Emergent Intelligence and Distributed Stochastic Optimization

Emergent intelligence is a property of a system of elements that is not inherent in each element individually. This behavior is based on local communications. This behavior helps to adapt to emerging uncertainties and achieve a global goal. This behavior exists in the natural world. A simplified example of emergent intelligence from the natural world is given. The repetition of natural behavior with the help of simple technical devices, which are limited in resources and cheap in construction, and the use of multi-agent approaches is considered. Distributed algorithms using local communications are considered. Such algorithms are more robust to noise.

Evolution of Japan's flood control planning and policy in response to climate change risks and social changes

Building a sustainable society by strengthening disaster resilience is a common goal in the world. It is crucial to promote cooperation between the general public and the science community by sharing data, information, knowledge, experiences, and ideas. Japan has routinely been beset by catastrophic floods caused mainly by destructive typhoons and critically active seasonal fronts. With the turn of the 21st century, changes in climate and society required additional realignment into the standardized procedures that had evolved over the previous half-century. Japan's new policy, ‘River Basin Disaster Resilience and Sustainability by All,’ takes comprehensive measures, mainly consisting of flood prevention, exposure reduction, and appropriate evacuation, response and recovery, aiming to strengthen disaster resilience and achieve sustainability through concerted efforts among all stakeholders. The policy can play a key role in the achievement of the common global goal.

Teaching Private Law in a Climate Crisis

First Nations analyses, climate science, social science and legal research indicate the significant role of private law in facilitating the conditions of climate change. Private law is a contingent feature of planetary health because its key concepts and institutions concentrate the legal rights to capital — the goods of life — in the private sphere. Private entitlements can act as shields against collective interests. Reforming law to address the climate crisis involves greater regulation of private interests to pursue the global goal of sustaining organised human societies, and thus addressing conflict between individual freedoms and collective exigencies. Reform depends on a differently educated generation of legal thinkers and practitioners.

Conceptual Technologies of Application of Coaching Technology in Public Administration

The article reveals the concept of coaching as an innovative technology of public administration. The technology is based on a democratic leadership style, formed by systematic thinking and a somewhat organized technique of questions, which ultimately focuses on the prospect of positive change and optimization of production relations, based on cooperation and feedback. The global goal of coaching in public administration is defined, which provides constant updating of skills of managerial competence and successful leadership through the formation of worldview, adoption of holistic attitudes, a certain culture of communication and interaction, motivation. The effectiveness of the use of coaching technology in public administration is substantiated. The main further prospects of work on the research are determined. Develop scales of indicators for evaluating the effectiveness of coaching technology in public administration.

Experience and Peculiarities of Reconciliation of Contradictions between Germany and France

The article is devoted to the study of the experience and peculiarities of reconciliation of contradictions between Germany and France. The positions of the Presidents of France and Chancellors of the Federal Republic of Germany regarding the theoretical foundations and practical steps of the implementation of French-German reconciliation are studied. This paper deals with the problem of Alsace-Lorraine, a region with a border identity, which repeatedly became the cause of Franco-German disputes and passed from one state to another. The role of the individual in overcoming the contradictions between Germany and France is highlighted. The factor of European integration is considered, which not only contributed to the reconciliation of contradictions between Germany and France, but also turned the two states into leaders of a united Europe. The Elysee Treaty and its implementation were analyzed. The military cooperation between France and Germany is investigated. The problem of historical memory and the desire to reconcile the contradictions between Germany and France are revealed. It is proved that the experience and peculiarities of reconciliation of contradictions between Germany and France testify to the fact that the real reconciliation of the two leading states directed their efforts towards a more global goal – the creation of a common Europe. It was concluded that the mechanisms for achieving Franco-German reconciliation are interesting for studying and borrowing, taking into account national characteristics in the reconciliation of other European countries, and regions with borderline identities. The French-German experience may be useful for application in Polish-Ukrainian relations. The main conclusion from the analysis of the experience and the peculiarities of reconciling the contradictions between Germany and France is that their implementation led to unexpected and far-reaching consequences that once seemed just a dream. At the beginning of European integration in the 50s of the twentieth century, it was difficult to imagine the contemporary EU with its common currency, the Schengen area, developed economy, social programs. Franco-German reconciliation was transformed into the fruitful work of the Franco-German tandem, on the success of which depends not only the future of France and Germany, but the evolution of the entire united Europe.

SPEECH ACTS ANALYSIS OF COVID-BASED EPIDEICTIC RHETORIC

The article is devoted to the analysis of speech acts of epideictic rhetoric in terms of pragmalinguistics. The research material encompasses official Covid-based speeches made by the top officials of the country: Boris Johnson, the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, and Donald Trump, the former President of the United States of America. The subject of the study comprises performative utterances of the speakers from the perspective of their illocutionary force. The theoretical and methodological basis for the analysis was the Theory of Speech Acts by J. Austin, as well as the classification of illocutionary acts by J. Searle. The analysis of Covid-based speech acts revealed their representative directive character. We have found out that the use of representatives in these epideictic speeches is due to the global goal of the speakers, that is to quiet the hearers (carrying out perlocutionary effect). It is supposed that stating the inevitability of certain events and their patterns, positive predictions and personal beliefs of people in power make ordinary citizens (hearers) put up with certain restrictions and inconveniences. In the pragmatic aspect, the use of directives (the second frequently used by speakers) is justified by the situational goal – to encourage the hearers to comply with the rules in connection with the introduction of quarantine. We have also concluded that commissives are used twice less frequently compared with the representatives and directives as their usage is primarily connected with the risk for the speaker to make promises and guarantees in quite unpredictable and uncontrolled time. For top officials this also involves reputational losses in case the promises are broken. It should be noted, though, that the use of declaratives in such speeches is very common and relevant as the speakers have appropriate social status and authority for official statements, decrees or decisions of state importance. Thus, the felicity conditions of declarations can be met. According to the research results the lowest frequency of the use of expressives proves the seriousness of the situation where emotionality and uninformativeness are inappropriate.

How to Meet New Global Targets in the Offshore Realms: Biophysical Guidelines for Offshore Networks of No-Take Marine Protected Areas

Networks of no-take marine protected areas (MPAs), where all extractive activities are prohibited, are the most effective tool to directly protect marine ecosystems from destructive and unsustainable human activities. No-take MPAs and MPA networks have been globally implemented in coastal seas, and their success has been significantly enhanced where science-based biophysical guidelines have informed their design. Increasingly, as human pressure on marine ecosystems is expanding further offshore, governments are establishing offshore MPAs—some very large—or MPA networks. Globally, there are growing calls from scientists, non-government organisations, and national governments to set global conservation targets upwards of 30%. Given that most of the ocean is found either in the high seas or offshore within national Exclusive Economic Zones, large offshore MPAs or networks of MPAs must be a major component of these global targets for ocean protection. However, without adequate design, these offshore MPAs risk being placed to minimise conflict with economic interests, rather than to maximise biodiversity protection. This paper describes detailed biophysical guidelines that managers can use to design effective networks of no-take MPAs in offshore environments. We conducted a systematic review of existing biophysical design guidelines for networks of MPAs in coastal seas, and found consistent elements relating to size, shape, connectivity, timeframes, and representation of biophysical features. However, few of the guidelines are tailored to offshore environments, and few of the large offshore MPAs currently in place were designed systematically. We discuss how the common inshore design guidelines should be revised to be responsive to the characteristics of offshore ecosystems, including giving consideration of issues of scale, data availability, and uncertainty. We propose 10 biophysical guidelines that can be used to systematically design offshore networks of MPAs which will also contribute to the global goal of at least 30% protection globally. Finally, we offer three priority guidelines that reflect the unique conservation needs of offshore ecosystems: emphasising the need for larger MPAs; maximising the inclusion of special features that are known and mapped; and representing minimum percentages of habitats, or, where mapped, bioregions. Ultimately, MPA guidelines need to be embedded within an adaptive management framework, and have the flexibility to respond to emerging knowledge and new challenges.

Do Tourism Activities and Urbanization Drive Material Consumption in the OECD Countries? A Quantile Regression Approach

The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UNSDGs) elaborately encompass a global goal for sustainable consumption and production (Goal 12: SDGs), thus providing potential drivers and/or pathways to attaining sustainable consumption. In view of this global goal, this study examined the role of real income per capita, urbanization and especially inbound tourism in domestic material consumption for the panel of OECD countries. The study is conducted for the period of 1995 to 2016 by employing the panel quantile approach. Interestingly, an inverted U-shaped relationship between outbound tourism and domestic material consumption is established across the quantiles, thus indicating that sustainable domestic consumption is achievable after a threshold of domestic material consumption is attained. In addition, achieving sustainable consumption through economic or income growth is a herculean task for the OECD countries because the current reality indicates that income growth triggers higher consumption of domestic materials. However, the results suggest that urbanization is a recipe for sustainable domestic consumption since there is a negative and significant relationship between the two parameters across the quantiles. Nevertheless, the study presents relevant policy for efficient material and resources utilization and that is suitable to drive the SDGs for 2030 and other country-specific sustainable ambitions.

Beyond Promotion: The un Global Goal Campaign

‘Beyond Promotion: The un Global Goals Campaign’, deals with the latter as a particularly interesting example, given the way this campaign did not advertise a product, but rather a policy. Does this change the way of relating to history? Advertising sustainability requires both economic development, environmental protection, and social responsibility. The chapter shows that the launch of this campaign, not least by using Aardman Animations, relies heavily on both film history and the history of commercials.