Developing government policies for distance education: lessons learnt from two Sri Lankan case studies

Education, especially higher education, is considered vital for maintaining national and individual competitiveness in the global knowledge economy. Following the introduction of its “Free Education Policy” as early as 1947, Sri Lanka is now the best performer in basic education in the South Asian region, with a remarkable record in terms of high literacy rates and the achievement of universal primary education. However, access to tertiary education is a bottleneck, due to an acute shortage of university places. In an attempt to address this problem, the government of Sri Lanka has invested heavily in information and communications technologies (ICTs) for distance education. Although this has resulted in some improvement, the authors of this article identify several barriers which are still impeding successful participation for the majority of Sri Lankans wanting to study at tertiary level. These impediments include the lack of infrastructure/resources, low English language proficiency, weak digital literacy, poor quality of materials and insufficient provision of student support. In the hope that future implementations of ICT-enabled education programmes can avoid repeating the mistakes identified by their research in this Sri Lankan case, the authors conclude their paper with a list of suggested policy options.

A battle of elephants: (I)legitimate ethical voices?

In this paper, we aim to distil myriad stakeholder voices through a Foucaudian theoretical apparatus in the establishment of ethical stakeholder voices amidst a takeover of a Ghanaian National Bank with ownership control by the state National Pension Fund and Insurance Company. Resonating with Foucault’s position that, the prove and an actual practice of ethical principles despite risk is non-existent within a democracy, this paper reveals how stakeholders in a takeover further their own interest to the neglect of the very germane societal expectation of a salient stakeholder role. We further fill an existing gap within the stakeholder literature that posit of stakeholders as always possessing the right and ethical voices. We conclude that, despite Foucault’s last lecture of The Courage of Truth: The Government of the Self and others having proven of a robust apparatus in distilling ethical voices from non-ethical within the realm of a democratic field, its idealist nature demands a counterfactual position.

State capitalism and social responsibility in China's banking industry

China’s financial system has experienced a series of major reforms in recent years. Efforts have been made towards introducing the shareholding system in state-owned commercial banks, restructuring of securities firms, re-organising equity of joint venture insurance companies, further improving the corporate governance structure, managing financial risks and ultimately establishing a system to protect investors (Xinhua, 2010). Financial product innovation, with the further opening up of financial markets and the development of the insurance and bond market, has increased liquidity as well as reduced financial risks. The U.S. subprime crisis indicated the benefit of financial innovations for the economy, but without proper control, they may lead to unexpected consequences. Kirkpatrick (2009) argues that failures and weaknesses in corporate governance arrangements and insufficient accounting standards and regulatory requirements attributed to the financial crisis. Similar to the financial crises of the last decade, the global financial crisis which sparked in 2008, surfaced a variety of significant corporate governance failures: the dysfunction of market mechanisms, the lack of transparency and accountability, misaligned compensation arrangements and the late response of government, all which encouraged management short-termism, poor risk management, as well as some fraudulent schemes. The unique characteristics of the Chinese banking system are an interesting point for studying post-crisis corporate governance reform. Considering that China modelled its governance system on the Anglo-American system, this paper examines the impact of the financial crisis on corporate governance reform in developed economies, and particularly, China’s reform of its financial sector. The paper further analyses the Chinese government’s role in bank supervision and risk management. In this regard, the paper contributes to the corporate governance literature within the Chinese context by providing insights into the contributing factors to the corporate governance failure that led to the global financial crisis. It also provides policy recommendations for China’s policy makers to seriously consider. The results suggest a need for the re-examination of corporate governance adequacy and the institutionalisation of business ethics. The paper’s next section provides a review of China’s financial system with reference to the financial crisis, followed by a critical evaluation of a capitalistic system and a review of Anglo-American and Continental European models. It then analyses the need for a new corporate governance model in China by considering the bank failures in developed economies and the potential risks and inefficiencies in a current State controlled system. The paper closes by reflecting the need for Chinese policy makers to continually develop, adapt and rewrite corporate governance practices capable of meeting the new challenge, and to pay attention to business ethics, an issue which goes beyond regulation.

The impact of uncertain precipitation data on insurance loss estimates using a flood catastrophe model

Catastrophe risk models used by the insurance industry are likely subject to significant uncertainty, but due to their proprietary nature and strict licensing conditions they are not available for experimentation. In addition, even if such experiments were conducted, these would not be repeatable by other researchers because commercial confidentiality issues prevent the details of proprietary catastrophe model structures from being described in public domain documents. However, such experimentation is urgently required to improve decision making in both insurance and reinsurance markets. In this paper we therefore construct our own catastrophe risk model for flooding in Dublin, Ireland, in order to assess the impact of typical precipitation data uncertainty on loss predictions. As we consider only a city region rather than a whole territory and have access to detailed data and computing resources typically unavailable to industry modellers, our model is significantly more detailed than most commercial products. The model consists of four components, a stochastic rainfall module, a hydrological and hydraulic flood hazard module, a vulnerability module, and a financial loss module. Using these we undertake a series of simulations to test the impact of driving the stochastic event generator with four different rainfall data sets: ground gauge data, gauge-corrected rainfall radar, meteorological reanalysis data (European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts Reanalysis-Interim; ERA-Interim) and a satellite rainfall product (The Climate Prediction Center morphing method; CMORPH). Catastrophe models are unusual because they use the upper three components of the modelling chain to generate a large synthetic database of unobserved and severe loss-driving events for which estimated losses are calculated. We find the loss estimates to be more sensitive to uncertainties propagated from the driving precipitation data sets than to other uncertainties in the hazard and vulnerability modules, suggesting that the range of uncertainty within catastrophe model structures may be greater than commonly believed.

Government intervention or entrepreneurial profit? Explaining innovation in the Korean online gaming industry

The paper examines how and why the Korean online gaming industry gained dominance in the global market despite US and Japanese competition in related gaming sectors.

Exploiting satellite-based rainfall for weather index insurance: the challenges of spatial and temporal aggregation

Lack of access to insurance exacerbates the impact of climate variability on smallholder famers in Africa. Unlike traditional insurance, which compensates proven agricultural losses, weather index insurance (WII) pays out in the event that a weather index is breached. In principle, WII could be provided to farmers throughout Africa. There are two data-related hurdles to this. First, most farmers do not live close enough to a rain gauge with sufficiently long record of observations. Second, mismatches between weather indices and yield may expose farmers to uncompensated losses, and insurers to unfair payouts – a phenomenon known as basis risk. In essence, basis risk results from complexities in the progression from meteorological drought (rainfall deficit) to agricultural drought (low soil moisture). In this study, we use a land-surface model to describe the transition from meteorological to agricultural drought. We demonstrate that spatial and temporal aggregation of rainfall results in a clearer link with soil moisture, and hence a reduction in basis risk. We then use an advanced statistical method to show how optimal aggregation of satellite-based rainfall estimates can reduce basis risk, enabling remotely sensed data to be utilized robustly for WII.

The use of remotely sensed rainfall for managing drought risk: a case study of weather index insurance in Zambia

Remotely sensed rainfall is increasingly being used to manage climate-related risk in gauge sparse regions. Applications based on such data must make maximal use of the skill of the methodology in order to avoid doing harm by providing misleading information. This is especially challenging in regions, such as Africa, which lack gauge data for validation. In this study, we show how calibrated ensembles of equally likely rainfall can be used to infer uncertainty in remotely sensed rainfall estimates, and subsequently in assessment of drought. We illustrate the methodology through a case study of weather index insurance (WII) in Zambia. Unlike traditional insurance, which compensates proven agricultural losses, WII pays out in the event that a weather index is breached. As remotely sensed rainfall is used to extend WII schemes to large numbers of farmers, it is crucial to ensure that the indices being insured are skillful representations of local environmental conditions. In our study we drive a land surface model with rainfall ensembles, in order to demonstrate how aggregation of rainfall estimates in space and time results in a clearer link with soil moisture, and hence a truer representation of agricultural drought. Although our study focuses on agricultural insurance, the methodological principles for application design are widely applicable in Africa and elsewhere.

The perception of accessibility in Web development by academy, industry and government: a survey of the Brazilian scenario

Accessibility has become a serious issue to be considered by various sectors of the society. However, what are the differences between the perception of accessibility by academy, government and industry? In this paper, we present an analysis of this issue based on a large survey carried out with 613 participants involved with Web development, from all of the 27 Brazilian states. The paper presents results from the data analysis for each sector, along with statistical tests regarding the main different issues related to each of the sectors, such as: government and law, industry and techniques, academy and education. The concern about accessibility law is poor even amongst people from government sector. The analyses have also pointed out that the academy has not been addressing accessibility training accordingly. The knowledge about proper techniques to produce accessible contents is better than other sectors`, but still limited in industry. Stronger investments in training and in the promotion of consciousness about the law may be pointed as the most important tools to help a more effective policy on Web accessibility in Brazil.

En studie om rehabilitering - en skamgörande process

The purpose of this essay is using theories about labeling and social bonds to study whether a measure of rehabilitation for the psychically disabled contributes to a return to a normal status as not-labeled. Partly we examine whether the activities organized by the regulation-ruled authorities during the work of rehabilitation lead to shame or pride, and partly how these activities are organized regarding the processes that lead to the emotions pride or shame among the participants. Method: qualitative semi-structured face-to-face interviews with professional rehabilitation-actors at the Public Employment Office (PEO), the Social Insurance Office (SIO), the Social Service (SOS), the Psychiatry and the Division of Labour Market (AME).Conclusions: the Psychiatry clients are treated with respect, may participate, and communication is characterized by attunement, therefore strong social bonds can be built. On the contrary, among the other examined activities, we found many elements that arouse shame. Since these are more ruled by regulations, the result is engulfment and demands on conformity, because the compromise-possibilities are almost non-existent. Psychically disabled persons are met by prejudice, ignorance, disrespect and a non-solidarity-language. To get help, the individual has to accept a label in form of a diagnosis, and this labeling leads to a negative self-image. Furthermore the psychically disabled persons are falling between two chairs because of a weak cooperation between the rehabilitation-actors. Bimodal alienation and triangulation contributes to the difficulties in cooperation.Result: the social bonds are not strong enough to achieve a rehabilitation-effect. Even if the treatment from each administrator is important, we find the explanation-level primarily in laws, rules and government, because the structure rules the rehabilitation-measures, with shame as a consequence. Since we found elements of shame institutionalized in the way of working at PEO, SIO, SOS and AME, it means that social bonds can never reach a level good enough for achieving pride and normalization from a deviance or labeled identity.

Government spending and unemployment : An empirical study on Sweden, 1994-2012

The aim of the study was to see if any relationship between government spending andunemployment could be empirically found. To test if government spending affectsunemployment, a statistical model was applied on data from Sweden. The data was quarterlydata from the year 1994 until 2012, unit-root test were conducted and the variables wheretransformed to its first-difference so ensure stationarity. This transformation changed thevariables to growth rates. This meant that the interpretation deviated a little from the originalgoal. Other studies reviewed indicate that when government spending increases and/or taxesdecreases output increases. Studies show that unemployment decreases when governmentspending/GDP ratio increases. Some studies also indicated that with an already largegovernment sector increasing the spending it could have negative effect on output. The modelwas a VAR-model with unemployment, output, interest rate, taxes and government spending.Also included in the model were a linear and three quarterly dummies. The model used 7lags. The result was not statistically significant for most lags but indicated that as governmentspending growth rate increases holding everything else constant unemployment growth rateincreases. The result for taxes was even less statistically significant and indicates norelationship with unemployment. Post-estimation test indicates that there were problems withnon-normality in the model. So the results should be interpreted with some scepticism.

The sustainability revolution : A societal paradigm shift - ethos, innovation, government transformation

The Sustainability revolution: A societal paradigm shift – ethos, innovation, governance transformation This paper identifies several key mechanisms that underlie major paradigm shifts. After identifying four such mechanisms, the article focuses on one type of transformation which has a prominent place in the sustainability revolution that the article argues is now taking place. The transformation is piecemeal, incremental, diffuse – in earlier writings referred to as ”organic”. This is a more encompassing notion than grassroots, since the innovation and transformation processes may be launched and developed at multiple levels through diverse mechanisms of discovery and development. Major features of the sustainability revolution are identified and comparisons made to the industrial revolution.

Usability of government websites in Uganda

Government websites offer great benefits to citizens and governments. Such benefits, however,cannot be realized if websites are unusable. This study investigates usability of government websites in Uganda.Using the feature investigation method, the study evaluated four Ugandan government websites according tothree perspectives. Results show that websites are partially usable in the design layout and navigationperspectives but are rather weak in stating legal policies. Evaluation results provide the Ugandan governmentwith a clear picture of what needs to be improved according to international website design standards. Moreover,the parsimonious evaluation framework proposed in the research is useful for any country that wants to do aquick and easy evaluation of their government websites.

Local Distributional Effects of Government Cash Transfers in Chile

Despite rapid economic growth and poverty reduction, inequality in Chile has remained high and remarkably constant over the last 20 years, prompting academic and public interest in the subject. Due to data limitations, however, research on inequality in Chile has concentrated on the national and regional levels. The impact of cash subsidies to poor households on local inequality is thus not well understood. Using poverty-mapping methods to asses this impact, we find heterogeneity in the effectiveness of regional and municipal governments in reducing inequality via poverty-reduction transfers, suggesting that alternative targeting regimes may complement current practice in aiding the poor.

Assisted Living: The Politics of Medicaid and Medicare

In this paper I examine the structure of the current assisted living industry in order to explain how and why it is appealing and effective, as well as look at its limitations. I discuss the politics of Medicaid and Medicare, and how through these programs the federal and state governments are failing to provide adequate care for the nation’s senior population. Like the rest of our health care system, these two public health insurance systems are fragmented, and consequently, financing long-term care is complicated and insufficient. Ultimately, this paper will function as a policy report and I will propose: standardized requirements for assisted living facilities; a stricter and new way to regulate assisted living on the state level; restructured models for the public insurance programs, including Medicaid, Medicare, and the State Children’s Health Insurance Program.