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Age, due among other causes to demographic transitions, has become a common and widespread content of discrimination. It concerns all age groups in all countries. Numerous analyses of regional and international institutions, including departments of the United Nations, demonstrate various determinants of age discrimination ('ageism') implicit in contemporary societies. This article explores issues of discrimination, in particular age discrimination. These topics are conceived as complex multidimensional societal problematiques that require comprehensive approaches to understand, prevent, and combat them. In our article, the available literature concerning age discrimination is explored. Albania, Great Britain, Norway, Ukraine, the Czech Republic, and Lithuania are deployed as cases of 'rules of law' related to ageism. Some practical legal cases are analyzed to explore the impacts of practices of legal politics on discriminatory situations concerning individuals. Finally, recent studies carried out in the context of the social quality approach are used to broaden our scope. Keywords: age, comprehensive approaches, discrimination, human rights, legislation, societal context, Discrimination on the basis of age remains widespread in all areas of society. A recent report from the European Commission provides further argument to strengthen protection against age discrimination, in [...]

This article updates and further develops the reflections of 'Urbanization and Sustainability after the COVID-19 Pandemic' (Motta 2020). It is now even more urgent to focus on the urban-rural relationships that are being modified by the pandemic, climate change, and the impacts of conflicts, causing serious human insecurities and increasing precarious circumstances worldwide. The fast-changing situation and recurrent emergencies confirm the need for a new urban development approach, related to the specificities of the surrounding environment and based on the revival of towns and settlements spread over territories. This should function as a complementary tool to mitigate urbanization flows and urban-rural gaps, identifying new relationships. This requires the review of current urban paradigms, which are no longer able to respond to modified conditions and demands with an innovative vision. This is actualized on the basis of the principles of the social quality theory (SQT) and approach (SQA) and their emphasis on processes in and between the four relevant dimensions of societal life. In the past decade, these principles have been developed tentatively in working papers about sustainability and urban issues from a social quality perspective. Keywords: comprehensiveness, social quality, mitigation of metropolitan flows, obsolete and palliative urban models, urban-rural inequalities, Introduction and premises The objective of the article, in the complex context of the urban 'problematique' is to explore the interrelated issues of urban conditions and human relationships, calling attention [...]

The digital transformation of contemporary societies may already have been seen by older people as an obstacle; during the pandemic, however, great emphasis was given to technology. The purpose of this article is to illustrate the phenomenon of social exclusion of older people, linked to their vulnerability and the 'COVID circumstances' and shaped by the various measures imposed by different countries to limit physical contact, which led to technological inequality. The findings emphasize the isolation of the elderly and their non- use or insufficient use of health services and long-term care services. Further implications relate to socioeconomic costs arising from the inefficient treatment of their needs regarding their physical and 'technological' vulnerability. The article concludes with considerations of the importance of distinct--both individually and collectively oriented--approaches to create better social conditions that will enhance technological equality for the elderly. Keywords: COVID-19, elderly, exclusion, health services, social quality, technological skills, vulnerability, Older people frequently face societal exclusion in their everyday lives. This phenomenon was acknowledged long before the recent pandemic. However, given that older people face 'technological disadvantage' and that technology [...]

This paper discusses the establishment of a governance framework to secure the development and deployment of 'good AI', and describes the quest for a morally objective compass to steer it. Asserting that human rights can provide such compass, this paper first examines what a human rights-based approach to AI governance entails, and sets out the promise it propagates. Subsequently, it examines the pitfalls associated with human rights, particularly focusing on the criticism that these rights may be too Western, too individualistic, too narrow in scope and too abstract to form the basis of sound AI governance. After rebutting these reproaches, a plea is made to move beyond the calls for a human rights-based approach, and start taking the necessary steps to attain its realisation. It is argued that, without elucidating the applicability and enforceability of human rights in the context of AI; adopting legal rules that concretise those rights where appropriate; enhancing existing enforcement mechanisms and securing an underlying societal infrastructure that enables human rights in the first place, any human rights-based governance framework for AI risks falling short of its purpose., Author(s): Nathalie A. Smuha [sup.1] Author Affiliations: (1) grid.5596.f, 0000 0001 0668 7884, Department of International & European Law, Faculty of Law, KU Leuven, , Tiensestraat 41, 3000, Leuven, Belgium [...]

In July 2020, former US Vice President and then-Democratic presidential nominee, Joe Biden, proposed to 'put an end to the era of shareholder capitalism--the idea that the only responsibility a [...]

In new forms of voluntary approaches to regulation (VAR) the functional division of labour between the private and the public sector is blurred. Companies have taken on authoritative roles and regulatory functions in national and transnational contexts. Given the growing use of corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives, it is important to understand the extent to which companies comply with non-binding norms, the factors that affect compliance, and the strategies available to increase it. This article detects patterns and explanations of the outcome of a transnational multi-stakeholder VAR in the field of sustainability reporting. It analyses voluntary norm compliance of Global Fortune 500 companies originating from Germany (German G500) in the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI). I start introducing descriptive categories and distinguish three patterns of corporate norm-consumership: all-embracing norm-consumers, incomplete norm-consumers, and non-consumers. Next, I discuss corporate norm compliance in the GRI and highlight the research methodology and case selection. Then, I apply a framework for analyses that combines the isomorphism approach from sociological neo-institutionalism with an actor-level perception argument. I present findings from a structured focused company comparison, test domestic and transnational factors of influence and come up with the conclusion that a causal complex consisting of one necessary and eight significant conditions adds explanatory value. Unternehmen sind zunehmend als politische Akteure ko-und/oder selbstregulativ an grenzuberschreitenden umweltpolitischen Normsetzungs--und Normdurchsetzungsprozessen beteiligt. Angesichts der wachsenden Anzahl transnationaler Selbstregulierungsarrangements analysiert der Beitrag deren handlungsanleitende Wirkungen auf Akteursebene. Mit einem besonderen Fokus auf unterschiedliche Erscheinungsformen und Einflussfaktoren wird die freiwillige Normbefolgung deutscher Unternehmen der G500 in der Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) untersucht. GemaB dem eingefuhrten Konzept von unternehmerischem Normkonsumententum werden Unterneh men anhand des AusmaBes ihrer Normbefolgung als vollstandige Normkonsumenten, unvollstandige Normkonsumenten oder Nichtkonsumenten unterschieden. Nach der Darlegung unternehmerischer Normbefolgung in der GRI werden die Untersuchungsmethode und die Fallauswahl vorgestellt. Die kausalanalytische Betrachtung basiert auf einem Herkunftslandkonzept, in dem der Isomorphismusansatz des soziologischen Neoinstitutionalismus um eine mikroanalytische Fundierung erweitert wird. Ein strukturiertfokussierter Unternehmensvergleich testet den Einfluss nationaler und transnationaler Faktoren und fuhrt auf der Grundlage der systematischen Auswertung halbstandardisierter Experteninterviews mit Unternehmensvertretern eine notwendige und acht signifikante Bedingungen in einem kausalen Bedingungskomplex zusammen, der fur das vollstandige Normkonsumententum deutscher Unternehmen der G500 Erklarungskraft besitzt., 1 Introduction A growing body of voluntary approaches to regulation (VAR) is applied in several countries and transnational contexts, especially in the environmental sector (see for example Toller, 2011; Dingwerth [...]

Abstract Although reports concerning the trafficking in women in Turkey grew in number subsequent to the UN Convention in November 2000, there are still many things which need to be [...]

A controversial issue in discussions on enlargement of the European Union beyond its existing membership of 15 countries is the migration flows that admission of new members could generate. Given [...]

In Europe, only 36% of mid-ranking professors, and 18% of full professors, are women, despite equal proportions of men and women at the undergraduate level (1). To address the problem [...]