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DECML:Distributed Edge Consensus Machine Learning Framework
Get PDFThe increasing reliance on interdependent data-driven services in the Internet of Things (IoT), smart homes, and Industry 4.0 is hindered by siloed security and privacy measures. Existing solutions like federated learning and distributed machine learning, with their various approaches such as differential privacy and homomorphic encryption, while promising, face challenges in ensuring robust security and privacy. We introduce Distributed Edge Consensus Machine Learning (DECML), a novel framework that enables secure, privacy-preserving insights sharing among multiple stakeholders without exposing underlying data or models. DECML distributes queries and aggregates responses through independent nodes, achieving accuracy comparable to local deployments with minimal added latency. Our evaluation, using standard datasets and a 20-node network, demonstrates DECML's potential for collaborative decision-making without compromising privacy. This has significant implications for domains such as cybersecurity, healthcar
Encountering rivers and robots as legal subjects in four acts: Law / Critical Theory / Speculative Fiction
Get PDFThis chapter is a scholarly play in four acts. The play is based on a series of discussions between three legal researchers (Van Dijk, Epstein and De Vries) and a cultural theorist (Goriunova), which focus on the notions of the subject, person, legal personhood and subjectivity in relation to newer developments in both law (cases which granted legal personhood to rivers and valleys and debates concerning personhood of artificial intelligence) and critical theory (posthumanities and the critique of the subject). Here, personified Law and Critical Theory argue, try to work together, watch fictional courtroom footage and formulate problems, exploring the limits of their discourses and fields of action
Exploring the role of management accounting in building sustainability and resilience
Get PDFThe COVID-19 pandemic highlighted and exacerbated pre-existing social, economic, and governance challenges while creating new complexities. More recent economic and geo-political developments such as the Russia-Ukraine War, global inflation surge and major adverse weather events have presented new challenges. As management accountants navigate these issues, they are positioned as key players in addressing immediate crises and fostering long-term adaptability. They can redefine their role to play an increasingly significant part in organisational resilience, tasked with ensuring that organisations are equipped to withstand and adapt to various disruptions while maintaining long-term, sustainable practices.Resilience has been understood in different ways, including in relation to stability, recovery, adaptation, and growth. However, the lack of a unified framework has led to a “jingle-jangle fallacy” where different approaches to resilience coexist without clarity. While the literature on resilience reveals a range of framings and definitions across disciplines, it is commonly defined as the ability of individuals, teams, or organisations to adapt, recover, and thrive in the face of adversity. In this report, we apply this understanding as the lens for exploring the role of management accounting in building sustainability and resilience.Management accounting scholars have long investigated the role of professionals and organisations in supporting decision-making in the context of sustainability strategy formulation and implementation, measuring and assessing sustainability, sustainability reporting and disclosure, supply chain sustainability, circular economy and resource efficiency.Sustainability is defined here as a triple-bottom-line concept encompassing environmental, social, and financial viability. While links between sustainability and resilience are often acknowledged, empirical evidence remains scarce on how management accounting can effectively support both. This report aims to provide insights and practical guidance to support management accountants and organisations in developing integrated approaches that effectively align sustainability initiatives with resilience strategies. The findings show two key themes:1. The first theme highlights how organisations are evolving their management accounting practices to enhance resilience in response to external disruptions, focusing on dynamic budgeting, enhanced risk management, supply chain transparency, stakeholder engagement, and innovation.2. The second theme sheds light on how organisations have integrated sustainability metrics into management accounting, providing a balanced view of financial performance alongside environmental and social responsibilities. Although our study focuses on garment firms, the practices we document (such as managing complex supply chains, accelerating forecasting cycles, embedding ESG metrics, fostering cross-functional collaboration, and leveraging data-driven transparency) address challenges that are common to many industries facing volatility, regulatory change, and heightened stakeholder expectations. These findings reflect broader opportunities for management accountants in firms that operate across diverse sectors, particularly those with extensive supply chains, a mix of mass-market and premium positioning, and a growing need to integrate data analytics, ESG indicators, and scenario planning into their financial control processes. Accordingly, the insights and recommendations presented in this report can be adapted beyond the garment industry to support more resilient and sustainability-oriented management accounting practices across sectors. <br/
Climate change as fake news.:Positive attribute framing as a tactic against corporate reputation damage from the evaluations of sceptical, right-wing audiences
Get PDFPurposeThe paper aims to examine whether CSR communication about a company’s support for climate change created using different content framing categories (positive vs negative) can lead climate change-sceptical audiences to positively influence their evaluations of the credibility of CSR communication, of a company and its actions, and lead to higher purchase intentions.Design/methodology/approachThe paper used an experimental design. About 266 respondents recruited via the Prolific platform were invited to participate in an online study. A between-subject design was used, and data was analysed using the bootstrapping technique, allowing to identify moderators of the relationship between CSR communication framing and different evaluations of a company.FindingsThe paper provides empirical support for the role of political preferences and climate change beliefs in predicting the preference for positive attribute framing among climate change sceptical audiences. It is argued that climate change sceptics are still in the process of deliberation about whether climate change is occurring.Research limitations/implicationsThe research findings may not be generalizable to countries where support for climate change is low, and a technique like attribute framing may not lead to noticeable differences in message reception.Practical implicationsThe paper underscores the impact of the type of attribute framing in CSR communication on different aspects of company evaluations depending on beliefs in climate change. Commercial communicators should additionally invest in climate change education to address the climate change challenge.Social implicationsAddressing climate change effectively requires support from companies to communicate their CSR efforts purposefully and to address climate change sceptical audiences.Originality/valueThe paper identifies beliefs in climate change as an important moderator of CSR communication attribute framing effectiveness
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