Objective To obtain information about the similarities and differences in regulating different types of medical research in the European Union .Methods Web searches were performed from September 2009 to January 2011. Notes on pre-determined topics were systematically taken down from the web pages. The analysis relied only on documents and reports available on the web, reflecting the situation at the end of 2010.Results In several countries, regulatory legislation applied only to clinical trials on drugs and medical devices, in other states (...) various types of research were also regulated but by laws different from those concerning trials, and in many countries, some research areas were not controlled by legislation at all. In very few countries was all medical research handled similarly from a legal point of view. The number of research ethics committees in a single country varied from one to 264. Their areas of responsibility, working principles and length of time to grant research permission varied as well as the rules for obtaining informed consent from vulnerable groups. In 10 EU countries, there was no appeal mechanism after a negative decision by an REC. The RECs were not accountable to any organisation in five EU countries.Conclusions There is a need for a fundamental debate regarding whether and which kinds of changes are needed for the further harmonisation of medical research governance in the EU and how cross-country medical research could be facilitated in the future. (shrink)

: This article critically examines the constitution of impairment in prenatal testing and screening practices and various discourses that surround these technologies. While technologies to test and screen prenatally are claimed to enhance women's capacity to be self-determining, make informed reproductive choices, and, in effect, wrest control of their bodies from a patriarchal medical establishment, I contend that this emerging relation between pregnant women and reproductive technologies is a new strategy of a form of power that began to emerge (...) in the late eighteenth century. Indeed, my argument is that the constitution of prenatal impairment, by and through these practices and procedures, is a widening form of modern government that increasingly limits the field of possible conduct in response to pregnancy. Hence, the government of impairment in utero is inextricably intertwined with the government of the maternal body. (shrink)

Clothing is central to the worlds described in early modern utopian texts: of twenty-three utopian texts written and published in England between 1516 and 1656, 91 percent mention dress, and 82 percent contain more extensive description or comment upon clothing. Written by elite authors for elite readers, these texts assign clothing a leading role in the establishment and maintenance of social order in a range of areas, including governance, social and religious control, personal expression, and ideological stance. Separated from (...) the material constraints of the physical world, dress in these worlds has meaning rather than substance; we see how the authors think about dress and fashion—not how... (shrink)

In this article I examine corporate social reporting as a form of New Governance regulation termed “democratic experimentalism.” Due to the challenges of regulating the behavior of corporations on issues related to sustainable economic development, New Governance regulation—which has a focus on decentralized, participatory, problem-solving-based approaches to regulation—is presented as an option to traditional command-and-control regulation. By examining the role of social reporting under a New Governance approach, I set out three necessary requirements for social (...) reporting to be effective: disclosure, dialogue with stakeholders, and the moral development of the corporation. I then assess current social reporting practices against these requirements and find significant problems. In response, I propose one option for solving those problems, and encourage future researchers to consider the demands of these three requirements and the possible trade-offs between them when attempting to find ways to improve social reporting practices. (shrink)

In this article I examine corporate social reporting as a form of New Governance regulation termed “democratic experimentalism.” Due to the challenges of regulating the behavior of corporations on issues related to sustainable economic development, New Governance regulation—which has a focus on decentralized, participatory, problem-solving-based approaches to regulation—is presented as an option to traditional command-and-control regulation. By examining the role of social reporting under a New Governance approach, I set out three necessary requirements for social (...) reporting to be effective: disclosure, dialogue with stakeholders, and the moral development of the corporation. I then assess current social reporting practices against these requirements and find significant problems. In response, I propose one option for solving those problems, and encourage future researchers to consider the demands of these three requirements and the possible trade-offs between them when attempting to find ways to improve social reporting practices. (shrink)

Human beings have engaged in animal husbandry and have slaughtered animals for food for thousands of years. During the majority of that time most societies had no animal welfare regulations that governed the care or slaughter of animals. Judaism is a notable exception in that from its earliest days it has included such rules. Among the Jewish dietary laws is a prohibition to consume meat from an animal that dies in any manner other than through the rigorously defined method of (...) slaughter known as shechita. In recent decades more and more attempts have been initiated by governments around the world to either outright ban or to control and modify the practice of shechita. This paper presents the requisite background about shechita and then analyzes the ethics of some of the recent legislation. The analysis includes a rebuttal of the assertion that shechita is an inhumane method of slaughter. It further presents the consequences on the Jewish community of legislation to impose pre-slaughter stunning and explains why such legislation is unethical. The actual effect of labeling laws is discussed and it is shown why such laws are also un-ethical. (shrink)

Controversies surrounding social media platforms have provided opportunities for institutional reflexivity amongst users and regulators on how to understand and govern platforms. Amidst contestation, platform companies have continued to enact projects that draw upon existing modes of privatized governance. We investigate how social media companies have attempted to achieve closure by continuing to set the terms around platform governance. We investigate two projects implemented by Facebook (Meta)—authenticity regulation and privacy controls—in response to the Russian Interference and Cambridge Analytica controversies (...) surrounding the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election. Drawing on Goffman’s metaphor of stage management, we analyze the techniques deployed by Facebook to reinforce a division between what is visible and invisible to the user experience. These platform governance projects propose to act upon _front-stage data relations:_ information that users can see from other users—whether that is content that users can see from “bad actors”, or information that other users can see about oneself. At the same time, these projects relegate _back-stage data relations_—information flows between users constituted by recommendation and targeted advertising systems—to invisibility and inaction. As such, Facebook renders the user experience actionable for governance, while foreclosing governance of back-stage data relations central to the economic value of the platform. As social media companies continue to perform platform governance projects following controversies, our paper invites reflection on the politics of these projects. By destabilizing the boundaries drawn by platform companies, we open space for continuous reflexivity on how platforms should be understood and governed. (shrink)

In After the Rights Revolution, Cass Sunstein confronts the ?Chicago? intellectual tradition on the effects of government regulation. While recognizing the many failures of regulation, Sunstein argues that most regulation serves a potentially useful purpose and that the courts can be relied on to correct the worst regulatory failures. He offers a dizzying array of prescriptions to ensure this outcome, many of which would appear to run afoul of clear congressional intent. In a more recent book, (...) Breaking the Vicious Circle, Stephen Breyer offers a different diagnosis. He sees health?safety?environmental regulation as essentially out of control because of the ?vicious circle? created by irrational and ineffective government responses to the public's concern about the risk of exposure to carcinogens. Breyer does not believe that this vicious circle of excessive and irrational regulation can be broken by the courts. Instead, he suggests the creation of an elite bureaucratic corps with the mission of proposing more effective and less costly approaches to controlling threats to human health. (shrink)

Garnett and Christidis (2017) [hereafter GC] recently proposed that the International Union of the Biological Sciences should centrally regulate the taxonomy of complex organisms. Their proposal was met with much criticism (e.g. Hołyński 2017; Thomson et al., 2018), and perhaps most extensively from Raposo et al. (2017) in this journal. The main target of this criticism was GC’s call to, first, “restrict the freedom of taxonomic action”, and, second, to let social, political and conservation values weigh in on species classification. (...) Some commentators even went as far as to draw a comparison with the infamous Lysenko-case of state-controlled and heavily restricted science (Raposo et al. 2017, 181; Hołyński 2017, 12). This comment will argue, without thereby endorsing GC’s position, that these two aspects of their views need not be as threatening as this comparison suggests, and indeed are very reasonable. (shrink)

The history of drug/vaccine development has included major advances guided primarily by risk/benefit analyses concerning the innovative agent, not by evidence-based clinical trials (Phase I–IV). Because the approval for new drugs is hindered under the present process, the system requires restructuring. The Phase I/II study period should be more flexible, using the “environment of knowledge” about the new agent, plus risk/benefit assessments. Phase III, as presently constructed, does not add new adverse events data, it provides a narrower profile of drug (...) efficacy than properly done Phase II studies, and placebo-controlled trials continue to raise unresolved ethical and social issues. Phase III studies should be abandoned for most drugs, and substituted with properly powered Phase II doseranging studies plus careful post-marketing surveillance. Phase III should be a penalty for poor drug development, not a regulatory requirement. (shrink)

Given the increasing importance attached to both corporate social responsibility (CSR) and corporate governance, this study investigates the association between these two complimentary mechanisms used by companies to enhance relations with stakeholders. Consistent with both legitimacy and stakeholder theory and controlling for industry profile, firm size, stockholder power/dispersion, creditor power/leverage, and economic performance, our analysis of the annual reports for a sample of 222 listed companies suggests that firms providing more CSR information: have better corporate governance ratings; are larger; belong (...) to higher profile industries; and are more highly leveraged. Our findings support the limited prior research suggesting a link between corporate governance quality and CSR disclosure in company annual reports and suggest that, rather than mandating specific disclosures, regulators might be better served focussing on corporate governance quality as a way of increasing CSR disclosures. (shrink)

Backdating of stock options is an example of an agency problem. It has emerged despite all the measures (i.e., new regulations and additional corporate governance mechanisms) aimed at addressing such problems? Beyond such negative controlling measures, a more positive empowering approach based on ethics may also be necessary. What ethical measures need to be taken to address the agency problem? What values and norms should guide the board of directors in protecting the shareholders' interests? To examine these issues, we first (...) discuss the role values and norms can play with respect to underlying corporate governance and the proper role of directors, such as transparency, accountability, integrity (which is reflected in proper mechanisms of checks and balances), and public responsibility. Second, we discuss various stakeholder approaches (e.g., government, directors, managers, and shareholders) by which conflicts of interest (i.e., the agency problem) can be addressed. Third, we assess the practice of backdating stock options, as an illustration of the agency problem, in terms of whether the practice is legally acceptable or ethically justifiable. Fourth, we proceed to an analysis of good corporate governance practice involving backdating options based on a series of ethical standards including: (1) trustworthiness; (2) utilitarianism; (3) justice; and (4) Kantianism. We conclude that while executive compensation schemes (e. g., stock options) were originally intended to help remedy the agency problem by tying together the interests of the executives and shareholders, these schemes may have actually become "part of the problem," and that the solution ultimately depends upon whether directors and executives accept that all of their actions must be based on a set of core ethical values. (shrink)

Research regulation is a timely topic for discussions in bioethics and public health policy. This response to articles in the previous special issue of the Monash Bioethics Review emphasises the importance of having both internal and external controls of human experimentation. Unless both elements are incorporated into research ethics governance frameworks, they will ultimately fail to achieve what should be their primary goal: human subject protection.

In the following, the author presents a case for federally mandated gun control regulations. Specifically, the author argues—with reference to The Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights—that the principle of limited government often used against federal gun control laws actually provides legitimate justification for them. The aim is to persuade gun advocates to accept such regulations from their own point of view.

In this text, our question is what is the current regulatory trend in countries that are not considered central in the development of artificial intelligence, such as Brazil: a preventive approach, or an experimental approach? We will analyze the bills (PL) that are being processed in legislative houses at the state level, and at the federal level, highlighting some elements, such as: Delimitation of the object (conceptualization), fundamental principles, ethical guidelines, relationship with human work, human supervision, and guidelines for public (...) authorities. Based on these elements, we identified how the issues that drive the contemporary debate on AI have been addressed in these legislative initiatives. The results indicate that the strongest national regulation proposal mentions risks, rights, governance, economic agents; these mentions dialogue with the concerns discussed by researchers around the world, regarding the mitigation and prevention of risks, regarding the preservation of individual and collective rights, the role of the State as a regulator and supervisor, and, as was to be expected, the maintenance of economic policies that possibly tend to protect the market; proposes that the foundations of the development, implementation and use of AI have values consistent with ‘human centered AI’ (Bingley et al. 2023), but also points to the neoliberal matrix; introduces human supervision as an effective element in the AI systems cycle; the trend that we can observe in Brazil is the configuration of a regulation that harmonizes articles that favor the preventive approach, with the presence of articles that favor the experimentation approach. (shrink)

Legal institutions worldwide construct theories about gender’s ontology—i.e., theories about what gender is—and use those constructions to govern. In this article, I analyse how the Family Court of Australia constructed ontologies of gender to govern young people’s gender-affirming hormone use. By analysing the ‘reasons for judgment’ published about cases where minors applied for the Court’s authorisation to use hormones, I show that the Court constructed two theories about the ontology of gender concurrently—one essentialist and the other performative—which it leveraged to (...) arbitrate the legitimacy of hormone use. By critically examining the Court’s ontological assertions, I argue that both theories advanced anti-queer directives that tethered the legitimacy of hormone use to its promise to produce normatively gendered subjects. This analysis highlights that legal regimes concerned with controlling gender-affirming practices have much more at stake than access to those practices alone. By governing mechanisms of gender’s production, these regimes do not merely shape how gender can be expressed but also the possible forms of gender itself. (shrink)

gamete donation, embryo donation, and surrogate motherhood. The OTA Report Infertility provides a range of policy choices for handling these reproductive procedures. The choice among these alternative regulations needs to be developed within the framework of the right to privacy of the U.S. Constitution, which provides support for an approach that allows the progenitors to control the uses made of their generative materials and to receive compensation for them, subject to laws which facilitate informed consent and attempt to assure (...) quality. Keywords: right to privacy, in vitro fertilization, artificial insemination, surrogate motherhood CiteULike Connotea Del.icio.us What's this? (shrink)

In traditional sectors, the intervention of private parties in the regulatory system tends to be justified by their enhanced expertise, government cuts or efficiency gains. In the sharing economy (e.g., home-sharing services offered by Airbnb), quality control and regulatory tasks (e.g., inspections) are to, a great extent, informally delegated to online platforms and peer-to-peer communities that rate and review performance. These communities consist of users that do not have more than their personal experience and the guidance of online (...) platforms to underpin their assessments. Existing literature has extensively criticized the reliability of these online reputational mechanisms, but it has overlooked other far-reaching effects of outsourcing regulatory tasks to private parties. This Article offers a more complete analysis of the regulatory value of online reputation. I argue that reputational mechanisms have the potential of creating democratic spaces where users can provide unique, regular, and first-hand insights that would otherwise be disregarded in a traditional regulatory system. Nevertheless, in their current form, these mechanisms still offer inadequate protection to the public values that typically underlie the regulation of certain services. This Article explains this problem by comparing the protection of public values in the sharing economy to that of traditional regulated sectors. This Article contributes to the literature by reflecting on whether the sharing economy is inviting us to rethink the broader involvement of citizens in the protection of public values and the challenges thereof. It suggests a framework to improve online reputational mechanisms and a better dialogue between traditional regulation and online reputation. (shrink)

Corporate governance delivers feasible and controlled company operations using a group of common shareholders and appropriate policies. The roles and responsibilities of the shareholders suggest and improve corporate development through monotonous and independent rights. The implication of artificial intelligence provides knowledgeable insights for decision-making and control management. This article introduces a Mutual Consent-based Governance Regulation Model for dissimilarity mitigation in corporate rule implications. The proposed model exploits transfer learning for balanced rule implication and decision-making. The learning states are (...) defined based on mutual agreement, individual interest, and operational features. Based on the governance policies, the above rules are employed without hindering the pioneer regulations implemented in different periods. Therefore, artificial intelligence technology is utilized for prompt and swift governance decisions in delivering special rights for consumers and shareholders. The performance of this model is validated and verified using data sources related to governance policies from a real-time industry. The impact of varying policy features with dissimilarity is analyzed for varying occurrences. The analysis is given based on the considered data sources for which the classification and its impact over reports, sharing, voting, complaint, and market are analyzed. The availability before and after the proposed improves the above metrics by 10.48, 10.65, 9.78, 13.39, and 9.26%. (shrink)

Governments across the world appreciate the need for checks on the transfer or exportation of commodities, information, software, and technology considered of strategic value. In order to control exports, countries rely on laws, treaties, international arrangements and other related instruments. In the current case, the UAE is largely dependent on Federal Law No. 12 of 2008 while the UK depends on the Export Control Act of 2002. It is established that the legislations enact amendments to reflect the dynamic (...) nature of the state environment. However, the entry into international arrangements supports the view that the fight against trading in dual-use, military, or sensitive products require cooperative efforts from state parties in order to attain success. The current paper assesses export controls in the United Arab Emirates and the United Kingdom. (shrink)

This edited collection examines the ethical, legal, social and policy implications of genome editing technologies. Moreover, it offers a broad spectrum of timely legal analysis related to bringing genome editing to the market and making it available to patients, including addressing genome editing technology regulation through procedures for regulatory approval, patent law and competition law. In twelve chapters, this volume offers persuasive arguments for justifying transformative regulatory interventions regarding human genome editing, as well as the various legal venues for (...) introducing necessary or desirable changes needed to create an environment for realizing the potential of genome editing technology for the benefit of patients and society. (shrink)

Nanotechnology presents significant challenges in terms of developing a regulatory framework. This is due to a lack of scientific knowledge about the behaviour of the technology in its interactions with biological and ecological processes, the environment and other technologies. Crucially, there is a great deal of uncertainty surrounding the potential environmental and human health and safety impacts of NT. Consequently, the development of NT is a potential test case for framing new models of ‘soft law’ voluntary governance as a substitute (...) for traditional command and control type regulation. Driven by ‘new science governance,’ an approach based on a combination of ideas in anticipatory ethics, future-oriented responsibility, upstream public engagement and deliberation and theories of justice may offer a solution. The uniqueness of the approach can be found in the incorporation of anticipatory approaches via public participation and deliberation as the input into procedural justice approaches with distributional justice as the output. The overarching objective of this work is to contribute to the discussion in relation to the internalisation of responsibility and the building of intellectual and societal capacity to anticipate negative consequences before they arise in the hope that such an approach could be the antithesis of the retrospective imposition of responsibility and liability after the harm is done, which is the outcome of traditional regulatory and ethical approaches. Ultimately, the purpose is to contribute to the long-term sustainability of NT. (shrink)

Control of the market microstructure theory of corporate governance perspective on the traditional theory of the firm as a deepening of the study, the use of information economics and game theory tools to the mainstream economic analysis framework for the development, the market for corporate control transactions, configuring and tuning the details of the process accurately describes the shares of companies in the separation of ownership and control of internal control case shareholders, tender offers, takeover bids (...) and other governance mechanisms different from the actual control and operation of, the existence of incomplete information and transaction costs under control conditions to analyze market transactions , from the perspective of market microstructure control to clarify the shareholders of the managers to implement effective control mechanisms, policies and conditions. Share control over the behavior of financial market issues, equity market and environmental factors control the interaction between the control and equity issues in the legal protection and market control policy design issues will be the future theoretical research in this field focus. Corporate governance theory based on corporate control market microstructure focuses on trading, allocating and adjusting process of the corporate control market, applying the information economic approach and game instrument to expand the mainstream economic analysis framework. It accurately describes the factual operation of different corporation control and governance mechanism such as corporation owner's internal control, tender offer, takeover bid and negotiating transfer, deepening the traditional firm theory. Moreover it analyzes the corporate control market transactions on the case of incomplete information and positive transaction cost, examines the effective mechanism, strategies and condition by which the owner control and monitor the management based on corporate control market microstructure perspective. Those are the future research topics in this field that behavior finance, interaction with environments and legislation protect and regulation policy designations. (shrink)

As the global communication network matures, the systems and procedures for regulating the growing network and its use are being challenged. The general proliferation of services or the specific demand for electronic transactions require guidance and control which the market alone cannot supply. Meanwhile, traditional regulatory regimes remain far from global or coherent. This article distinguishes between coordination and regulation to clarify areas where government intervention is unnecessary and where indispensable. It explores the current patchwork of regulatory (...) approaches, reviews different regulatory areas and strategies, identifies trends, and highlights problem areas particular to electronic commerce and third party protection. (shrink)

The control of women's public form of mourning in India was undertaken in the colonial era by male social reformers. The article argues that this was both a part of the process which enabled the consolidation of colonial rule – since laments were repositories for the social memory of the dead which could lead to vendettas – and that this fed into the construction of a specific domestic ideology. The latter was predicated on the privatization and interiorization of grief, (...) whereby women were enjoined to bear themselves with rectitude. The taming of the transgressive form of mourning, whereby women who had earlier exhibited their grievances in a spectacular form through lament, took to more quietist (devotional) forms, has reconfigured the relationship to death and mourning. However, this has been a partial phenomenon, limited to the upper-caste, middle-class milieu. Where women continue to hold a dependent position within community, nation-state and international economy, the article suggests that, in contexts of modern conflicts and warfare, where death runs ‘wild’, the exhibitionist and ‘wild’ forms of showing grief and anger continue to be demonstrated by women as an appropriate public response. (shrink)

As the global communication network matures, the systems and procedures for regulating the growing network and its use are being challenged. The general proliferation of services or the specific demand for electronic transactions require guidance and control which the market alone cannot supply. Meanwhile, traditional regulatory regimes remain far from global or coherent. This article distinguishes between coordination and regulation to clarify areas where government intervention is unnecessary and where indispensable. It explores the current patchwork of regulatory (...) approaches, reviews different regulatory areas and strategies, identifies trends, and highlights problem areas particular to electronic commerce and third party protection. (shrink)

This article is currently available as a free download on ingentaconnect.

Enterprises seem to entirely operate on their management. But behind the scenes directors play a very important role. On a strategic level (in the long term) they will determine the direction of the company.Even though on the level of daily management a great deal of quality instruments and control systems exist, this is not the case on the highest level, the board. It is in this specific area that the idea of corporate governance must be situated.

Corporate governance and finance are dynamic academic fields that offer myriad opportunities for business ethics analysis. Within the corporate governance triad in recent years, shareholders have increased their power over boards of directors and executives through both regulation and movements to change corporate by-laws. The impact of board characteristics on firm performance has proven elusive, leading to questions concerning board processes and individual director beliefs and behaviors. At the same time, CEOs have lost considerable power, leaving many struggling to (...) regain their control and maintain their compensation levels, while others adopt a stewardship approach to their posts. In the field of finance, the recent financial debacle has led to a reexamination of financial regulation and of the fundamental nature and purpose of the industry. All of these issues provide business ethicists fodder for investigation and analysis. (shrink)

The Argumentwhile reconizing that public sector research has long been managed by a wide variety of practices and techniques, this paper concentrates on the increasingly important role that patents are playing in the management and regulation of public sector research. It argues that as a specific form of technology, patents play a significant and growing role in facilitating the management of the scientific object and can also be seen as a particular instance of governmentality. More specifically, it argues that (...) patents have had an important impact on the culture and political ecomomy of science. In this sence patents can be seen not only as a legal regime that provides limited property rights over technical information but also as a sophisticated tool of discipline and control that is used to regulate and manage public sector research. The paper suggests that with the increasing use of patents as a means of governing science, we are witnessing the growing juridification of science, the intervention of the law into an arena it hitherto largely ignored. (shrink)

Countries increasingly have been entering bilateral labor agreements as a tool for the regulation and governance of short-term temporary labor migration worldwide. However, these are often confidential legal instruments, and consequently we know relatively little about their actual content and impact, and why countries choose to enter them. This Article complements existing explanations in the literature regarding the reasons why countries enter BLAs and their potential to create and improve migrant workers’ rights. Based on a detailed content analysis of (...) 81 recent BLAs signed largely over the last 20 years, and on a wide literature review and interest analysis, we introduce a “control thesis.” According to the control thesis, the popularity, confidentiality and unenforceability of BLAs can be explained, at least partially, by their ability to promote a key shared interest of sending and receiving countries in controlling and policing the mobility and actions of migrant workers and also, at times, aspects of the illicit migration industry that develops around labor migration. We reach this conclusion, and elaborate on its meaning and the potential it may hold for migrant workers and their advocates, in strategically seeking to use BLAs to improve temporary migrant workers’ rights and protections. (shrink)

Technology regulation is one of the most important public policy issues facing society and governments at the present time, and further clarity could improve decision making in this complex and challenging area. Since the rise of the internet in the late 1990s, a number of approaches to technology regulation have been proposed, prompted by the associated changes in society, business and law that this development brought with it. However, over the past decade, the impact of technology has been (...) profound and the associated issues for government have extremely challenging, ranging across cyber security, artificial intelligence, and many other areas. To that end, this article introduces a Theory of Institutional Technology Actors and Norms (TITAN), a normatively informed and institutionally-based account of technology regulation. It focuses on the moral and legal (including regulatory) rights and responsibilities of the relevant actors and seeks to inform the development of regulation that is both fit for purpose, rights compliant and fair for all concerned. The account incorporates the perspectives of four key categories of groups in society: producers of technology, users of technology, government regulators, and normative policy shapers. (shrink)

The regulation of Native identity has been central to the colonization process in both Canada and the United States. Systems of classification and control enable settler governments to define who is "Indian," and control access to Native land. These regulatory systems have forcibly supplanted traditional Indigenous ways of identifying the self in relation to land and community, functioning discursively to naturalize colonial worldviews. Decolonization, then, must involve deconstructing and reshaping how we understand Indigenous identity.

In the U.S.A., advocates of academic freedom—the ability to pursue research unencumbered by government controls—have long found sparring partners in government officials who regulate technology trade. From concern over classified research in the 1950s, to the expansion of export controls to cover trade in information in the 1970s, to current debates over emerging technologies and global innovation, the academic community and the government have each sought opportunities to demarcate the sphere of their respective authority and autonomy and (...) assert themselves in that sphere. In this paper, we explore these opportunities, showing how the Social Contract for Science set the terms for the debate, and how the controversy turned to the proper interpretation of this compact. In particular, we analyze how the 1985 presidential directive excluding fundamental research from export controls created a boundary object that successfully demarcated science and the state, but only for a Cold War world that would soon come to an end. Significant changes have occurred since then in the governance structures of science and in the technical and political environment within which both universities and the state sit. Even though there have been significant and persistent calls for reassessing the Cold War demarcation, a new institutionalization of how to balance the concerns of national security and academic freedom is still only in its nascent stages. We explore the value of moving from a boundary object to a boundary organization, as represented in a proposed new governance body, the Science and Security Commission. (shrink)

In the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae, the regulation of expression of many of the enzymes for amino acid biosynthesis involves an interlinked general control system. Molecular and genetic analyses of this system reveal an underlying set of hierarchical transcriptional controls and a novel translational regulatory mechanism for governing expression of a key activator gene.

: The regulation of Native identity has been central to the colonization process in both Canada and the United States. Systems of classification and control enable settler governments to define who is "Indian," and control access to Native land. These regulatory systems have forcibly supplanted traditional Indigenous ways of identifying the self in relation to land and community, functioning discursively to naturalize colonial worldviews. Decolonization, then, must involve deconstructing and reshaping how we understand Indigenous identity.

This article aims to compare the national legal systems that regulate biomedical research in an industrialized country (United States) and a developing country (Venezuela). A new international order is emerging in which Europe, Japan and the United States (US) are revising common guidelines and harmonizing standards. In this article, we analyze – as an example – the US system. This system is controlled by a federal agency structured to regulate research funded by the federal government uniformly, either in the (...) US or abroad. In contrast, in Venezuela, a developing country, the creation of a centralized system is a slow process. Different types of ethical committees review research projects using non-uniform criteria. Consequently, various parallel organizations that conduct biomedical research, such as universities, research institutes and private hospitals have diverse regulations operating at a local level. Thus, the most relevant difference between the Venezuelan and the US systems is the degree of standardization. In the US, the review process is performed by institutional review boards (IRBs), which have a similar organization and maintain relationships with a centralized agency, following standard regulations. Although new proposals for establishing national regulations are currently being considered in Venezuela, the success of these initiatives will depend on promoting governmental efforts to create a more structured centralized system supported by a national regulatory framework. This system will need governmental financial support at all levels. This article proposes an integrated system to regulate research with human participants in Venezuela and other developing countries. (shrink)

ABSTRACT This article aims to compare the national legal systems that regulate biomedical research in an industrialized country (United States) and a developing country (Venezuela). A new international order is emerging in which Europe, Japan and the United States (US) are revising common guidelines and harmonizing standards. In this article, we analyze – as an example – the US system. This system is controlled by a federal agency structured to regulate research funded by the federal government uniformly, either in (...) the US or abroad. In contrast, in Venezuela, a developing country, the creation of a centralized system is a slow process. Different types of ethical committees review research projects using non‐uniform criteria. Consequently, various parallel organizations that conduct biomedical research, such as universities, research institutes and private hospitals have diverse regulations operating at a local level. Thus, the most relevant difference between the Venezuelan and the US systems is the degree of standardization. In the US, the review process is performed by institutional review boards (IRBs), which have a similar organization and maintain relationships with a centralized agency, following standard regulations. Although new proposals for establishing national regulations are currently being considered in Venezuela, the success of these initiatives will depend on promoting governmental efforts to create a more structured centralized system supported by a national regulatory framework. This system will need governmental financial support at all levels. This article proposes an integrated system to regulate research with human participants in Venezuela and other developing countries. (shrink)

Institute a proactive reputational management framework that matches individual behaviour to organizational values The Business Ethics Twin-Track is a practical guide to reputational risk management. A deep exploration of the concept of reputation, the ways in which it can suffer, and the consequences when it does, the book outlines an ethics controls framework that can mitigate risk and improve business performance. Readers will learn how to identify and manage weaknesses, and how to institute a system of governance that embeds proper, (...) ethical conduct into the corporate culture. A clear set of controls and procedures provides actionable instruction that can be customised to suit the organisational structure, and discussion of historical and international ethics provides the context for implementation. Case studies illustrate the real-world applications, while interviews with executives from a variety of sectors provide important practical insights into some of the key issues discussed in the book. The law regulates behaviour in health and safety and financial crime, but otherwise, conduct is largely determined by the culture, ethics and values of an organisation. Effective reputation management is complex, and often difficult to achieve, as much of the available information on the topic is more theoretical than practical. This book bridges the gap by providing the tools that will help managers to: Implement a modern ethics control framework, encompassing codes, officers, reporting lines and training Consider the role of the media and social media in reputational damage to individuals and organisations Analyse the key controls in responsibility and governance frameworks from around the world Determine the causes and controls of conduct risk, including incompetence, negligence and criminality Today's fast-paced media environment means corporate reputations can be obliterated in moments, and damage limitation is often too little, too late. Adopting the measures set out in this book will embed ethics into the culture, and match people's behaviours to the organisation's values. (shrink)

This paper examines the existing statutory frameworks in the US limiting government use of individual fingerprint, DMV, and tax data, drawing lessons for the existing statutory limitations on the use of government-controlled offender DNA databanks.

The provision of police services and the suppression of crime is one of the first functions of civil government. Article 3 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights speaks of a right to “security of person.” “The term ‘police’ traditionally connoted social organization, civil authority, or formation of a political community—the control and regulation of affairs affecting the general order and welfare of society,” including the protection of public health. Civil dispute resolution is also an important part (...) of a system that moves people away from self-help and toward reliance on collectively constituted, peaceful channels for working out problems.A safe and secure environment is tied to health. Research in social epidemiology suggests that a shared sense of security from physical violence and interference with property can contribute to better community health. (shrink)

The provision of police services and the suppression of crime is one of the first functions of civil government. Article 3 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights speaks of a right to “security of person.” “The term ‘police’ traditionally connoted social organization, civil authority, or formation of a political community—the control and regulation of affairs affecting the general order and welfare of society,” including the protection of public health. Civil dispute resolution is also an important part (...) of a system that moves people away from self-help and toward reliance on collectively constituted, peaceful channels for working out problems.A safe and secure environment is tied to health. Research in social epidemiology suggests that a shared sense of security from physical violence and interference with property can contribute to better community health. (shrink)

The provision of police services and the suppression of crime is one of the first functions of civil government. Article 3 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights speaks of a right to “security of person.” “The term ‘police’ traditionally connoted social organization, civil authority, or formation of a political community—the control and regulation of affairs affecting the general order and welfare of society,” including the protection of public health. Civil dispute resolution is also an important part (...) of a system that moves people away from self-help and toward reliance on collectively constituted, peaceful channels for working out problems.A safe and secure environment is tied to health. Research in social epidemiology suggests that a shared sense of security from physical violence and interference with property can contribute to better community health. (shrink)

Purpose– This paper aims to consider selected results from the Arts and Humanities Research Council -funded “Managing Access to the internet in Public Libraries” project, from 2012-2014. MAIPLE has explored the ways in which public library services manage use of the internet connections that they provide for the public. This included the how public library services balance their legal obligations and the needs of their communities in a public space and the ethical dilemmas that arise.Design/methodology/approach– The researchers used a mixed-method (...) approach involving a review of the literature, legal analysis, a questionnaire survey and case studies in five public library authorities.Findings– UK public library services use a range of methods to regulate internet access. The research also confirms previous findings that filtering software is an ubiquitous tool for controlling access to and protecting library users from “inappropriate”, illegal and harmful internet content. There is a general, if sometimes reluctant, acceptance of filtering software as a practical tool by library staff, which seems to contrast with professional codes of ethics and attitudes in other countries. The research indicates that public library internet access will be a valued service for some time to come, but that some aspects of how public library services regulate internet access is currently managed can have socially undesirable consequences, including blocking legitimate sites and preventing users from accessing government services. Education could play a greater part in helping the general population to exercise judgement in selection of materials to view and use. This does not preclude implementing stricter controls to protect children, whilst allowing public libraries to continue providing a social good to those who are unable to otherwise participate in the digital age.Research limitations/implications– The response to the survey was 39 per cent meaning that findings may not apply across the whole of the UK. The findings of this study are compared with and supplemented by other quantitative sources, but a strength of this study is the depth of understanding afforded by the use of case studies.Originality/value– This paper provides both a quantitative and qualitative analysis of how internet access is managed in UK public libraries, including how library services fulfil their legal obligations and the ethical implications of how they balance their role in facilitating access to information with their perceived role as a safe and trusted environment for all members of their communities. The findings add to the international discussion on this issue and stimulate debate and policy making in the UK. (shrink)

An increasing number of financial services (FS) companies are adopting solutions driven by artificial intelligence (AI) to gain operational efficiencies, derive strategic insights, and improve customer engagement. However, the rate of adoption has been low, in part due to the apprehension around its complexity and self-learning capability, which makes auditability a challenge in a highly regulated industry. There is limited literature on how FS companies can implement the governance and controls specific to AI-driven solutions. AI auditing cannot be performed in (...) a vacuum; the risks are not confined to the algorithm itself, but rather permeates the entire organization. Using the risk of unfairness as an example, this paper will introduce the overarching governance strategy and control framework to address the practical challenges in mitigating risks AI introduces. With regulatory implications and industry use cases, this framework will enable leaders to innovate with confidence. (shrink)

The European Union is strategically committed to the development of nanotechnology and its industrial exploitation. However, nanotechnology also has the potential to disrupt human health and the environment. The EU claims to be committed to the safe and responsible development of nanotechnology. In this sense, the EU has become the first governing body in the world to develop nanospecific regulations, largely due to legislative action taken by the European Parliament, which has compensated for the European Commission’s reluctance to develop special (...) regulations for nanomaterials. Nevertheless, divergences aside, political bodies in the EU assume that nanotechnology development is controllable and take for granted that both the massive industrial use of nanomaterials and a high level of environmental and health protection are compatible. However, experiences such as the European controversy over agri-food biotechnology, which somewhat delegitimized the regulatory authority of the EU over technological safety and acceptability, arguably show that controllability assumptions are contestable on the grounds of alternative socio-economic and cultural preferences and values. Recently developed inclusive governance models on safety and innovation, such as “Responsible Research and Innovation”, widely claim that a diversity of considerations and issues are integrated into R&D processes. Even so, the possibility of more radically alternative constitutions of socio-technical safety seems to be seriously limited by the current ideology of innovation and economic imperatives of the global, knowledge-based, capitalist economy. (shrink)