cultures for the purpose of decolonizing the Anthropocene, this article seeks to understand possible points of alliance between Guattarian ecosophy and Gandhian ecophilosophy. This cross-cultural conversation becomes pertinent when neoliberal capitalism is radically transforming the lives and landscapes of the planet, reconfiguring the registers of what Guattari (2000) has called the three ecologies: namely those of the environment, social relations and human subjectivity. This cross-cultural confluence of philosophical ideas unveils how the ecologies of both humans and nonhumans are globally reconfigured according to the logic of neoliberal capitalism. Therefore, this article seeks to conjoin Guattarian ecosophy and Gandhian ecophilosophy to understand environmental (in)justice in the Indian subcontinent in the context of anthropogenic climate change. Reflecting on Gandhian ideas with the help of Guattarian ecosophy would help us understand the detrimental effects of the colonial Anthropocene. The condition of the Global South is still deeply colonial, which is marked by economic inequality and social injustice. Therefore, engaging with Gandhi and Guattari in the Anthropocene is a task of radical ecological imagination. This article elaborates on this project of radical ecological vision by drawing their philosophical contributions.This article examines the relevance of Guattari’s ecosophy and Gandhi’s ecophilosophy to provide an ontological response to environmental (in)justice in the Indian subcontinent in the context of Anthropogenic climate change. Considering what it signifies to live in the Anthropocene, it engages with the Guattarian idea of emancipation and the Gandhian concept of swaraj to understand the ethics of justice in the new climate regime. Through these intellectual encounters, this article develops an ontological framework for addressing the question of human agency in the Anthropocene considering the long history of decolonization in South Asia which was largely shaped by Gandhi’s idea of swaraj. To facilitate engagement across diverse philosophical cultures for the purpose of decolonizing the Anthropocene, this article seeks to understand possible points of alliance between Guattarian ecosophy and Gandhian ecophilosophy. This cross-cultural conversation becomes pertinent when neoliberal capitalism is radically transforming the lives and landscapes of the planet, reconfiguring the registers of what Guattari (2000) has called the three ecologies: namely those of the environment, social relations and human subjectivity. This cross-cultural confluence of philosophical ideas unveils how the ecologies of both humans and nonhumans are globally reconfigured according to the logic of neoliberal capitalism. Therefore, this article seeks to conjoin Guattarian ecosophy and Gandhian ecophilosophy to understand environmental (in)justice in the Indian subcontinent in the context of anthropogenic climate change. Reflecting on Gandhian ideas with the help of Guattarian ecosophy would help us understand the detrimental effects of the colonial Anthropocene. The condition of the Global South is still deeply colonial, which is marked by economic inequality and social injustice. Therefore, engaging with Gandhi and Guattari in the Anthropocene is a task of radical ecological imagination. This article elaborates on this project of radical ecological vision by drawing their philosophical contributions.This article examines the relevance of Guattari’s ecosophy and Gandhi’s ecophilosophy to provide an ontological response to environmental (in)justice in the Indian subcontinent in the context of Anthropogenic climate change. Considering what it signifies to live in the Anthropocene, it engages with the Guattarian idea of emancipation and the Gandhian concept of swaraj to understand the ethics of justice in the new climate regime. Through these intellectual encounters, this article develops an ontological framework for addressing the question of human agency in the Anthropocene considering the long history of decolonization in South Asia which was largely shaped by Gandhi’s idea of swaraj. To facilitate engagement across diverse philosophical cultures for the purpose of decolonizing the Anthropocene, this article seeks to understand possible points of alliance between Guattarian ecosophy and Gandhian ecophilosophy. This cross-cultural conversation becomes pertinent when neoliberal capitalism is radically transforming the lives and landscapes of the planet, reconfiguring the registers of what Guattari (2000) has called the three ecologies: namely those of the environment, social relations and human subjectivity. This cross-cultural confluence of philosophical ideas unveils how the ecologies of both humans and nonhumans are globally reconfigured according to the logic of neoliberal capitalism. Therefore, this article seeks to conjoin Guattarian ecosophy and Gandhian ecophilosophy to understand environmental (in)justice in the Indian subcontinent in the context of anthropogenic climate change. Reflecting on Gandhian ideas with the help of Guattarian ecosophy would help us understand the detrimental effects of the colonial Anthropocene. The condition of the Global South is still deeply colonial, which is marked by economic inequality and social injustice. Therefore, engaging with Gandhi and Guattari in the Anthropocene is a task of radical ecological imagination. This article elaborates on this project of radical ecological vision by drawing their philosophical contributions

Behavior of Shear Wall with Base Opening

Provision of parking may require an opening to be kept at the base of a shear wall. In this paper, an attempt is made to establish the range of base opening that may be allowed without significantly affecting the strength and stiffness. The behavior of planar and box shear wall with varying percentages of base opening has been studied and compared to that of a shear wall without opening. Finite element package ANSYS has been used for modeling. A set of non-dimensional graphs has been prepared featuring important parameters which will guide the designer to choose an appropriate opening width. It is observed that the rate of decrease of stiffnessis is relatively low for up to 60% base opening. Beyond this limit, strength and stiffness degradations are excessive. Based on the findings of the study, it has been recommended that in high-rise constructions the provision of a base opening up to 50% of the length of the wall may be considered as a feasible optio

Privacy Vulnerabilities in the Practices of Repairing Broken Digital Artifacts in Bangladesh

This paper presents a study on the privacy concerns associated with the practice of repairing broken digital objects in Bangladesh. Historically, repair of old or broken technologies has received less attention in ICTD scholarship than design, development, or use. As a result, the potential privacy risks associated with repair practices have remained mostly unaddressed. This paper describes our three-month long ethnographic study that took place at ten major repair sites in Dhaka, Bangladesh. We show a variety of ways in which the privacy of an individual’s personal data may be compromised during the repair process. We also examine people’s perceptions around privacy in repair, and its connections with their broader social and cultural values. Finally, we discuss the challenges and opportunities for future research to strengthen the repair ecosystem in developing countries. Taken together, our findings contribute to the growing discourse around post-use cycles of technology

Human Activity Recognition from Wi-Fi CSI Data Using Principal Component-Based Wavelet CNN

Human Activity Recognition (HAR) is an emerging technology with several applications in surveillance, security, and healthcare sectors. Noninvasive HAR systems based on Wi-Fi Channel State Information (CSI) signals can be developed leveraging the quick growth of ubiquitous Wi-Fi technologies, and the correlation between CSI dynamics and body motions. In this paper, we propose Principal Component-based Wavelet Convolutional Neural Network (or PCWCNN) -- a novel approach that offers robustness and efficiency for practical real-time applications. Our proposed method incorporates two efficient preprocessing algorithms -- the Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and the Discrete Wavelet Transform (DWT). We employ an adaptive activity segmentation algorithm that is accurate and computationally light. Additionally, we used the Wavelet CNN for classification, which is a deep convolutional network analogous to the well-studied ResNet and DenseNet networks. We empirically show that our proposed PCWCNN model performs very well on a real dataset, outperforming existing approaches.Comment: \c{opyright} 2022. This manuscript version is made available under the CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 license https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0

Drivers' perceptions of unsafe driving behaviors and their countermeasures: a study in Saudi Arabia

There is an increased public concern about the role of aggressive driving and "road rage" in crashes and traffic fatalities. There is no general agreement as to what constitutes aggressive driving. Consequently, the objective of the study was to survey of the perceptions on the specific unsafe driving acts. Perceptions and beliefs of drivers about unsafe and aggressive driving actions and their countermeasures are presented in this paper. The study primarily looked at the wide range of driver attitudes about speeding and other forms of unsafe driving behavior. The study was conducted in Jeddah, the second largest city of Saudi Arabia by interviewing a sample of 300 drivers. The results indicated that the drivers, in general, prefer to drive at higher speeds and could be considered as more aggressive compared to the drivers in the United States. The most dangerous reported driving act was "drive thru red light", followed by "racing another driver". Only 23% of the drivers thought that it was dangerous to drive over 30 km of the legal speed limits. The most often seen unsafe driving action was "speeding (70%), followed by "driving too closely (57%), "failing to use turn signals (53%), "drive inattentively (50%)", and "running red lights (43%)". The main causes of unsafe driving behaviors were "being in a hurry/time pressure (66%)", "aggressive behavior of others (52%)", and "refusing traffic rules (51%)". The countermeasure that was viewed to be the most effective in reducing unsafe driving behaviors was assigning more traffic police officers (66%). The study revealed that, more than half the drivers believed that more frequent ticketing (60%), doubling or tripling fines (54%), and doubling the length of imprisonment (53%) would be effective in reducing unsafe driving behavior