Search results for: trusted third party
Commenced in January 2007
Frequency: Monthly
Edition: International
Paper Count: 469

Search results for: trusted third party

379 The Diversity of Contexts within Which Adolescents Engage with Digital Media: Contributing to More Challenging Tasks for Parents and a Need for Third Party Mediation

Authors: Ifeanyi Adigwe, Thomas Van der Walt

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Digital media has been integrated into the social and entertainment life of young children, and as such, the impact of digital media appears to affect young people of all ages and it is believed that this will continue to shape the world of young children. Since, technological advancement of digital media presents adolescents with diverse contexts, platforms and avenues to engage with digital media outside the home environment and from parents' supervision, a wide range of new challenges has further complicated the already difficult tasks for parents and altered the landscape of parenting. Despite the fact that adolescents now have access to a wide range of digital media technologies both at home and in the learning environment, parenting practices such as active, restrictive, co-use, participatory and technical mediations are important in mitigating of online risks adolescents may encounter as a result of digital media use. However, these mediation practices only focus on the home environment including digital media present in the home and may not necessarily transcend outside the home and other learning environments where adolescents use digital media for school work and other activities. This poses the question of who mediates adolescent's digital media use outside the home environment. The learning environment could be a ''loose platform'' where an adolescent can maximise digital media use considering the fact that there is no restriction in terms of content and time allotted to using digital media during school hours. That is to say that an adolescent can play the ''bad boy'' online in school because there is little or no restriction of digital media use and be exposed to online risks and play the ''good boy'' at home because of ''heavy'' parental mediation. This is the reason why parent mediation practices have been ineffective because a parent may not be able to track adolescents digital media use considering the diversity of contexts, platforms and avenues adolescents use digital media. This study argues that due to the diverse nature of digital media technology, parents may not be able to monitor the 'whereabouts' of their children in the digital space. This is because adolescent digital media usage may not only be confined to the home environment but other learning environments like schools. This calls for urgent attention on the part of teachers to understand the intricacies of how digital media continue to shape the world in which young children are developing and learning. It is, therefore, imperative for parents to liaise with the schools of their children to mediate digital media use during school hours. The implication of parents- teachers mediation practices are discussed. The article concludes by suggesting that third party mediation by teachers in schools and other learning environments should be encouraged and future research needs to consider the emergent strategy of teacher-children mediation approach and the implication for policy for both the home and learning environments.

Keywords: digital media, digital age, parent mediation, third party mediation

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378 From the Lack of Trust Law to a Controversial Judicial Case Law: Implications for Perfecting Vietnam’s Legal System

Authors: Le Bich Thuy

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A trust is an alien notion in Vietnamese law until 2021, which not only dissatisfies the practical demands of the nation’s civilians but also results in some detrimental shortcomings. The Judicial Case Law No 2 to be applied in adjudicating subsequent cases is a typical example of such negative consequences, implying a need for an application of trust law into Vietnam’s legal system. This paper first presents the similarity in nature between parties’ relationship in the mentioned case and a proprietary trust relationship, followed by an analysis of such a case from a trusted perspective. Subsequently, an introduction of potential obstacles hindering the introduction of trust law into the Vietnamese legal framework is presented. Finally, some implications are suggested for perfecting Vietnam’s legal system.

Keywords: Vietnamese case law no 2, trust law, private property management, patrimony

Procedia PDF Downloads 170
377 Indonesian Marriage Law Reform: A Doctrinal Research to Find the Way to Strengthen Children's Rights against Child Marriage

Authors: Erni Agustin, Zendy Prameswari

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The Law Number 1 Year 1974 on Marriage was issued by Indonesian Government to replace the old marriage law stipulated in Burgerlijk Wetboek inherited from the Dutch colonial. The Law defines marriage as both physical and mental bond between a man and a woman as husband and wife with the purpose to form a harmonious family based on deity. Marriage shall be conducted when determined requirements are met based on the Law. Article 7 of the Law Number 1 Year 1974 stipulates the minimum age requirement to enter into marriage, which is 19 years for men and 16 years for women. This stipulation is made to make the marriage achieve the true goal to form a happy, eternal and prosperous family. It is expected at that age, each party has a mature soul and physic. However, it is possible for those who have not reached the age to enter into marriage if there is a dispensation granted by the courts or other official designated by the parents of each party in the marriage. As many other countries in the world, Indonesia has serious problems linked with the child or underage marriage. Indonesia is one of the countries with the highest absolute numbers of child marriage. In 2012, a judicial review was filed to the Constitutional Court against the provisions of the minimum age limit in the Law Number 1 Year 1974 on Marriage. The appeal was filed in order to raise the limit of minimum age for women from 16 years to be 18 years. However, the Constitutional Court considered that the provisions on the minimum age in the Law Number 1 Year 1974 on Marriage is constitutional. At the international level, Indonesia has participated in the formulation of variety of international human rights instrument which have an impact on children, and is a party to a number of them. Indonesia ratified the CRC through Presidential Decree of the Republic of Indonesia Number 36 Year 1990 on 5 September 1990. This paper attempts to analyze three main issues. Firstly, it will scrutinize the ratio legis of the stipulation on minimum age requirement to enter into marriage in the Law Number 1 Year 1974 on Marriage. Secondly, it will discuss the conformity of Indonesian marriage law to the principles and provisions on the CRC. Last, this paper will elaborate the legal measures shall be taken to strengthen the legal protection for children against child marriage. This paper is a doctrinal research using statute, conceptual and historical approaches. This study argues that The Law-making of Indonesian marriage law influenced by religious values that live in Indonesia. With regard to the conformity of Indonesian marriage law with the CRC, Indonesia is facing the issue of the compatibility of its respective national law with the CRC. Therefore, the legal measures that have to be taken are to review and amend the Indonesian Marriage Law to provide better protection for the children against underage marriage.

Keywords: child marriage, children’s rights, indonesian marriage law, underage marriage

Procedia PDF Downloads 174
376 Women's Parliamentary Representation in Uganda: A Relative Analysis of the Pathways of Women on the Open vs. Affirmative Action Seat

Authors: Doreen Chemutai

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While women's parliamentary representation has increased over the years, most women contest the affirmative action seat (A.A). There is a lack of knowledge on why women prefer the affirmative seat vis- a- vis the open seat. This study argues that comparing women's path on the reserved and open seat to parliamentary representation enables us to pass judgment on why this trend continues. This paper provides a narrative analysis of women members of parliament's (MPs) trajectory in the open seat and Affirmative Action seat to parliamentary representation. Purposive sampling was used to select participants from the Northern Uganda districts of Kitgum, Pader, Oyam, Agago, and Gulu. The eight women MPs chosen for the study completed in-depth interviews exploring their qualifications, careers, and experiences before joining the political office, their party affiliation, and the kind of seat they currently occupy in the 10th parliament. Findings revealed similarities between women on the open and reserved to include; women generally irrespective of the seat they choose to contest for find it difficult to win elections because voters doubt women's effectiveness as leaders. All women as incumbents find it difficult to be re-elected because their evaluation is harsher than that for men. Findings also revealed that women representatives are motivated by their personal lived experiences, community work, educational leadership, and local leadership. The study establishes that the popularity of the party in a given geographical location and the opponents' quality will determine the success of the parliamentary candidate in question irrespective of whether one is contesting on the open or Affirmative seat. However, the study revealed differences between MPs' experiences in the quest for the parliamentary seat, females on the open seat are subjected to gender discrimination in elections by party leadership, stereotyped, and are victims of propaganda in the initial contesting stages. Women who win elections in the open seat have to be superior to their male opponents. In other circumstances where a woman emerges successful, she may be voted for due to other reasons beyond capability, such as physical appearance or sociability. On the other hand, MPs' revelations on affirmative action seats show that the political terrain is smoother despite larger constituencies. Findings show that women on the Affirmative Action seat do not move to the open seat because of the comfort associated with the seat and maintain consistency, since the constituencies doubt the motives of representatives who change from one seat to another. The study concludes that women MPs who contest on the open seat are likely to suffer structural barriers such as gender discrimination and political recruitment bias instead of women on the affirmative seat. This explains why the majority of women contest on the affirmative seat.

Keywords: affirmative action seats, open seats, parliamentary representation, pathways

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375 Development of a Web-Based Application for Intelligent Fertilizer Management in Rice Cultivation

Authors: Hao-Wei Fu, Chung-Feng Kao

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In the era of rapid technological advancement, information technology (IT) has become integral to modern life, exerting significant influence across diverse sectors and serving as a catalyst for development in various industries. Within agriculture, the integration of IT offers substantial benefits, notably enhancing operational efficiency. Real-time monitoring systems, for instance, have been widely embraced in agriculture, effectively improving crop management practices. This study specifically addresses the management of rice panicle fertilizer, presenting the development of a web application tailored to handle data associated with rice panicle fertilizer management. Leveraging the normalized difference red edge index, this application optimizes the quantity of rice panicle fertilizer used, providing recommendations to agricultural stakeholders and service providers in the agricultural information sector. The overarching objective is to minimize costs while maximizing yields. Furthermore, a robust database system has been established to store and manage relevant data for future reference in rice cultivation management. Additionally, the study utilizes the Representational State Transfer software architectural style to construct an application programming interface (API), facilitating data creation, retrieval, updating, and deletion for users via the HyperText Transfer Protocol methods. Future plans involve integrating this API with third-party services to incorporate it into larger frameworks, thus catering to the diverse requirements of various third-party services.

Keywords: application programming interface, HyperText Transfer Protocol, nitrogen fertilizer intelligent management, web-based application

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374 Tracing Digital Traces of Phatic Communion in #Mooc

Authors: Judith Enriquez-Gibson

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This paper meddles with the notion of phatic communion introduced 90 years ago by Malinowski, who was a Polish-born British anthropologist. It explores the phatic in Twitter within the contents of tweets related to moocs (massive online open courses) as a topic or trend. It is not about moocs though. It is about practices that could easily be hidden or neglected if we let big or massive topics take the lead or if we simply follow the computational or secret codes behind Twitter itself and third party software analytics. It draws from media and cultural studies. Though at first it appears data-driven as I submitted data collection and analytics into the hands of a third party software, Twitonomy, the aim is to follow how phatic communion might be practised in a social media site, such as Twitter. Lurking becomes its research method to analyse mooc-related tweets. A total of 3,000 tweets were collected on 11 October 2013 (UK timezone). The emphasis of lurking is to engage with Twitter as a system of connectivity. One interesting finding is that a click is in fact a phatic practice. A click breaks the silence. A click in one of the mooc website is actually a tweet. A tweet was posted on behalf of a user who simply chose to click without formulating the text and perhaps without knowing that it contains #mooc. Surely, this mechanism is not about reciprocity. To break the silence, users did not use words. They just clicked the ‘tweet button’ on a mooc website. A click performs and maintains connectivity – and Twitter as the medium in attendance in our everyday, available when needed to be of service. In conclusion, the phatic culture of breaking silence in Twitter does not have to submit to the power of code and analytics. It is a matter of human code.

Keywords: click, Twitter, phatic communion, social media data, mooc

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373 Fear-Mongering and Its Antidotes: The Case of the Hungarian Anti-Migrant Campaign

Authors: Zsofia Nagy

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A sharp increase in the number of refugees crossing Hungary during 2015, coupled with the Hungarian government’s agenda-setting strategy led to a powerful anti-migrant campaign in public, framing asylum-seekers as external threats to the country. While this campaign was, by and large, unchallenged by the Hungarian parliamentary opposition, Two-Tailed Dog Party, a Hungarian mock-party launched a counter-billboard campaign attacking the governmental discourse. Taking the latter as a case of digitally supported civic action, the paper first discusses two theoretical problems related to contemporary social movements: the problem of voice and the problem of participation. Afterward the paper presents the case of the Hungarian anti-migrant billboard campaign led by the government and the counter-billboard campaign and examines their action repertoires. It argues that a number of strategic differences are noteworthy: contrasts between traditional and digital methods, the reliance on the ’spirals of silence’ on the one hand and the breaking of this very silence on the other, where people are holding a minority opinion were given a platform and visibility in public. On a deeper level, the counter-campaign challenged the hegemonic views about public discourse. It effectively contrasted the government’s one-to-many, top-bottom approach to political communication with a campaign that relied on many-to-many communication and a bottom-up approach. While it is true that through memetic engineering, the original governmental messages were altered and the outcomes were brought back to the streets of Hungary; the effects of the two campaigns nevertheless reinforced the original anti-migrant focus of the political agenda.

Keywords: counterpublics, migration, refugees, social movements

Procedia PDF Downloads 210
372 Political Party Mobilization Strategies in Ghana: A Comparative Analysis of Three Constituencies

Authors: F. Agbele

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Elections are core democratic institutions. Consequently, voter participation during elections is paramount to democratic governance as it serves as a medium to legitimize authority and make the privileges of electoral democracy meaningful to citizens. To this effect, the topic of voter mobilization and subsequent turnout level have been largely studied in advanced democracies. In young and consolidating democracies, the debate has, however, revolves around the huge reliance on ethnic and regional appeals. According to the Author’s knowledge, studies on electoral mobilization especially within the African context have argued the use of ethnic linkages by political parties to mobilize voters during elections. Literature has however not differentiated between the level of democratic dispensation among African countries and the use of ethnic linkages. The question, however, is whether the state of the country’s democracy determines the strategies employed by political parties to induce voter participation. In other words, do parties simply play ethno-regional cards as strongly suggested by literature or will consider an arrayed of strategies to mobilize voters? Additionally, studies have not differentiated the impact of mobilization strategy within a country, i.e. between high to low turnout areas. They have also not distinguished between strategies employed by an incumbent or an opposition party. This paper, therefore, is a comparative analysis of voter mobilization in Ghana. It uses original survey and interview data from three constituencies in Ghana: Nanton, Assin North, and Ellembelle, which are typical cases of high, average and low turnout areas, respectively. The data were concurrently collected during fieldworks conducted in November 2016 to February 2017, and again from July to August 2017. The study found that political parties within a consolidating democracy employ a blend of strategies to ensure turnout by both parties’ faithful and swing voters. The dominant strategies used depends on whether the party is an incumbent or in opposition. While an incumbent may depend more on personalistic and clientelistic strategies, parties in opposition will largely use programmatic strategies, which entails making many campaign promises. Additionally, opposition parties do use clientelistic tactics, but not on the same level as the incumbent. Similarly, within the context of this study, the use of ethnic linkage by political parties to mobilize voters has not been found to be as strong as suggested in the literature. Further, location was key in determining the strategy to use. In all, the consolidation process of a democratic country like Ghana means the change of mobilization strategies used by political parties, which entail a gradual shift from ethnic linkages to programmatic and other forms of non-programmatic strategies.

Keywords: comparative analysis, elections, mobilization strategies, voter turnout

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371 Jurisdictional Problem of International Criminal Court over National of Non-Parties: A Legal Analysis in the Light of Rome Statute

Authors: Nour Mohammad

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The concept of International Criminal Court is not a new idea.It goes back to the late 19th century and was first mooted in 1872 by Gustave Moynier of the International Commitee of the Red Cross(ICRC). This paper attempts to focus on jurisdictional problem of the international criminal court (ICC) over national of states of non parties to the Rome statute. Mor than 120 countries are state parties to the Rome Statute representing all regions, Afria, the Asia-pacofoc Eastern Europe, Latin America and the Caribben as well as Western Europe and North America.The Statute is the core document of internationa criminal law todaycontaining 128 Articles and divided in 13 parts.The Rome Statute provides that the court may sit elsewhere the judge consider it desirable.The International Criminal Court is not in a position to adjudicate all international crimes but its jurisdiction is limited to the four categories of crime viz. genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and crime of aggression as stipulated in Article 5 of the ICC Statute. It also mention here that the Court will be able to exercise its jurisdiction over the crime of aggression only when this crime is defined. Due to the highly political nature of this crime, it is unlikely that a consensus in this regard would be arrived at in the near future.The main point of this article is to discuss the mandate of international criminal court to prosecute and punish persons responsible for the henious crimes of concern to the international community.The author highlighted the principles which support the delegation of criminal jurisdiction by state to international tribunals and discuss the precedents of such delegation.It also argued that the exercise of ICC jurisdiction over acts done pursuant to the officially policy of non-party state would not be contrary to the principles requiring consent for the exercise of jurisdiction by international tribunals. The article explore the limit to jurisdiction of ICC over non-party nationals.

Keywords: jurisdiction, international, criminal, court, non-parties

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370 Applying Quadrant Analysis in Identifying Business-to-Business Customer-Driven Improvement Opportunities in Third Party Logistics Industry

Authors: Luay Jum'a

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Many challenges are facing third-party logistics (3PL) providers in the domestic and global markets which create a volatile decision making environment. All these challenges such as managing changes in consumer behaviour, demanding expectations from customers and time compressions have turned into complex problems for 3PL providers. Since the movement towards increased outsourcing outpaces movement towards insourcing, the need to achieve a competitive advantage over competitors in 3PL market increases. This trend continues to grow over the years and as a result, areas of strengths and improvements are highlighted through the analysis of the LSQ factors that lead to B2B customers’ satisfaction which become a priority for 3PL companies. Consequently, 3PL companies are increasingly focusing on the most important issues from the perspective of their customers and relying more on this value of information in making their managerial decisions. Therefore, this study is concerned with providing guidance for improving logistics service quality (LSQ) levels in the context of 3PL industry in Jordan. The study focused on the most important factors in LSQ and used a managerial tool that guides 3PL companies in making LSQ improvements based on a quadrant analysis of two main dimensions: LSQ declared importance and LSQ inferred importance. Although, a considerable amount of research has been conducted to investigate the relationship between logistics service quality (LSQ) and customer satisfaction, there remains a lack of developing managerial tools to aid in the process of LSQ improvement decision-making. Moreover, the main advantage for the companies to use 3PL service providers as a trend is due to the realised percentage of cost reduction on the total cost of logistics operations and the incremental improvement in customer service. In this regard, having a managerial tool that help 3PL service providers in managing the LSQ factors portfolio effectively and efficiently would be a great investment for service providers. One way of suggesting LSQ improvement actions for 3PL service providers is via the adoption of analysis tools that perform attribute categorisation such as Importance–Performance matrix. In mind of the above, it can be stated that the use of quadrant analysis will provide a valuable opportunity for 3PL service providers to identify improvement opportunities as customer service attributes or factors importance are identified in two different techniques that complete each other. Moreover, the data were collected through conducting a survey and 293 questionnaires were returned from business-to-business (B2B) customers of 3PL companies in Jordan. The results showed that the LSQ factors vary in their importance and 3PL companies should focus on some LSQ factors more than other factors. Moreover, ordering procedures, timeliness/responsiveness LSQ factors considered being crucial in 3PL businesses and therefore they need to have more focus and development by 3PL service providers in the Jordanian market.

Keywords: logistics service quality, managerial decisions, quadrant analysis, third party logistics service provider

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369 Monocular Visual Odometry for Three Different View Angles by Intel Realsense T265 with the Measurement of Remote

Authors: Heru Syah Putra, Aji Tri Pamungkas Nurcahyo, Chuang-Jan Chang

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MOIL-SDK method refers to the spatial angle that forms a view with a different perspective from the Fisheye image. Visual Odometry forms a trusted application for extending projects by tracking using image sequences. A real-time, precise, and persistent approach that is able to contribute to the work when taking datasets and generate ground truth as a reference for the estimates of each image using the FAST Algorithm method in finding Keypoints that are evaluated during the tracking process with the 5-point Algorithm with RANSAC, as well as produce accurate estimates the camera trajectory for each rotational, translational movement on the X, Y, and Z axes.

Keywords: MOIL-SDK, intel realsense T265, Fisheye image, monocular visual odometry

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368 Cybersecurity Challenges in the Era of Open Banking

Authors: Krish Batra

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The advent of open banking has revolutionized the financial services industry by fostering innovation, enhancing customer experience, and promoting competition. However, this paradigm shift towards more open and interconnected banking ecosystems has introduced complex cybersecurity challenges. This research paper delves into the multifaceted cybersecurity landscape of open banking, highlighting the vulnerabilities and threats inherent in sharing financial data across a network of banks and third-party providers. Through a detailed analysis of recent data breaches, phishing attacks, and other cyber incidents, the paper assesses the current state of cybersecurity within the open banking framework. It examines the effectiveness of existing security measures, such as encryption, API security protocols, and authentication mechanisms, in protecting sensitive financial information. Furthermore, the paper explores the regulatory response to these challenges, including the implementation of standards such as PSD2 in Europe and similar initiatives globally. By identifying gaps in current cybersecurity practices, the research aims to propose a set of robust, forward-looking strategies that can enhance the security and resilience of open banking systems. This includes recommendations for banks, third-party providers, regulators, and consumers on how to mitigate risks and ensure a secure open banking environment. The ultimate goal is to provide stakeholders with a comprehensive understanding of the cybersecurity implications of open banking and to outline actionable steps for safeguarding the financial ecosystem in an increasingly interconnected world.

Keywords: open banking, financial services industry, cybersecurity challenges, data breaches, phishing attacks, encryption, API security protocols, authentication mechanisms, regulatory response, PSD2, cybersecurity practices

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367 Real Time Classification of Political Tendency of Twitter Spanish Users based on Sentiment Analysis

Authors: Marc Solé, Francesc Giné, Magda Valls, Nina Bijedic

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What people say on social media has turned into a rich source of information to understand social behavior. Specifically, the growing use of Twitter social media for political communication has arisen high opportunities to know the opinion of large numbers of politically active individuals in real time and predict the global political tendencies of a specific country. It has led to an increasing body of research on this topic. The majority of these studies have been focused on polarized political contexts characterized by only two alternatives. Unlike them, this paper tackles the challenge of forecasting Spanish political trends, characterized by multiple political parties, by means of analyzing the Twitters Users political tendency. According to this, a new strategy, named Tweets Analysis Strategy (TAS), is proposed. This is based on analyzing the users tweets by means of discovering its sentiment (positive, negative or neutral) and classifying them according to the political party they support. From this individual political tendency, the global political prediction for each political party is calculated. In order to do this, two different strategies for analyzing the sentiment analysis are proposed: one is based on Positive and Negative words Matching (PNM) and the second one is based on a Neural Networks Strategy (NNS). The complete TAS strategy has been performed in a Big-Data environment. The experimental results presented in this paper reveal that NNS strategy performs much better than PNM strategy to analyze the tweet sentiment. In addition, this research analyzes the viability of the TAS strategy to obtain the global trend in a political context make up by multiple parties with an error lower than 23%.

Keywords: political tendency, prediction, sentiment analysis, Twitter

Procedia PDF Downloads 210
366 Men of Congress in Today’s Brazil: Ethnographic Notes on Neoliberal Masculinities in Support of Bolsonaro

Authors: Joao Vicente Pereira Fernandez

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In the context of a democratic crisis, a new wave of authoritarianism prompts domineering male figures to leadership posts worldwide. Although the gendered aspect of this phenomenon has been reasonably documented, recent studies have focused on high-level commanding posts, such as those of president and prime-minister, leaving other positions of political power with limited attention. This natural focus of investigation, however powerful, seems to have restricted our understanding of the phenomenon by precluding a more thorough inquiry of its gendered aspects and its consequences for political representation as a whole. Trying to fill this gap, in recent research, we examined the election results of Jair Bolsonaro’s party for the Legislative Branch in 2018. We found that the party's proportion of non-male representatives was on average, showing it provided reasonable access of women to the legislature in a comparative perspective. However, and perhaps more intuitively, we also found that the elected members of Bolsonaro’s party performed very gendered roles, which allowed us to draw the first lines of the representative profiles gathered around the new-right in Brazil. These results unveiled new horizons for further research, addressing topics that range from the role of women for the new-right on Brazilian institutional politics to the relations between these profiles of representatives, their agendas, and political and electoral strategies. This article aims to deepen the understanding of some of these profiles in order to lay the groundwork for the development of the second research agenda mentioned above. More specifically, it focuses on two out of the three profiles that were grasped predominantly, if not entirely, from masculine subjects during our last research, with the objective of portraying the masculinity standards mobilized and promoted by them. These profiles –the entrepreneur and the army man – were chosen to be developed due to their proximity to both liberal and authoritarian views, and, moreover, because they can possibly represent two facets of the new-right that were integrated in a certain way around Bolsonaro in 2018, but that can be reworked in the future. After a brief introduction of the literature on masculinity and politics in times of democratic crisis, we succinctly present the relevant results of our previous research and then describe these two profiles and their masculinities in detail. We adopt a combination of ethnography and discourse analysis, methods that allow us to make sense of the data we collected on our previous research as well as of the data gathered for this article: social media posts and interactions between the elected members that inspired these profiles and their supporters. Finally, we discuss our results, presenting our main argument on how these descriptions provide a further understanding of the gendered aspect of liberal authoritarianism, from where to better apprehend its political implications in Brazil.

Keywords: Brazilian politics, gendered politics, masculinities, new-right

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365 Identification of Risks Associated with Process Automation Systems

Authors: J. K. Visser, H. T. Malan

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A need exists to identify the sources of risks associated with the process automation systems within petrochemical companies or similar energy related industries. These companies use many different process automation technologies in its value chain. A crucial part of the process automation system is the information technology component featuring in the supervisory control layer. The ever-changing technology within the process automation layers and the rate at which it advances pose a risk to safe and predictable automation system performance. The age of the automation equipment also provides challenges to the operations and maintenance managers of the plant due to obsolescence and unavailability of spare parts. The main objective of this research was to determine the risk sources associated with the equipment that is part of the process automation systems. A secondary objective was to establish whether technology managers and technicians were aware of the risks and share the same viewpoint on the importance of the risks associated with automation systems. A conceptual model for risk sources of automation systems was formulated from models and frameworks in literature. This model comprised six categories of risk which forms the basis for identifying specific risks. This model was used to develop a questionnaire that was sent to 172 instrument technicians and technology managers in the company to obtain primary data. 75 completed and useful responses were received. These responses were analyzed statistically to determine the highest risk sources and to determine whether there was difference in opinion between technology managers and technicians. The most important risks that were revealed in this study are: 1) the lack of skilled technicians, 2) integration capability of third-party system software, 3) reliability of the process automation hardware, 4) excessive costs pertaining to performing maintenance and migrations on process automation systems, and 5) requirements of having third-party communication interfacing compatibility as well as real-time communication networks.

Keywords: distributed control system, identification of risks, information technology, process automation system

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364 New Media Impact on Newspaper Readership

Authors: Umar Lawal Maradun

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Newspapers are very important sources of information and are trusted by majority of populations in America, Latin America, Europe and many parts of the world. In the mid-1950s newspapers were at the forefront of providing people with information. However, in the 1970s television took over, while in the 1980s cable satellites became popular and in the 1990s the Internet and World Wide Web became major sources of media content and also major threats to the print media form. This paper looks at how newspaper readership has been affected by new media technology, especially the Internet. It uses empirical data by reviewing available literature within the context of change that is likely to threaten conventional media. It discovers that there is a growing decline in newspaper readership as a result of widespread use of the Internet. The decline in readership has been discovered to be a global phenomenon. The paper suggests strategies for the survival and revenue generation for print-based newspapers.

Keywords: Internet, media, newspaper, press

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363 The Use of Political Savviness in Dealing with Workplace Ostracism: A Social Information Processing Perspective

Authors: Amy Y. Wang, Eko L. Yi

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Can vicarious experiences of workplace ostracism affect employees’ willingness to voice? Given the increasingly interdependent nature of the modern workplace in which employees rely on social interactions to fulfill organizational goals, workplace ostracism –the extent to which an individual perceives that he or she is ignored or excluded by others in the workplace– has garnered significant interest from scholars and practitioners alike. Extending beyond conventional studies that largely focus on the perspectives and outcomes of ostracized targets, we address the indirect effects of workplace ostracism on third-party employees embedded in the same social context. Using a social information processing approach, we propose that the ostracism of coworkers acts as political information that influences third-party employees in their decisions to engage in risky and discretionary behaviors such as employee voice. To make sense of and to navigate through experiences of workplace ostracism, we posit that both political understanding and political skill allow third party employees to minimize the risks and uncertainty of voicing. This conceptual model was tested by a study involving 154 supervisor-subordinate dyads of a publicly listed bio-technology firm located in Mainland China. Each supervisor and their direct subordinates composed of a work team; each team had a minimum of two subordinates and a maximum of four subordinates. Human resources used the master list to distribute the ID coded questionnaires to the matching names. All studied constructs were measured using existing scales proved effective in previous literature. Hypotheses were tested using Confirmatory Factor Analysis and Hierarchal Multiple Regression. All three hypotheses were supported which showed that employees were less likely to engage in voice behaviors when their coworkers reported having experienced ostracism in the workplace. Results also showed a significant three-way interaction between political understanding and political skill on the relationship between coworkers’ ostracism and employee voice, indicating that political savviness is a valuable resource in mitigating ostracism’s negative and indirect effects. Our results illustrated that an employee’s coworkers being ostracized indeed adversely impacted his or her own voice behavior. However, not all individuals reacted passively to the social context; rather, we found that politically savvy individuals – possessing both political understanding and political skill – and their voice behaviors were less impacted by ostracism in their work environment. At the same time, we found that having only political understanding or only political skill was significantly less effective in mitigating ostracism’s negative effects, suggesting a necessary duality of political knowledge and political skill in combatting ostracism. Organizational implications, recommendations, and future research ideas are also discussed.

Keywords: employee voice, organizational politics, social information processing, workplace ostracism

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362 USBware: A Trusted and Multidisciplinary Framework for Enhanced Detection of USB-Based Attacks

Authors: Nir Nissim, Ran Yahalom, Tomer Lancewiki, Yuval Elovici, Boaz Lerner

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Background: Attackers increasingly take advantage of innocent users who tend to use USB devices casually, assuming these devices benign when in fact they may carry an embedded malicious behavior or hidden malware. USB devices have many properties and capabilities that have become the subject of malicious operations. Many of the recent attacks targeting individuals, and especially organizations, utilize popular and widely used USB devices, such as mice, keyboards, flash drives, printers, and smartphones. However, current detection tools, techniques, and solutions generally fail to detect both the known and unknown attacks launched via USB devices. Significance: We propose USBWARE, a project that focuses on the vulnerabilities of USB devices and centers on the development of a comprehensive detection framework that relies upon a crucial attack repository. USBWARE will allow researchers and companies to better understand the vulnerabilities and attacks associated with USB devices as well as providing a comprehensive platform for developing detection solutions. Methodology: The framework of USBWARE is aimed at accurate detection of both known and unknown USB-based attacks by a process that efficiently enhances the framework's detection capabilities over time. The framework will integrate two main security approaches in order to enhance the detection of USB-based attacks associated with a variety of USB devices. The first approach is aimed at the detection of known attacks and their variants, whereas the second approach focuses on the detection of unknown attacks. USBWARE will consist of six independent but complimentary detection modules, each detecting attacks based on a different approach or discipline. These modules include novel ideas and algorithms inspired from or already developed within our team's domains of expertise, including cyber security, electrical and signal processing, machine learning, and computational biology. The establishment and maintenance of the USBWARE’s dynamic and up-to-date attack repository will strengthen the capabilities of the USBWARE detection framework. The attack repository’s infrastructure will enable researchers to record, document, create, and simulate existing and new USB-based attacks. This data will be used to maintain the detection framework’s updatability by incorporating knowledge regarding new attacks. Based on our experience in the cyber security domain, we aim to design the USBWARE framework so that it will have several characteristics that are crucial for this type of cyber-security detection solution. Specifically, the USBWARE framework should be: Novel, Multidisciplinary, Trusted, Lightweight, Extendable, Modular and Updatable and Adaptable. Major Findings: Based on our initial survey, we have already found more than 23 types of USB-based attacks, divided into six major categories. Our preliminary evaluation and proof of concepts showed that our detection modules can be used for efficient detection of several basic known USB attacks. Further research, development, and enhancements are required so that USBWARE will be capable to cover all of the major known USB attacks and to detect unknown attacks. Conclusion: USBWARE is a crucial detection framework that must be further enhanced and developed.

Keywords: USB, device, cyber security, attack, detection

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361 The Perspective of British Politicians on English Identity: Qualitative Study of Parliamentary Debates, Blogs, and Interviews

Authors: Victoria Crynes

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The question of England’s role in Britain is increasingly relevant due to the ongoing rise in citizens identifying as English. Furthermore, the Brexit Referendum was predominantly supported by constituents identifying as English. Few politicians appear to comprehend how Englishness is politically manifested. Politics and the media have depicted English identity as a negative and extremist problem - an inaccurate representation that ignores the breadth of English identifying citizens. This environment prompts the question, 'How are British Politicians Addressing the Modern English Identity Question?' Parliamentary debates, political blogs, and interviews are synthesized to establish a more coherent understanding of the current political attitudes towards English identity, the perceived nature of English identity, and the political manifestation of English representation and governance. Analyzed parliamentary debates addressed the democratic structure of English governance through topics such as English votes for English laws, devolution, and the union. The blogs examined include party-based, multi-author style blogs, and independently authored blogs by politicians, which provide a dynamic and up-to-date representation of party and politician viewpoints. Lastly, fourteen semi-structured interviews of British politicians provide a nuanced perspective on how politicians conceptualize Englishness. Interviewee selection was based on three criteria: (i) Members of Parliament (MP) known for discussing English identity politics, (ii) MPs of strongly English identifying constituencies, (iii) MPs with minimal English identity affiliation. Analysis of parliamentary debates reveals the discussion of English representation has gained little momentum. Many politicians fail to comprehend who the English are, why they desire greater representation and believe that increased recognition of the English would disrupt the unity of the UK. These debates highlight the disconnect of parliament from the disenfranchised English towns. A failure to recognize the legitimacy of English identity politics generates an inability for solution-focused debates to occur. Political blogs demonstrate cross-party recognition of growing English disenfranchisement. The dissatisfaction with British politics derives from multiple factors, including economic decline, shifting community structures, and the delay of Brexit. The left-behind communities have seen little response from Westminster, which is often contrasted to the devolved and louder voices of the other UK nations. Many blogs recognize the need for a political response to the English and lament the lack of party-level initiatives. In comparison, interviews depict an array of local-level initiatives reconnecting MPs to community members. Local efforts include town trips to Westminster, multi-cultural cooking classes, and English language courses. These efforts begin to rebuild positive, local narratives, promote engagement across community sectors, and acknowledge the English voices. These interviewees called for large-scale, political action. Meanwhile, several interviewees denied the saliency of English identity. For them, the term held only extremist narratives. The multi-level analysis reveals continued uncertainty on Englishness within British politics, contrasted with increased recognition of its saliency by politicians. It is paramount that politicians increase discussions on English identity politics to avoid increased alienation of English citizens and to rebuild trust in the abilities of Westminster.

Keywords: British politics, contemporary identity politics and its impacts, English identity, English nationalism, identity politics

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360 Alternate Methods to Visualize 2016 U.S. Presidential Election Result

Authors: Hong Beom Hur

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Politics in America is polarized. The best illustration of this is the 2016 presidential election result map. States with megacities like California, New York, Illinois, Virginia, and others are marked blue to signify the color of the Democratic party. States located in inland and south like Texas, Florida, Tennesse, Kansas and others are marked red to signify the color of the Republican party. Such a stark difference between two colors, red and blue, combined with geolocations of each state with their borderline remarks one central message; America is divided into two colors between urban Democrats and rural Republicans. This paper seeks to defy the visualization by pointing out its limitations and search for alternative ways to visualize the 2016 election result. One such limitation is that geolocations of each state and state borderlines limit the visualization of population density. As a result, the election result map does not convey the fact that Clinton won the popular vote and only accentuates the voting patterns of urban and rural states. The paper seeks whether an alternative narrative can be observed by factoring in the population number into the size of each state and manipulating the state borderline according to the normalization. Yet another alternative narrative may be reached by factoring the size of each state by the number of the electoral college of each state by voting and visualize the number. Other alternatives will be discussed but are not implemented in visualization. Such methods include dividing the land of America into about 120 million cubes each representing a voter or by the number of whole population 300 million cubes. By exploring these alternative methods to visualize the politics of the 2016 election map, the public may be able to question whether it is possible to be free from the narrative of the divide-conquer when interpreting the election map and to look at both parties as a story of the United States of America.

Keywords: 2016 U.S. presidential election, data visualization, population scale, geo-political

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359 The Image of Saddam Hussein and Collective Memory: The Semiotics of Ba'ath Regime's Mural in Iraq (1980-2003)

Authors: Maryam Pirdehghan

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During the Ba'ath Party's rule in Iraq, propaganda was utilized to justify and to promote Saddam Hussein's image in the collective memory as the greatest Arab leader. Consequently, urban walls were routinely covered with images of Saddam. Relying on these images, the regime aimed to provide a basis for evoking meanings in the public opinion, which would supposedly strengthen Saddam’s power and reconstruct facts to legitimize his political ideology. Nonetheless, Saddam was not always portrayed with common and explicit elements but in certain periods of his rule, the paintings depicted him in an unusual context, where various historical and contemporary elements were combined in a narrative background. Therefore, an understanding of the implied socio-political references of these elements is required to fully elucidate the impact of these images on forming the memory and collective unconscious of the Iraqi people. To obtain such understanding, one needs to address the following questions: a) How Saddam Hussein is portrayed in mural during his rule? b) What of elements and mythical-historical narratives are found in the paintings? c) Which Saddam's political views were subject to the collective memory through mural? Employing visual semiotics, this study reveals that during Saddam Hussein's regime, the paintings were initially simple portraits but gradually transformed into narrative images, characterized by a complex network of historical, mythical and religious elements. These elements demonstrate the transformation of a secular-nationalist politician into a Muslim ruler who tried to instill three major policies in domestic and international relations i.e. the arabization of Iraq, as well as the propagation of pan-arabism ideology (first period), the implementation of anti-Israel policy (second period) and the implementation of anti-American-British policy (last period).

Keywords: Ba'ath Party, Saddam Hussein, mural, Iraq, propaganda, collective memory

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358 The Lighthouse Project: Recent Initiatives to Navigate Australian Families Safely Through Parental Separation

Authors: Kathryn McMillan

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A recent study of 8500 adult Australians aged 16 and over revealed 62% had experienced childhood maltreatment. In response to multiple recommendations by bodies such as the Australian Law Reform Commission, parliamentary reports and stakeholder input, a number of key initiatives have been developed to grapple with the difficulties of a federal-state system and to screen and triage high-risk families navigating their way through the court system. The Lighthouse Project (LHP) is a world-first initiative of the Federal Circuit and Family Courts in Australia (FCFOCA) to screen family law litigants for major risk factors, including family violence, child abuse, alcohol or substance abuse and mental ill-health at the point of filing in all applications that seek parenting orders. It commenced on 7 December 2020 on a pilot basis but has now been expanded to 15 registries across the country. A specialist risk screen, Family DOORS, Triage has been developed – focused on improving the safety and wellbeing of families involved in the family law system safety planning and service referral, and ¬ differentiated case management based on risk level, with the Evatt List specifically designed to manage the highest risk cases. Early signs are that this approach is meeting the needs of families with multiple risks moving through the Court system. Before the LHP, there was no data available about the prevalence of risk factors experienced by litigants entering the family courts and it was often assumed that it was the litigation process that was fueling family violence and other risks such as suicidality. Data from the 2022 FCFCOA annual report indicated that in parenting proceedings, 70% alleged a child had been or was at risk of abuse, 80% alleged a party had experienced Family Violence, 74 % of children had been exposed to Family Violence, 53% alleged through substance misuse by party children had caused or was at risk of causing harm to children and 58% of matters allege mental health issues of a party had caused or placed a child at risk of harm. Those figures reveal the significant overlap between child protection and family violence, both of which are under the responsibility of state and territory governments. Since 2020, a further key initiative has been the co-location of child protection and police officials amongst a number of registries of the FCFOCA. The ability to access in a time-effective way details of family violence or child protection orders, weapons licenses, criminal convictions or proceedings is key to managing issues across the state and federal divide. It ensures a more cohesive and effective response to family law, family violence and child protection systems.

Keywords: child protection, family violence, parenting, risk screening, triage.

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357 Using Focus Group Method to Identify Citizen Requirements to Saudi Mobile Government Services

Authors: S. Alotaibi, D. Roussinov

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Mobile government services implementation faces several challenges in developing countries. This paper studies some of those challenges in the context of Saudi Arabia. The study aims to investigate factors affecting m-government acceptance in Saudi Arabia, including ease of use, usefulness, service quality, trust, intention to use and users’ satisfaction. Our investigation will help in integrating the m-government services in citizens’ everyday life. We collected and analyzed our data from focus groups. These focus groups are from King Saud University and Imam Muhammed Bin Saud University, so the samples size are five and seven participants, respectively. We found that there are some factors to identifying citizen requirements to Saudi mobile government services. These services should be easy to use and not require too much effort. Also, these services must be fully trusted.

Keywords: e-government, m-government, focus group, Saudi mobile government services

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356 Governance Framework for an Emerging Trust Ecosystem with a Blockchain-Based Supply Chain

Authors: Ismael Ávila, José Reynaldo F. Filho, Vasco Varanda Picchi

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The ever-growing consumer awareness of food provenance in Brazil is driving the creation of a trusted ecosystem around the animal protein supply chain. The traceability and accountability requirements of such an ecosystem demand a blockchain layer to strengthen the weak links in that chain. For that, direct involvement of the companies in the blockchain transactions, including as validator nodes of the network, implies formalizing a partnership with the consortium behind the ecosystem. Yet, their compliance standards usually require that a formal governance structure is in place before they agree with any membership terms. In light of such a strategic role of blockchain governance, the paper discusses a framework for tailoring a governance model for a blockchain-based solution aimed at the meat supply chain and evaluates principles and attributes in terms of their relevance to the development of a robust trust ecosystem.

Keywords: blockchain, governance, trust ecosystem, supply chain, traceability

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355 Technological Applications in Automobile Manufacturing Sector - A Case Study Analysis

Authors: Raja Kannusamy

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The research focuses on the applicable technologies in the automobile industry and their effects on the productivity and annual revenue of the industry. A study has been conducted on 6 major automobile manufacturing industries represented in this research as M1, M2, M3, M4, M5 and M6. The results indicate that M1, which is a pioneer in technological applications, remains the market leader, followed by M5 & M2 taking the second and third positions, respectively. M3, M6 and M4 are the followers and are placed next in positions. It has also been observed that M1 and M2 have entered into an agreement to share the basic structural technologies and they maintain long-term and trusted relationships with their suppliers through the Keiretsu system. With technological giants such as Apple, Microsoft, Uber and Google entering the automobile industry in recent years, an upward trend is expected in the futuristic market with self-driving cars to dominate the automobile sector. To keep up with the market trend, it is essential for automobile manufacturers to understand the importance of developing technological capabilities and skills to be competitive in the marketplace.

Keywords: automobile manufacturing industries, competitiveness, performance improvement, technological applications

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354 New Media and the Personal Vote in General Elections: A Comparison of Constituency Level Candidates in the United Kingdom and Japan

Authors: Sean Vincent

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Within the academic community, there is a consensus that political parties in established liberal democracies are facing a myriad of organisational challenges as a result of falling membership, weakening links to grass-roots support and rising voter apathy. During the same period of party decline and growing public disengagement political parties have become increasingly professionalised. The professionalisation of political parties owes much to changes in technology, with television becoming the dominant medium for political communication. In recent years, however, it has become clear that a new medium of communication is becoming utilised by political parties and candidates – New Media. New Media, a term hard to define but related to internet based communication, offers a potential revolution in political communication. It can be utilised by anyone with access to the internet and its most widely used platforms of communication such as Facebook and Twitter, are free to use. The advent of Web 2.0 has dramatically changed what can be done with the Internet. Websites now allow candidates at the constituency level to fundraise, organise and set out personalised policies. Social media allows them to communicate with supporters and potential voters practically cost-free. As such candidate dependency on the national party for resources and image now lies open to debate. Arguing that greater candidate independence may be a natural next step in light of the contemporary challenges faced by parties, this paper examines how New Media is being used by candidates at the constituency level to increase their personal vote. The paper will present findings from research carried out during two elections – the Japanese Lower House election of 2014 and the UK general election of 2015. During these elections a sample of candidates, totalling 150 candidates, from the three biggest parties in each country were selected and their new media output, specifically candidate websites, Twitter and Facebook output subjected to content analysis. The analysis examines how candidates are using new media to both become more functionally, through fundraising and volunteer mobilisation and politically, through the promotion of personal/local policies, independent from the national party. In order to validate the results of content analysis this paper will also present evidence from interviews carried out with 17 candidates that stood in the 2014 Japanese Lower House election or 2015 UK general election. With a combination of statistical analysis and interviews, several conclusions can be made about the use of New Media at constituency level. The findings show not just a clear difference in the way candidates from each country are using New Media but also differences within countries based upon the particular circumstances of each constituency. While it has not yet replaced traditional methods of fundraising and activist mobilisation, New Media is also becoming increasingly important in campaign organisation and the general consensus amongst candidates is that its importance will continue to grow along as politics in both countries becomes more diffuse.

Keywords: political campaigns, elections, new media, political communication

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353 Electoral Politics and Voting Behaviour in 2011 Assembly Election in West Bengal, India: A Case Study in Electoral Geography

Authors: Md Motibur Rahman

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The present paper attempts to study the electoral politics and voting behavior of 2011 assembly election of West Bengal state in India. Electoral geography is considered as the study of geographical aspects of the organization, conduct, and result of elections. It deals with the spatial voting patterns/behaviour or the study of the spatial distribution of political phenomena of voting. Voting behavior is a form of political psychology which played a great role in political decision-making process. The voting behavior of the electorates is largely influenced by their perception that existing during the time of election. The main focus of the study will be to analyze the electoral politics of the party organizations and political profile of the electorates. The principle objectives of the present work are i) to study the spatial patterns of voting behavior in 2011 assembly election in West Bengal, ii) to analysis the result and finding of 2011 assembly election. The whole study based on the secondary source of data. The electoral data have taken from Election Commission of India, New Delhi and Centre for the study of Developing Societies (CSDS) in New Delhi. In the battle of 2011 Assembly election in West Bengal, the two major parties were Left Front and Trinamool Congress. This election witnessed the remarkable successes of Trinamool Congress and decline of 34 years longest ruler party that is Left Front. Trinamool Congress won a majority of seats that 227 out of 294 but Left Front won only 62 seats out of 294 seats. The significance of the present study is that it helps in understanding the voting pattern, voting behaviour, trends of voting and also helps for further study of electoral geography in West Bengal. The study would be highly significant and helpful to the planners, politicians, and administrators who are involved in the formulation of development plans and programmes for the people of the state.

Keywords: assembly election, electoral geography, electoral politics, voting behaviour

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352 Digital Watermarking Based on Visual Cryptography and Histogram

Authors: R. Rama Kishore, Sunesh

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Nowadays, robust and secure watermarking algorithm and its optimization have been need of the hour. A watermarking algorithm is presented to achieve the copy right protection of the owner based on visual cryptography, histogram shape property and entropy. In this, both host image and watermark are preprocessed. Host image is preprocessed by using Butterworth filter, and watermark is with visual cryptography. Applying visual cryptography on water mark generates two shares. One share is used for embedding the watermark, and the other one is used for solving any dispute with the aid of trusted authority. Usage of histogram shape makes the process more robust against geometric and signal processing attacks. The combination of visual cryptography, Butterworth filter, histogram, and entropy can make the algorithm more robust, imperceptible, and copy right protection of the owner.

Keywords: digital watermarking, visual cryptography, histogram, butter worth filter

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351 Application of Neural Networks to Predict Changing the Diameters of Bubbles in Pool Boiling Distilled Water

Authors: V. Nikkhah Rashidabad, M. Manteghian, M. Masoumi, S. Mousavian, D. Ashouri

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In this research, the capability of neural networks in modeling and learning complicated and nonlinear relations has been used to develop a model for the prediction of changes in the diameter of bubbles in pool boiling distilled water. The input parameters used in the development of this network include element temperature, heat flux, and retention time of bubbles. The test data obtained from the experiment of the pool boiling of distilled water, and the measurement of the bubbles form on the cylindrical element. The model was developed based on training algorithm, which is typologically of back-propagation type. Considering the correlation coefficient obtained from this model is 0.9633. This shows that this model can be trusted for the simulation and modeling of the size of bubble and thermal transfer of boiling.

Keywords: bubble diameter, heat flux, neural network, training algorithm

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350 Critical Discourse Analysis of Xenophobia in UK Political Party Blogs

Authors: Nourah Almulhim

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This paper takes a critical discourse analysis (CDA) approach to investigate discourse and ideology in political blogs, focusing in particular on the Conservative Home blog from the UK’s current governing party. The Conservative party member’s discourse strategies as the blogger, alongside the discourse used by members of the public who reply to the blog in the below-the-lines comments, will be examined. The blog discourse reflects the writer's political identity and authorial voice. The analysis of the below-the-lines comments enables members of the public to engage in creating adversative positions, introducing different language users who bring their own individual and collective identities. These language users can play the role of news reporters, political analysts, protesters or supporters of a specific agenda and current socio-political topics or events. This study takes a qualitative approach to analyze the discriminatory context towards Islam/Muslims in ' The Conservative Home' blog. A cognitive approach is adopted and an analysis of dominant discourses in the blog text and the below-the-line comments is used. The focus of the study is, firstly, on the construction of self/ collective national identity in comparison to Muslim identity, highlighting the in-group and out-group construction. Second, the type of attitudes, whether feelings or judgments, related to these social actors as they are explicated to draw on the social values. Third, the role of discursive strategies in justifying and legitimizing those Islamophobic discriminatory practices. Therefore, the analysis is based on the systematic analysis of social actors drawing on actors, actions, and arguments to explicate identity construction and its development in the different discourses. A socio-semantic categorization of social actors is implemented to draw on the discursive strategies in addition to using literature to understand these strategies. An appraisal analysis is further used to classify attitudes and elaborate on core values in both genres. Finally, the grammar of othering is applied to explain how discriminatory dichotomies of 'Us' Vs. ''Them' actions are carried in discourse. Some of the key findings of the analysis can be summarized in two main points. First, the discursive practice used to represent Muslims/Islam as different from ‘Us’ are different in both genres as the blogger uses a covert voice while the commenters generally use an overt voice. This is to say that the blogger uses a mitigated strategy to represent the Muslim identity, for example, using the noun phrase ‘British Muslim’ but then representing them as ‘radical’ and ‘terrorists'. Contrary to this is in below the lines comments, where a direct strategy with an active declarative voice is used to negatively represent the Muslim identity as ‘oppressors’ and ‘terrorists’ with no inclusion of the noun phrase ‘British Muslims’. Second, the negotiation of the ‘British’ identity and values, such as culture and democracy, are prominent in the comment section as being unique and under threat by Muslims, while in the article, these standpoints are not represented.

Keywords: xenophobia, blogs, identity, critical discourse analysis

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