Applying Social and Behavioral Science to Federal Policies and Programs to Deliver Better Outcomes

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

The White House: “Human behavior is a key component of every major national and global challenge. Social and behavioral science examines if, when, and how people’s actions and interactions influence decisions and outcomes. Understanding human behavior through social and behavioral science is vitally important for creating federal policies and programs that open opportunities for everyone.

Today, the Biden-Harris Administration shares the Blueprint for the Use of Social and Behavioral Science to Advance Evidence-Based Policymaking. This blueprint recommends actions for agencies across the federal government to effectively leverage social and behavioral science in improving policymaking to deliver better outcomes and opportunities for people all across America. These recommendations include specific actions for agencies, such as considering social and behavioral insights early in policy or program development. The blueprint also lays out broader opportunities for agencies, such as ensuring agencies have a sufficient number of staff with social and behavioral science expertise.  

The blueprint includes nearly a hundred examples of how social and behavioral science is already used to make real progress on our highest priorities, including promoting safe, equitable, and engaged communities; protecting the environment and promoting climate innovation; advancing economic prosperity and the future of the workforce; enhancing the health outcomes of all Americans; rebuilding our infrastructure and building for tomorrow; and promoting national defense and international security. Social and behavioral science informs the conceptualization, development, implementation, dissemination, and evaluation of interventions, programs, and policies. Policymakers and social scientists can examine data about how government services reach people or measure the effectiveness of a program in assisting a particular community. Using this information, we can understand why programs sometimes fall short in delivering their intended benefits or why other programs are highly successful in delivering benefits. These approaches also help us design better policies and scale proven successful interventions to benefit the entire country…(More)”.

Data Stewardship: The Way Forward in the New Digital Data Landscape

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Essay by Courtney Cameron: “…It is absolutely critical that Statistics Canada, as a national statistical office (NSO) and public service organization, along with other government agencies and services, adapt to the new data ecosystem and digital landscape. Canada is falling behind in adjusting to rapid digitalization, exploding data volumes, the ever-increasing digital market monopolization by private companies, foreign data harvesting, and in managing the risks associated with data sharing or reuse. If Statistics Canada and the federal public service are to keep up with private companies or foreign powers in this digital data context, and to continue to provide useful insights and services for Canadians, concerns of data digitalization, data interoperability and data security must be addressed through effective data stewardship.

However, it is not sufficient to have data stewards responsible for data: as data governance expert David Plotkin argues in Data Stewardship: An Actionable Guide to Effective Data Management and Data Governance, government departments must also consult these stewards on decisions about the data that they steward, if they are to ensure that decisions are made in the best interests of those who get value from the information. Frameworks, policies and procedures are needed to ensure this, as is having a steward involved in the processes as they occur. Plotkin also writes that data stewardship involvement needs to be integrated into enterprise processes, such as in project management and systems development methodologies. Data stewardship and data governance principles must be accepted as a part of the corporate culture, and stewardship leaders need to advise, drive and support this shift.

Finally, stewardship goes beyond sound data management and standards: it is important to be mindful of the role of an NSO. Public acceptability and trust are of vital importance. Social licence, or acceptability, and public engagement are necessary for NSOs to be able to perform their duties. These are achieved through practising data stewardship and adhering to the principles of open data, as well as by ensuring transparent processes, confidentiality and security, and by communicating the value of citizens’ sharing their data…With the rapidly accelerating proliferation of data and the increasing demand for, and potential of, data sharing and collaboration, NSOs and public governance organizations alike need to reimagine data stewardship as a function and role encompassing a wider range of purposes and responsibilities…(More)”. See also: Data Stewards — Drafting the Job Specs for A Re-imagined Data Stewardship Role

Groups want N.Y. to disaggregate data of Middle Eastern, North African individuals

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Article by Luke Parsnow: “A group of organizations are pushing for New York lawmakers to pass a bill that would disaggregate data of Middle Eastern and North African (MENA) individuals, according to a letter sent Monday.

The bill (S6584-B/A6219-A) would direct every state agency, board, department and commission that collects demographic data to use separate categories to collect data for the “White” and “Middle Eastern or North African” groups.

“Our organizations have seen firsthand the impact of the systemic exclusion of Middle Eastern and North African communities from data collection,” the letter reads. “Our communities do not perceive themselves to be white and are not perceived to be white. We also experience various disparities compared to non-Hispanic whites that go unseen because of the lack of data.”

The group says those communities categorized as “White” hinders those communities in education, employment, housing, health care and political representation.

“Miscategorizing a New Yorker’s race is not only offensive, but has real-world impacts on services and resources my particular communities receive,” Senate Deputy Leader Michael Gianaris said in a statement. “It should be obvious that people from the Middle East or North Africa are not white, yet that is how our laws define them.”

Gianaris said the legislation would give many New Yorkers better representation and a more powerful voice.

“The lack of a MENA category has hindered our understanding of the needs of MENA communities and our ability to consider those needs in decision-making and resource allocation,” according to the letter…(More)”.

US Senate AI Working Group Releases Policy Roadmap

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Article by Gabby Miller: “On Wednesday, May 15, 2024, a bipartisan US Senate working group led by Majority Leader Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY), Sen. Mike Rounds (R-SD), Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-NM), and Sen. Todd Young (R-IN) released a report titled “Driving U.S. Innovation in Artificial Intelligence: A Roadmap for Artificial Intelligence Policy in the United States Senate.” The 31-page report follows a series of off-the-record “educational briefings,” including “the first ever all-senators classified briefing focused solely on AI,” and nine “AI Insight Forums” hosted in the fall of 2023 that drew on the participation of more than 150 experts from industry, academia, and civil society.

The report makes a number of recommendations on funding priorities, the development of new legislation, and areas that require further exploration. It also encourages the executive branch to share information “in a timely fashion and on an ongoing basis” about its AI priorities and “any AI-related Memorandums of Understanding with other countries and the results from any AI-related studies in order to better inform the legislative process.”…(More)”.

Crowded Out: The True Costs of Crowdfunding Healthcare

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Book by Nora Kenworthy: “Over the past decade, charitable crowdfunding has exploded in popularity across the globe. Sites such as GoFundMe, which now boasts a “global community of over 100 million” users, have transformed the ways we seek and offer help. When faced with crises—especially medical ones—Americans are turning to online platforms that promise to connect them to the charity of the crowd. What does this new phenomenon reveal about the changing ways we seek and provide healthcare? In Crowded Out, Nora Kenworthy examines how charitable crowdfunding so quickly overtook public life, where it is taking us, and who gets left behind by this new platformed economy.

Although crowdfunding has become ubiquitous in our lives, it is often misunderstood: rather than a friendly free market “powered by the kindness” of strangers, crowdfunding is powerfully reinforcing inequalities and changing the way Americans think about and access healthcare. Drawing on extensive research and rich storytelling, Crowded Out demonstrates how crowdfunding for health is fueled by—and further reinforces—financial and moral “toxicities” in market-based healthcare systems. It offers a unique and distressing look beneath the surface of some of the most popular charitable platforms and helps to foster thoughtful discussions of how we can better respond to healthcare crises both small and large…(More)”.

QuantGov

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

About: “QuantGov is an open-source policy analytics platform designed to help create greater understanding and analysis of the breadth of government actions through quantifying policy text. By using the platform, researchers can quickly and effectively retrieve unique data that lies embedded in large bodies of text – data on text complexity, part of speech metrics, topic modeling, etc. …

QuantGov is a tool designed to make policy text more accessible. Think about it in terms of a hyper-powerful Google search that not only finds (1) specified content within massive quantities of text, but (2) also finds patterns and groupings and can even make predictions about what is in a document. Some recent use cases include the following:

  • Analyzing state regulatory codes and predicting which parts of those codes are related to occupational licensing….And predicting which occupation the regulation is talking about….And determining the cost to receive the license.
  • Analyzing Canadian province regulatory code while grouping individual regulations by industry-topic….And determining which Ministers are responsible for those regulations….And determining the complexity of the text for those regulation.
  • Quantifying the number of tariff exclusions that exists due to the Trade Expansion Act of 1962 and recent tariff polices….And determining which products those exclusions target.
  • Comparing the regulatory codes and content of 46 US states, 11 Canadian provinces, and 7 Australian states….While using consistent metrics that can lead to insights that provide legitimate policy improvements…(More)”.

The Poisoning of the American Mind

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Book by Lawrence M. Eppard: “Humans are hard-wired to look for information that they agree with (regardless of the information’s veracity), avoid information that makes them uncomfortable (even if that information is true), and interpret information in a manner that is most favorable to their sense of self. The damage these cognitive tendencies cause to one’s perception of reality depends in part upon the information that a person surrounds himself/herself with. Unfortunately, in the U.S. today, both liberals and conservatives are regularly bombarded with misleading information as well as lies from people they believe to be trustworthy and authoritative sources. While there are several factors one could plausibly blame for this predicament, the decline in the quality of the sources of information that the right and left rely on over the last few decades plays a primary role. As a result of this decline, we are faced with an epistemic crisis that is poisoning the American mind and threatening our democracy. In his forthcoming book with Jacob L. Mackey, The Poisoning of the American Mind, Lawrence M. Eppard explores epistemic problems in both the right-wing and left-wing ideological silos in the U.S., including ideology presented as fact, misinformation, disinformation, and malinformation…(More)”.

5 Ways AI Could Shake Up Democracy

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Article by Shane Snider: “Tech luminary, author and Harvard Kennedy School lecturer Bruce Schneier on Tuesday offered his take on the promises and perils of artificial intelligence in key aspects of democracy.

In just two years, generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) has sparked a race to adopt (and defend against) the technology in government and the enterprise. It seems every aspect of life will soon be impacted — if not already feeling AI’s influence. A global race to place regulatory guardrails is taking shape even as companies and governments are spending billions of dollars implementing new AI technologies.

Schneier contends that five major areas of our democracy will likely see profound changes, including politics, lawmaking, administration, the legal system, and to citizens themselves.

“I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to predict that artificial intelligence will affect every aspect of our society, not necessarily by doing new things, but mostly by doing things that already or could be done by humans, are now replacing humans … There are potential changes in four dimensions: speed, scale, scope, and sophistication.”..(More)”.

Establish Data Collaboratives To Foster Meaningful Public Involvement

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Article by Gwen Ottinger: “Federal agencies are striving to expand the role of the public, including members of marginalized communities, in developing regulatory policy. At the same time, agencies are considering how to mobilize data of increasing size and complexity to ensure that policies are equitable and evidence-based. However, community engagement has rarely been extended to the process of examining and interpreting data. This is a missed opportunity: community members can offer critical context to quantitative data, ground-truth data analyses, and suggest ways of looking at data that could inform policy responses to pressing problems in their lives. Realizing this opportunity requires a structure for public participation in which community members can expect both support from agency staff in accessing and understanding data and genuine openness to new perspectives on quantitative analysis. 

To deepen community involvement in developing evidence-based policy, federal agencies should form Data Collaboratives in which staff and members of the public engage in mutual learning about available datasets and their affordances for clarifying policy problems…(More)”.

Technology and the Transformation of U.S. Foreign Policy

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Speech by Antony J. Blinken: “Today’s revolutions in technology are at the heart of our competition with geopolitical rivals. They pose a real test to our security. And they also represent an engine of historic possibility – for our economies, for our democracies, for our people, for our planet.

Put another way: Security, stability, prosperity – they are no longer solely analog matters.

The test before us is whether we can harness the power of this era of disruption and channel it into greater stability, greater prosperity, greater opportunity.

President Biden is determined not just to pass this “tech test,” but to ace it.

Our ability to design, to develop, to deploy technologies will determine our capacity to shape the tech future. And naturally, operating from a position of strength better positions us to set standards and advance norms around the world.

But our advantage comes not just from our domestic strength.

It comes from our solidarity with the majority of the world that shares our vision for a vibrant, open, and secure technological future, and from an unmatched network of allies and partners with whom we can work in common cause to pass the “tech test.”

We’re committed not to “digital sovereignty” but “digital solidarity.”

On May 6, the State Department unveiled the U.S. International Cyberspace and Digital Strategy, which treats digital solidarity as our North Star. Solidarity informs our approach not only to digital technologies, but to all key foundational technologies.

So what I’d like to do now is share with you five ways that we’re putting this into practice.

First, we’re harnessing technology for the betterment not just of our people and our friends, but of all humanity.

The United States believes emerging and foundational technologies can and should be used to drive development and prosperity, to promote respect for human rights, to solve shared global challenges.

Some of our strategic rivals are working toward a very different goal. They’re using digital technologies and genomic data collection to surveil their people, to repress human rights.

Pretty much everywhere I go, I hear from government officials and citizens alike about their concerns about these dystopian uses of technology. And I also hear an abiding commitment to our affirmative vision and to the embrace of technology as a pathway to modernization and opportunity.

Our job is to use diplomacy to try to grow this consensus even further – to internationalize and institutionalize our vision of “tech for good.”..(More)”.