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DOAJ Open Access 2026
Land consolidation from a comparative perspective: Legal inspirations for Slovakia

Ludovit Macaj

Land consolidation is a legal instrument for the adjustment of land ownership, present in various forms across many countries in Europe. Land ownership, by its very nature, constitutes a prerequisite for the performance of numerous human activities, including agricultural production, forestry, and, in certain cases, development in built-up municipal areas. However, due to its shape, fragmentation within the landscape, and the frequent presence of multiple co-ownership shares, such ownership often fails to effectively serve its intended purposes. This article therefore focuses on describing and comparing selected foreign legal frameworks for land consolidation and explores the potential for applying inspiring solutions within the legislative system of the Slovak Republic.

Environmental law, Regulation of industry, trade, and commerce. Occupational law
DOAJ Open Access 2025
Private Proceedings: A New Perspective in the Field of Resolving Commercial Disputes in American Law with a Look at Iranian Law

alireza alidad, mohammad taghi rafiei, rasul maghsudpur

Commercial disputes have always faced challenges such as delay in proceedings, complexity and high costs, and in response to these challenges, alternative dispute resolution methods, including "private litigation" as a new method in American law, have attracted special attention in a way Today, ignoring this new and effective method in resolving commercial claims, not only does not lead to growth and excellence, but failure in this field is certain. The current research, which was compiled with a descriptive-analytical method after disambiguation of some topics, concludes that characteristics such as "volunteering,"; "informality,"; "Confidential information," and "expediting dispute resolution" have been effective in resolving commercial claims. Also, after introducing some of the challenges in using the said institution and that every institution is not free from challenges, appropriate solutions such as; careful selection of an impartial third party in private proceedings; Collecting documents; setting realistic expectations; honest communication with a focus on benefits; Limiting the disclosed information as a way out of the challenges has been identified and introduced, which can be established in Iranian law if the above principles are taken into consideration.1. Introduction Disputes are an inseparable part of the business world and there is no escaping it. In the meantime, the quick and fair resolution of commercial disputes has played an essential role in social stability and economic prosperity, and the practice has shown that businessmen do not have a firm belief in the official judgment system and tend to settle their disputes. to use as quickly as possible, cheaply, and without the least challenge in the form of alternative methods of dispute resolution (ADR). Traditional legal systems, which are based on militancy, face many challenges, including delay in proceedings, complexity and high costs, which prevent this from being realized. The belligerent nature of traditional systems also creates fundamental concerns about justice. Also, this system's focus on the victory of one party and the defeat of the other party destroys the relations between the parties and instead of discovering the truth and reaching a solution that provides the interests of both parties. Kand emphasizes on compliance with the law and procedures. Private proceedings were created in response to traditional proceedings (court and judge) in response to cumbersome procedures, costs and delays. The roots of the aforementioned proceedings can be found in the case of Telecredit and TR Debilio in America half a century ago in 1977, and after that it was popularized in an evolved form in American law. (Darvishi Hoyda, 1402: 23) From the point of view of comparative analysis, the institution of conciliation in Iranian law can be considered to be very close to the institution of private proceedings, while there are differences between these two institutions with the explanation that according to Article 180 of Q.A. D.M. Conciliation can be established at any stage of the proceedings or even outside the court, while private proceedings have no relation to judicial institutions and are completely independent. Also, another aspect of the difference between the two aforementioned institutions is in the selection of a third party, in a way that in conciliation, the third party can be any person, but in private proceedings, the third party to resolve the dispute is usually chosen among experts, lawyers, experts, or old judges. (Jason, 2010: 113, on the other hand, the compromise agreement is largely set with the intention of resolving the differences between the parties to the dispute, and its ultimate goal is to reach a final solution, but it is possible in private proceedings for individuals to test themselves and the other party in line with in future lawsuits, they should use private proceedings or guidance in order to untie the knot. In any case, the dispute should be untied in private proceedings as soon as possible by presenting the documents. The author believes that the meaning of private proceedings in general is to resolve all commercial disputes of individuals in an environment outside the court, in this method, the services of a third party are used to resolve the hostility away from any conflict and in the shortest possible time. The background of the research in the category of private litigation does not directly show a history, so in the research that has been conducted, this issue has been addressed less as a solution to commercial disputes, and in a way, the research literature has innovation in this regard. In the current research, the author, while disambiguating the issue, seeks to answer what are the characteristics of private proceedings? Second, how can private litigation settle commercial claims as a new method and be established in Iranian law? To find the answer, it is necessary for the research to follow a systematic theoretical framework. Therefore, to get familiar with this emerging concept under the first paragraph under the title; The knowledge of private proceedings, the concept, characteristics and implementation process of private proceedings have been researched, then in the second paragraph under the title of challenges and desirable solutions of private proceedings, firstly the challenges and then the favorable solutions are examined and finally in the third paragraph the manifestations of private proceedings that the mentioned institution in It will be able to resolve the dispute well. 2. Methodology The authors have tried to use primary sources (including laws, regulations, circulars, judicial decisions, etc.) and secondary sources (such as books and articles, dissertations, research reports, etc.) in the upcoming research. Collect and collect information. Scientific research data centers, official and authoritative websites, libraries and similar resources. And considering that the topic of private litigation is in American law and its feasibility is established in Iranian law, it has been tried to discuss some comparative issues in American law. 3. Results and Discussion Alternative methods of dispute resolution (ADR) such as "private proceedings" as considered in the American legal system have not been applied in Iranian law; And the main reason for this neglect of the category of private proceedings in Iranian law can include; He considered the lack of a necessary legal framework, the unknown nature of ADR as a method of private proceedings in the society, cultural causes and the belief in the lack of efficiency of private proceedings in asserting rights and resolving disputes, and at the same time the better efficiency of courts and the firm implementation of court decisions and orders. . Although private proceedings cannot be considered as a cure for all the inadequacies and problems of judicial proceedings, but private proceedings have the ability and capacity to resolve an important and significant part of commercial claims in an expert manner. Due to its non-aggressive and informal aspect, private proceedings save time and money and avoid lawsuits that may last months or even years and cause very heavy legal expenses. Also, it has limited the time required to provide evidence, presentations and the number of main witnesses, and as a result, the cost needed to resolve the dispute has also been reduced. On the other hand, as in the business world, time is wealth, and dispute resolution managers spend much less time compared to judicial proceedings. They spend on preparing and participating in hearings, and these advantages make people welcome to resolve commercial disputes. Therefore, with the spread of private proceedings in the form of using the capacity of arbitration institutions in Iranian law, it is possible to attract people's opinion in resolving commercial disputes by explaining the aforementioned benefits. This situation and the turn of people's opinion towards private proceedings will gradually reduce the number of courts and the desire to settle disputes through the said institution. The characteristics of private proceedings that have a positive effect on commercial lawsuits can be based on "voluntariness", "informality"; He considered "confidential information" and "expediting dispute resolution". Secondly, the said institution can, with Sirajrai, "agreement on private proceedings"; "preparation for private proceedings"; "Presentations in private proceedings"; "Negotiation in private proceedings" and "result" to resolve commercial disputes. Of course, it is necessary to explain that there are always challenges in this path, and solutions such as; "Careful selection of an impartial third party in private proceedings", "Collecting documents", "Establishing realistic expectations", "Honest communication with a focus on interests", "Limiting disclosed information" are presented by the author of this article, which if you pay attention to the aforementioned The possibility of establishing a private judicial institution in Iran's legal system does not seem unlikely. 4. Conclusions and Future Research Considering the fact that the foundations of Islamic jurisprudence emphasize the peaceful settlement of disputes away from conflict and based on peace and compromise, and the method of private proceedings is based on agreement (peace and compromise) and does not conflict with Sharia standards, and considering the density of existing cases In the courts and the consequences caused by this inflation, as well as the high sensitivity of commercial lawsuits and its role in the economy of the society, with the aim of using the capacities of private proceedings with the aim of solving a significant part of the lawsuits, the necessary planning and infrastructure should be done. In the first step, the most important step is to introduce this method in the society and clarify the benefits of its use, to provide the necessary grounds for the establishment of institutions active in the field of private litigation in commercial lawsuits and, most importantly, to pass appropriate laws regarding alternative methods of dispute resolution with the approach It is supporting such methods and persuading and encouraging people to use them. In the legislative process, one of the most important issues that must be taken into consideration by the legislator is the provision of a guarantee for the implementation of agreements resulting from the process of special proceedings in relation to commercial lawsuits. Therefore, the approval of regulations that guarantee the rights of the parties in this process and support the parties in reaching the result is necessary and necessary. The success of private proceedings in American law can be attributed to factors such as: flexibility, cooperation, voluntary nature and creativity of managers in implementing and proposing new methods of resolving commercial disputes in each case in a special way, and the use of these capacities can be seen as a special method in solving Commercial lawsuits in Iranian law, leading to a reduction in the density of cases in the courts, should be taken into consideration by the legislator. Therefore, while establishing the mentioned institution, it is necessary and necessary to pay attention to maintaining and expanding the aforementioned components, similar to American law, in order to obtain a similar answer in Iranian law.

Regulation of industry, trade, and commerce. Occupational law, Islamic law
DOAJ Open Access 2025
Analyzing Methods of Resolving Disputes and Enforcing Intellectual Property Rights in Exhibitions

Hojjat Mobayen, Azar Farahmand, Haniyeh Zakerinia

Exhibitions are still the best way to exchange the latest technological and commercial developments, especially innovations in intellectual property and identifying competitors. They have long been a platform for disputes related to intellectual property rights, including the claims of competitors against each other. Experience has shown that in disputes related to intellectual property rights in expositions, both dispute sides are at risk of hasty judgments. On one side, due to the short duration of the exposition, the owners of intellectual property do not have enough time to collect documents and take action against the infringer. On the other side, due to the large audience in the exposition, any action or temporary order against the possible defendant will damage his reputation and deprive him of the marketing opportunity. So, it is necessary to adopt an appropriate approach to resolve disputes to protect intellectual property rights by maintaining a balance between the conflicting interests of the parties to the dispute. With an analytical approach, this article has examined three dispute resolution mechanisms, i.e. judicial method, alternative dispute resolution methods (ADR), and administrative proceedings to protect intellectual property rights in expositions. In the end, it seems that alternative dispute resolution methods and the formation of fast-specialized investigation boards have priority over other available methods. Establishing a specialized board in the field of exhibition activity or permanently in the relevant trade unions, according to a specific statute or the arbitration clause in the contracts of participating in the exhibitions, can be a strategy for different methods of resolving intellectual property rights disputes in exhibitions, for Iranian law.

Regulation of industry, trade, and commerce. Occupational law, Islamic law
DOAJ Open Access 2025
ML and Statistics-Driven Route Planning: Effective Solutions Without Maps

Péter Veres

<i>Background</i>: Accurate route planning is a core challenge in logistics, particularly for small- and medium-sized enterprises that lack access to costly geospatial tools. This study explores whether usable distance matrices and routing outputs can be generated solely from geographic coordinates without relying on full map-based infrastructure. <i>Methods</i>: A dataset of over 5000 Hungarian postal locations was used to evaluate five models: Haversine-based scaling with circuity, linear regression, second- and third-degree polynomial regressions, and a trained artificial neural network. Models were tested on the full dataset, and three example routes representing short, medium, and long distances. Both statistical accuracy and route-level performance were assessed, including a practical optimization task. <i>Results</i>: Statistical models maintained internal consistency, but systematically overestimated longer distances. The ANN model provided significantly better accuracy across all scales and produced routes more consistent with map-based paths. A new evaluation method was introduced to directly compare routing outputs. <i>Conclusions</i>: Practical route planning can be achieved without GIS services. ML-based estimators offer a cost-effective alternative, with potential for further improvement using larger datasets, additional input features, and the integration of travel time prediction. This approach bridges the gap between simplified approximations and commercial routing systems.

Transportation and communication, Management. Industrial management
DOAJ Open Access 2025
The Role of Walkability in Shaping Shopping and Delivery Services: Insights into E-Consumer Behavior

Leise Kelli de Oliveira, Rui Colaço, Gracielle Gonçalves Ferreira de Araújo et al.

<i>Background</i>: As e-commerce expands and delivery services diversifies, understanding the factors that shape consumer preferences becomes critical to designing efficient and sustainable urban logistics. This study examines how perceived walkability influences consumers’ preferences for shopping channels (in-store or online) and delivery methods (home delivery versus pickup points). <i>Method</i>: The analysis is based on structural equation modeling and utilizes survey data collected from 444 residents of Belo Horizonte, Brazil. <i>Results</i>: The findings emphasize the importance of walkability in supporting weekday store visits, encouraging pickup for online purchases and fostering complementarity between different modes of purchase and delivery services. Perceived walkability positively affects the preference to buy in physical stores and increases the likelihood of using pickup points. Educated men, particularly those living in walkable areas, are the most likely to adopt pickup services. In contrast, affluent individuals and women are less likely to forgo home delivery in favor of pickup points. <i>Conclusions</i>: The results highlight the role of perceived walkability in encouraging in-person pickup as a sustainable alternative to home delivery, providing practical guidance for retailers, urban planners, and logistics firms seeking to align consumer convenience with sustainable delivery strategies.

Transportation and communication, Management. Industrial management
DOAJ Open Access 2024
Study on the Relationship between Port Governance and Terminal Operation System for Smart Port: Japan Case

Hideyo Inutsuka, Kinya Ichimura, Yoshihisa Sugimura et al.

<i>Background</i>: To improve port productivity, safety, and sustainability, the use of information and communication technology is being promoted as a smart port. The utilization of a terminal operation system (TOS) is important for advanced port operations, and it is necessary to organize the issues and characteristics of the TOS. <i>Methods</i>: The characteristics of TOSs introduced in Japan and those widely introduced in Europe and Southeast Asia will be investigated and discussed according to the port management system in Japan. <i>Results</i>: Japanese TOSs are characterized by a lack of automated functions, such as ship loading plans, and by the fact that they are designed to allow the crane driver to select the order of operations, which may be attributed to a system wherein stakeholders are segmented and on-site decisions are emphasized. The promotion of smart ports in Japanese-style ports requires a system for information linkage between stakeholders. <i>Conclusions</i>: TOS capabilities for smart ports should be implemented according to the characteristics of port management in each region, and the studies conducted in this paper are useful in examining port system implementation strategies.

Transportation and communication, Management. Industrial management
DOAJ Open Access 2024
Efficient Humanitarian Logistics: Multi-Commodity Location–Inventory Model Incorporating Demand Probability and Consumption Coefficients

Majid Mehrabi Delshad, Adel Pourghader Chobar, Peiman Ghasemi et al.

<i>Background:</i> A logistics network plan could be a major key issue due to its effect on supply chain effectiveness and responsiveness. This study aims to investigate the inventory location in the humanitarian logistics response stage using a three-level logistics network to integrate location–allocation problems such as warehouse location and shelter allocation to each facility, and then determine the inventory level in each warehouse. <i>Methods</i>: In this research, the center and its distribution, as well as the reduction in service-level costs due to inventory deficit, have been considered to increase the level of shelter services. In order to investigate the network, in this study, bi-objective mixed-integer linear programming (BOMILP) is presented. <i>Results</i>: The first objective is to reduce location costs and inventory costs that take into account probable demand, consumption factors, and transportation costs, and the second objective is to raise the level of services offered to victims in the model. The software programs GAMS win32, 25.1.2 and MATLAB have been utilized with numerical examples in various dimensions. <i>Conclusions</i>: To maximize the efficiency and quality of the service, first, the model was numerically solved, and then the location where the most commodities could be transported at the lowest possible cost was identified.

Transportation and communication, Management. Industrial management
DOAJ Open Access 2024
Lean and Agile Supply Strategies in Distribution Centres to Deliver Value-Added Services (VAS)

Eduard Klundt, Neil Towers, Kamal Bechkoum

<i>Background:</i> This paper examines how logistics mangers increase performance by incorporating VAS in their distribution centres in the context of different natures of customer demand. The study is underpinned by the principles of lean and agile strategies as two key concepts that can be applied to respond to different customer expectations. <i>Methods</i>: Based on the phenomenological interpretivist paradigm, an empirical multiple-case study was conducted in German distribution centres operated by six companies. The empirical data were collected through semi-structured interviews, built on the triangulation of sources. Open, axial, and selective coding were employed to analyse data collected through eighteen in-depth interviews with managers from the distribution centres. <i>Results:</i> The findings indicated that the construct of customer demand forms different benefits that the logistics service providers can achieve through VAS. Simultaneously, various customer demands on VAS requires the distribution centres to focus on developing different operational capabilities to gain superior performance. <i>Conclusions:</i> Based on the research findings, a conceptual model was created. This model can support logistics service providers in improving company performance through effectively managing VAS in their distribution centres. The high dynamic VAS customer demand can bring more financial and non-financial benefits but needs higher flexibility in the warehouse operation system. Stable and predictable VAS, in turn, require a higher degree of standardisation.

Transportation and communication, Management. Industrial management
arXiv Open Access 2024
Neural Graph Matching for Video Retrieval in Large-Scale Video-driven E-commerce

Houye Ji, Ye Tang, Zhaoxin Chen et al.

With the rapid development of the short video industry, traditional e-commerce has encountered a new paradigm, video-driven e-commerce, which leverages attractive videos for product showcases and provides both video and item services for users. Benefitting from the dynamic and visualized introduction of items,video-driven e-commerce has shown huge potential in stimulating consumer confidence and promoting sales. In this paper, we focus on the video retrieval task, facing the following challenges: (1) Howto handle the heterogeneities among users, items, and videos? (2)How to mine the complementarity between items and videos for better user understanding? In this paper, we first leverage the dual graph to model the co-existing of user-video and user-item interactions in video-driven e-commerce and innovatively reduce user preference understanding to a graph matching problem. To solve it, we further propose a novel bi-level Graph Matching Network(GMN), which mainly consists of node- and preference-level graph matching. Given a user, node-level graph matching aims to match videos and items, while preference-level graph matching aims to match multiple user preferences extracted from both videos and items. Then the proposed GMN can generate and improve user embedding by aggregating matched nodes or preferences from the dual graph in a bi-level manner. Comprehensive experiments show the superiority of the proposed GMN with significant improvements over state-of-the-art approaches (e.g., AUC+1.9% and CTR+7.15%). We have developed it on a well-known video-driven e-commerce platform, serving hundreds of millions of users every day

en cs.LG, cs.AI
arXiv Open Access 2024
Exit Spillovers of Foreign-invested Enterprises in Shenzhen's Electronics Manufacturing Industry

Hanqiao Zhang

Neighborhood characteristics have been broadly studied with different firm behaviors, e.g. birth, entry, expansion, and survival, except for firm exit. Using a novel dataset of foreign-invested enterprises operating in Shenzhen's electronics manufacturing industry from 2017 to 2021, I investigate the spillover effects of firm exits on other firms in the vicinity, from both the industry group and the industry class level. Significant neighborhood effects are identified for the industry group level, but not the industry class level.

en econ.GN, stat.AP
arXiv Open Access 2024
E-Commerce in Africa: Divergent Impacts on Rural and Urban Economies

Jaelyn S. Liang, Rehaan S. Mundy, Shriya Jagwayan

E-commerce is rapidly transforming economies across Africa, offering immense opportunities for economic growth, market expansion, and digital inclusion. This study investigates the effects of e-commerce on select African regions. By utilizing readiness factors, including mobile money deployment, GDP per capita, internet penetration, and digital infrastructure, the preparedness of African countries for e-commerce adoption is quantified, highlighting significant disparities. Through case studies in urban and rural areas, including Lagos, Kano, Nairobi, and the Rift Valley, the study shows e-commerce's significant effects on small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), employment, and market efficiency. Urban centers demonstrated significant gains in productivity and profitability, whereas rural regions experienced slower growth due to limited internet access and infrastructural barriers. Despite these challenges, localized solutions such as mobile money systems and agricultural e-commerce platforms are bridging gaps. This study highlights the significant potential of e-commerce in Africa while emphasizing the need for targeted investments and strategies to address existing regional disparities.

en econ.GN
DOAJ Open Access 2023
Green Supply Chain Management: The Effect of Procurement Sustainability on Reverse Logistics

Nataliia Letunovska, Felix Amoako Offei, Prince Amoh Junior et al.

<i>Background</i>: Sustainable procurement is about considering social and environmental factors alongside financial factors in making procurement decisions and purchasing goods and services that take into account the social, economic, and environmental impact that such purchasing has on people and communities. This study was carried out to address the effects of procurement sustainability on reverse logistics. It considered four objectives: to establish the relationship between environmental procurement sustainability and reverse logistics, to examine the relationship between economic procurement sustainability and reverse logistics, to examine the relationship between social sustainability procurement and reverse logistics, and to examine the moderating role of government policy. <i>Methods</i>: This study applied structural equation modeling to check the research hypotheses. A purposive sampling technique was used. A structured questionnaire was used to gather primary data. The data gathered were analyzed using descriptive and inferential analysis. The data were analyzed in SPSS version 21. The study found that environmental, economic, and social procurement sustainability has a significant and positive effect on reverse logistics. Government policy moderates the relationships between environmental, economic, and social procurement sustainability and reverse logistics. <i>Conclusions</i>: This study recommends that organizations team up with environmental protection agencies to produce environmentally friendly products. Social interventions that can help protect society from damage should be acknowledged. Good economic policies that ensure that organizations increase their wealth should also be acknowledged.

Transportation and communication, Management. Industrial management
DOAJ Open Access 2023
Optimization of Broadband Microstrip Antenna Device for 5G Wireless Communication Systems

Islamov Islam

The paper proposes a new method for finding the optimal design of complementary split ring resonator cells for a microstrip antenna, which makes it possible to purposefully optimize the parameters of resonator cells, which significantly improve the electrical characteristics of the antenna. This antenna is designed for cellular communication 5G. The proposed method combines a regression model using a deep network based on fully connected neural layers with a search based on the conditional optimization algorithm COBYLA to find the optimal design parameters of resonator cells. This approach fully automates the process of creating microstrip antennas with resonator cells based on metamaterials and makes it possible to find the parameters of complementary split ring resonator cells that provide the optimal operating mode as a whole and gives the maximum level of antenna radiation while maintaining the bandwidth. The small size of complementary split ring resonator cells opens up the possibility of using this peculiar configuration to create compact and efficient microstrip antennas.

Transportation and communication
DOAJ Open Access 2023
Validation of electronic bills of exchange in Iranian law by looking at American law in the light of UNCITRAL

Ali Keshavarz, Ali Nakhjavani , naser alidoosti shahraki

lectronic bill of lading has a special place in commercial law today. On the one hand, in parallel with the observance of business principles, including the principle of the speed of business affairs, its electronification is also inevitable and requires the application of rules and regulations to stabilise and validate them. On the other hand, because the judicial validation of this crucial electronic document is ambiguous, it is necessary to use the international rules and the laws of leading countries to regulate the governing rules for this document. Therefore, in the analysis of Iran's laws in this regard with the descriptive and analytical method, the criteria of UNCITRAL rules and combined with those laws of the United States as a leading country in registering the rules of electronification of commercial documents, the international achievements of validation and verification of the confirmation and assignment of this document to the obligee And the issuer of the electronic bill is introduced. This way, electronic signature stabilisation criteria and public assurance methods, a judicial act, can be selected as a criterion and presented as a problem. Investigations showed that the rules of UNCITRAL are closer to the rules of justice in this regard, and some of the rules of the law of Utah in the United States regarding electronic bills of lading are different from what is the public and private link of judicial validation of other electronic evidence.

Regulation of industry, trade, and commerce. Occupational law, Islamic law
arXiv Open Access 2023
BlockChain I/O: Enabling Cross-Chain Commerce

Anwitaman Datta, Daniël Reijsbergen, Jingchi Zhang et al.

Blockchain technology enables secure tokens transfers in digital marketplaces, and recent advances in this field provide other desirable properties such as efficiency, privacy, and price stability. However, these properties do not always generalize to a setting across multiple independent blockchains. Despite the growing number of existing blockchain platforms, there is a lack of an overarching framework whose components provide all of the necessary properties for practical cross-chain commerce. We present BlockChain I/O to provide such a framework. BlockChain I/O introduces entities called cross-chain services to relay information between different blockchains. The proposed design ensures that cross-chain services cannot violate transaction safety, and they are furthermore disincentivized from other types of misbehavior through an audit system. BlockChain I/O uses native stablecoins to mitigate price fluctuations, and a decentralized ID system to allow users to prove aspects of their identity without violating privacy. After presenting the core architecture of BlockChain I/O, we demonstrate how to use it to implement a cross-chain marketplace and discuss how its desirable properties continue to hold in the end-to-end system. Finally, we use experimental evaluations to demonstrate BlockChain I/O's practical performance.

en cs.CR
arXiv Open Access 2023
Fairness in Image Search: A Study of Occupational Stereotyping in Image Retrieval and its Debiasing

Swagatika Dash

Multi-modal search engines have experienced significant growth and widespread use in recent years, making them the second most common internet use. While search engine systems offer a range of services, the image search field has recently become a focal point in the information retrieval community, as the adage goes, "a picture is worth a thousand words". Although popular search engines like Google excel at image search accuracy and agility, there is an ongoing debate over whether their search results can be biased in terms of gender, language, demographics, socio-cultural aspects, and stereotypes. This potential for bias can have a significant impact on individuals' perceptions and influence their perspectives. In this paper, we present our study on bias and fairness in web search, with a focus on keyword-based image search. We first discuss several kinds of biases that exist in search systems and why it is important to mitigate them. We narrow down our study to assessing and mitigating occupational stereotypes in image search, which is a prevalent fairness issue in image retrieval. For the assessment of stereotypes, we take gender as an indicator. We explore various open-source and proprietary APIs for gender identification from images. With these, we examine the extent of gender bias in top-tanked image search results obtained for several occupational keywords. To mitigate the bias, we then propose a fairness-aware re-ranking algorithm that optimizes (a) relevance of the search result with the keyword and (b) fairness w.r.t genders identified. We experiment on 100 top-ranked images obtained for 10 occupational keywords and consider random re-ranking and re-ranking based on relevance as baselines. Our experimental results show that the fairness-aware re-ranking algorithm produces rankings with better fairness scores and competitive relevance scores than the baselines.

en cs.IR, cs.CL
arXiv Open Access 2023
Robust Regulation of Firms' Access to Consumer Data

Jose Higueras

I study how to regulate firms' access to consumer data when a regulator faces non-Bayesian uncertainty about how firms will exploit the consumer's information to segment the market and set prices. I fully characterize all worst-case optimal policies when the regulator maximizes consumer surplus: the regulator allows a firm to access data only if the firm cannot use the database to identify a small group of consumers.

en econ.TH
DOAJ Open Access 2022
Akty prawa międzynarodowego dotyczące odpowiedzialności karnej w prawie ochrony środowiska w kontekście środków penalnych przewidzianych w prawie polskim

Rafał Fic

Przedmiotem artykułu jest w pierwszej kolejności przedstawienie aktów prawnych przyjętych przez społeczność międzynarodową w ramach walki z degradacją środowiska z poświęceniem szczególnej uwagi dyrektywie PE i Rady 2008/99/WE w sprawie ochrony środowiska poprzez prawo karne. Poddane analizie zostały najważniejsze regulacje tych aktów prawnych ze wskazaniem na proponowane przez prawodawcę międzynarodowego środki penalne mające na celu ochronę dobra prawnego jakim jest środowisko naturalne. Przedstawiona zostanie również ewolucja prawodawstwa w omawianym zakresie. W dalszej części przedstawiony katalog narzędzi prawnokarnych wynikających z ww. aktów, został zestawiony z występującymi w polskim prawie karnym środkami penalnymi stosowanymi w reakcji na przestępstwa przeciwko środowisku, ze wskazaniem perspektyw rozwoju prawodawstwa w omawianym zakresie.

Environmental law, Regulation of industry, trade, and commerce. Occupational law
arXiv Open Access 2021
Quantifying the noise in bursty gene expression under regulation by small RNAs

Shigang Qiu, Tao Jia

Gene expression is a fundamental process in a living system. The small RNAs (sRNAs) is widely observed as a global regulator in gene expression. The inherent nonlinearity in this regulatory process together with the bursty production of messenger RNA (mRNA), sRNA and protein make the exact solution for this stochastic process intractable. This is particularly the case when quantifying the protein noise level, which has great impact on multiple cellular processes. Here we propose an approximate yet reasonably accurate solution for the gene expression noise with infrequent burst and strong regulation by sRNAs. This analytical solution allows us to better analyze the noise and stochastic deviation of protein level. We find that the regulation amplifies the noise, reduces the protein level. The stochasticity in the regulation generates more proteins than what if the stochasticity is removed from the system. The sRNA level is most important to the relationship between the noise and stochastic deviation. The results provide analytical tools for more general studies of gene expression and strengthen our quantitative understandings of post-transcriptional regulation in controlling gene expression processes.

en q-bio.MN

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