In dit artikel gaan wij in op de vraag hoe een mededingingsautoriteit datagedreven technieken kan inzetten om effectiever te worden. Machine learning is in de laatste jaren enorm populair geworden, levert vaak snel goede resultaten op en vormt de basis voor succes van vele e-commerce-bedrijven die (bijna) dagelijks machine learning-algoritmes toepassen om de optimale prijzen te bepalen van al hun producten, gegeven historische transacties die concurrenten aanbieden en gelet op de omvang van de eigen voorraad. Machine learning is echter alleen geschikt voor specifieke vraagstukken. Het verschil tussen causaliteit en voorspelkracht speelt daarbij een belangrijke rol. Vaak past een ‘ouderwetse’ statistische analyse beter bij de onderzoeksvraag over oorzaak en gevolg. Voorbeelden van nuttige toepassingen van machine learning-technieken zijn voorspellingsmodellen en verkennende data-analyse, die op nieuwe inzichten kan wijzen of bepaalde gebeurtenissen kan signaleren. Wij bespreken een simpel algoritme toegepast op detectie van veranderingen in prijsdata en laten zien hoe dit tijdrovende handmatige analyses kan vervangen. Een mededingingsautoriteit kan soortgelijke algoritmes als een belangrijke en noodzakelijke aanvulling gebruiken op de ‘ouderwetse’ maar eveneens nuttige statistische analyses voor o.a. opsporing van kartels. De methode is flexibel qua inzet in verschillende markten en toepassingen van diverse aannames over het gedrag van ondernemingen.

In the ‘participation society’ it is expected that citizens actively contribute to solving societal problems, including health care, immigration and security issues. A somewhat similar responsibilisation culture is visible in prisons, where prisoners are held responsible for their own rehabilitation. This article problematizes the way in which prisoners’ agency is promoted in Dutch prisons, considering prisoners’ constrained agency and the normative expectations that are tied to the approach. This critique is advanced through discussion of the promotion/demotion system that has been used in Dutch prisons since 2014. This system, comparable to the Incentives and Earned Privileges system in England and Wales, espouses both ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ behavioural norms. The soft behavioural norms reflect a citizenship ideal that extends beyond compliance with the law. It is argued that these normative expectations tied to agency have a limiting effect on prisoners’ autonomy. This article argues in favour of a shift from the citizenship ideal to an autonomy ideal, which applies the principle of minimum restrictions. Furthermore, access to education, reintegration courses and contact with family should be treated as a right, rather than a privilege, in order to maximise autonomy and minimise the harmful effects of imprisonment.

Empirical research on restorative justice shows that offenders can apologise to victims. Because of the ritual component of restorative justice and the possible influence on the justice system, certain questions arise: how do victims perceive these apologies? Is it important for victims that these apologies are sincere? The aim of the article is to discuss these questions through three topics, namely the physical aspect of the ritual, the symbolic meaning for victims and the relation between the offender’s apologies and the victim’s reaction.

Despite enjoying distinct and privileged constitutional statuses, the Indigenous minorities of Malaysia, namely, the natives of Sabah, natives of Sarawak and the Peninsular Malaysia Orang Asli continue to endure dispossession from their customary lands, territories and resources. In response, these groups have resorted to seeking justice in the domestic courts to some degree of success. Over the last two decades, the Malaysian judiciary has applied the constitutional provisions and developed the common law to recognise and protect Indigenous land and resource rights beyond the literal confines of the written law. This article focuses on the effectiveness of the Malaysian courts in delivering the preferred remedy of Indigenous communities for land and resource issues, specifically, the restitution or return of traditional areas to these communities. Despite the Courts’ recognition and to a limited extent, return of Indigenous lands and resources beyond that conferred upon by the executive and legislative arms of government, it is contended that the utilisation of the judicial process is a potentially slow, costly, incongruous and unpredictable process that may also not necessarily be free from the influence of the domestic political and policy debates surrounding the return of Indigenous lands, territories and resources.

Indigenous claims have challenged a number of orthodoxies within state legal systems, one of them being the kinds of proof that can be admissible. In Canada, the focus has been on the admissibility and weight of oral traditions and histories. However, these novel forms are usually taken as alternative means of proving a set of facts that are not in themselves “cultural”, for example, the occupation by a group of people of an area of land that constitutes Aboriginal title. On this view, maps are a neutral technology for representing culturally different interests within those areas. Through Indigenous land use studies, claimants have been able to deploy the powerful symbolic capital of cartography to challenge dominant assumptions about “empty” land and the kinds of uses to which it can be put. There is a risk, though, that Indigenous understandings of land are captured or misrepresented by this technology, and that what appears neutral is in fact deeply implicated in the colonial project and occidental ideas of property. This paper will explore the possibilities for an alternative cartography suggested by digital technologies, by Indigenous artists, and by maps beyond the visual order.

This paper empirically investigates whether the Flemish local income tax base yield in 306 Flemish municipalities is sensitive to changes in the local crime level between 2000 and 2014. There are two underlying assumptions. First, in a Tiebout world, rational voters holding the local government accountable for the safety of its citizens move when the local level of security becomes too greatly alienated from what they want it to be (first assumption). If migration is due to crime, the wealthier citizens are expected to move first. Consequently, the average income per capita and thus the income distribution will be affected, which in turn will influence the local income tax base yield (second assumption). By confirming both assumptions, evidence is presented for a relation between changes in local crime rates and the income tax base yield of Flemish municipalities, occurring through household mobility.