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This study aims to develop a predictive model using machine learning techniques to forecast construction dispute outcomes, thereby minimizing economic and social losses and promoting amicable settlements between parties.

This study develops a novel conceptual model incorporating project characteristics, root causes, and underlying causes to predict construction dispute outcomes. Utilizing a dataset of arbitration cases in Türkiye, the model was tested using five machine learning algorithms namely Logistic Regression, Support Vector Machines, Decision Trees, K-Nearest Neighbors, and Random Forest in a Python environment. The performance of each algorithm was evaluated to identify the most accurate predictive model.

The analysis revealed that the Support Vector Machine algorithm achieved the highest prediction accuracy at 71.65%. Twelve significant variables were identified for the best model namely, work type, root causes, delays from a contractor, extension of time, different site conditions, poorly written contracts, unit price determination, penalties, price adjustment, acceptances, delay of schedule, and extra payment claims. The study’s results surpass some existing models in the literature, highlighting the model’s robustness and practical applicability in forecasting construction dispute outcomes.

This study is unique in its consideration of various contract, dispute, and project attributes to predict construction dispute outcomes using machine learning techniques. It uses a fact-based dataset of arbitration cases from Türkiye, providing a robust and practical predictive model applicable across different regions and project types. It advances the literature by comparing multiple machine learning algorithms to achieve the highest prediction accuracy and offering a comprehensive tool for proactive dispute management.

There is growing awareness that global public health problems are so complex, and require such major resources, that neither states nor other stakeholders can tackle them and achieve the millennium development goals (MDGs) on their own. This paper aims to examine the relevance of the MDGs to the pharmaceutical sector and summarizes the industry's contributions to helping achieve the MDGs in the context of its business goals.

The paper reviews the MDGs for which industry has made significant contributions, particularly goal 4: reduce child mortality; goal 5: improve maternal health; goal 6: combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases; and goal 8: develop a global partnership for development. The paper focuses on two public‐private partnerships (PPPs) in particular – the Merck MECTIZAN^® Donation Program, for the elimination of river blindness as a public health problem, and the African Comprehensive HIV/AIDS Partnerships to address the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Botswana – and outlines some lessons learned. The paper also offers some considerations for PPPs to contribute further to public health and the MDGS in the future.

The pharmaceutical industry has made some major contributions to addressing public health challenges. Along the way, companies such as Merck & Co., Inc. (Whitehouse Station, New Jersey; Merck operates in most countries outside the USA as Merck Sharp & Dohme) have learned useful lessons that can be shared to inform the approach and practices of other PPPs in global health.

Relatively few overviews document the industry's contributions to public health, especially in relation to the MDGs. This paper provides a first step to fill that gap at a time when interest in PPPs is increasing.

The purpose of this paper is to defend the appropriateness of a global governance framework for the transnational pharmaceutical corporations (TNPCs) as a way to tackle the problems resulting out of a non‐implementation or violation of the “right to health” by a lack of accessibility of vital medicines in developing countries, and control the risks of the TNPCs themselves and to provide for more accountability and trust on their part. The aim is to show that such a framework can prepare the ground for a win‐win‐situation for all stakeholders and for a sustainable combination of interests in profits, human rights, especially the “right to health”, and human welfare.

This is a conceptual paper on the basis of step‐by‐step analytical and interdiscinplinary approach that requires to pick up arguments from economics, business ethics, law, political science as well as aspects of the human rights and the health governance discourse. A broad spectrum of literature and various information sources are referred to: scientific articles and monographs, newspaper and magazine articles, internet sources and information provided by the corporations themselves and by NGOs (non‐governmental organizations), as well as recent academic and institutional publications. Desk research is the underlying technique to analyze the sources in a heuristic and interpretative way. For a better understanding, first the complexity of the implementation of “the right to health” and the role of different actors will be outlined and second, advantages, positive impacts and deficits of existing health‐related CSR (corporate social responsibility) and multistakeholder initiatives by the TNPCs will be pointed out. This is to prepare a ground for arguing in favor of a global governance framework for the TNPCs and to underline the existence of external and internal drivers for the TNPCs to adhere to a global governance framework.

Especially in developing countries the “right to health” is poorly implemented. TNPCs could contribute to improvements and partly already do so. Yet, the existing approaches are deficitary, insufficient and not sustainable. The problem calls for more accountability in regard to the access to vital medicines. A global governance frameworks for the TNPCs would pose a win‐win‐opportunity: While the TNPCs can benefit from more accountability, precisely defined responsibilities as well as efficiency by constructive, strategic partnerships on a stable level‐playing‐field and a legitimized conduct, their stakeholders benefit from an improved accessibility to vital medicines and an enhanced implementation of the “right to health”.

The paper contributes to the ongoing debate on how to improve the implementation of “right to health” by improving the accessibility of vital medicines, especially in developing (and emerging) countries. It proposes new modes of CSR‐based conduct and partnerships of the TNPCs and a framework of global governance that are urgently required to tackle with a long‐term perspective the problems and threats that pandemics pose on a global scale and to cut down risks for the TNPCs while also widening their markets.

The child is at the centre of all Models of Child Health Appraised research and indeed all primary care delivery for children. Appraising models of primary care for children is incomplete without ensuring that experiences of primary care, design, treatment, management and outcomes are optimal for the child. However, the principle of child centricity is not implicit in many healthcare systems and in many aspects of life, yet it is extremely important for optimal child health service design and child health. By exploring the changing concept of ‘childhood’, we understand better the emergence of the current attitude towards children and their role in today’s Europe and the evolution of child rights. Understanding child centricity, and the role of agents acting on behalf of the child, allows us to identify features of children’s primary care systems that uphold the rights of a child to optimum health. This is placed against the legal commitments made by the countries of the European Union and European Economic Area to ensure that children’s rights are respected.

In financial markets investors and borrowers are faced with a whole structure of prices and interest rates on financial instruments. The determination of equilibria in these markets is a complex process and presents a challenge to researchers and practitioners alike. In this article we are concerned with a single section of these markets where we study the relationships between the interest rates or yields on financial securities which can be distinguished from each other (as far as possible) only by their term to maturity. We only cover the structure of money or nominal yields, as an examination of the real returns would require another arti‐cle in itself.

Beyond the rhetoric of Nigeria's policymakers, there are multifaceted challenges threatening sustainable development (SD) in Nigeria under climate change (CC). To strengthen theory and practice, this chapter discusses SD under CC in Nigeria using SWOT analysis. The exploratory focus of this chapter made the qualitative research method, an interpretivist research paradigm, most appropriate. Data sourced from scholarly articles and other secondary resources were reviewed, integrated and synthesised using SWOT analysis. At the end of the SWOT analysis, four insights emerged. The strengths and opportunities of SD under CC include increased awareness and growing access to climate-friendly technologies, sustainable finance, climate-friendly agriculture, solar technologies and renewable energy solutions, among others. The weaknesses and threats include deforestation, unabated gas flaring, rising carbon emissions and exorbitant cost of climate-friendly technologies, among others. The chapter explicates the need for policymakers and regulatory agencies in Nigeria to consolidate the strengths, correct all weaknesses, harness opportunities and avert the looming threats of CC. The chapter contributes to the three themes of SD by affirming that CC comes with devastating consequences that evidently pose existential risks and threats to people, profits and the planet. Consequently, policymakers need to mobilise sufficient resources and capabilities for CC adaptation and mitigation to achieve SD in Nigeria.

L'année 1970 a été proclamée année de protection de la nature et les campagnes d'information sur ce thème ont reçu l'appui de nombreux Chefs d'Etat, les budgets affectés à cette protection par les pouvoirs publics augmentent partout. Il est normal que les experts qui ont la charge de conseiller les autorités pour le développement du tourisme se posent à cette occasion un certain nombre de questions sur leur responsabilité face à la protection de la nature.

The purpose of this paper is to examine current momentum in the sport policy arena congruent with the sustainable development agenda. It presents two consensus frameworks endorsed by the UN that provide mechanism for coherent action to 2030. With a human rights backdrop it outlines the role of organisations operating in the domains of physical education, physical activity and sport (PEPAS), promoting multidisciplinary partnerships and aligning to global agendas that enhance health and well-being for all.

This position paper is a narrative literature review reporting on the status of sports policy frameworks in the UN system of relevance to the sport sector generally. It relates these to research evidence on the interlinkage between sport, human rights, health and well-being based on critical literature.

The advent of the Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development, the Kazan Action Plan, the WHO Global Action Plan on Physical Activity 2018–2030 and allied developments across the sports movement provides an opportunity for revisiting and realigning the definitions and policy objectives of sport and health.

The author’s bias as a UNESCO chair towards UN frameworks is acknowledged as is leniency towards physical education, PEPAS.

Multilateral agencies, health and sport authorities, are encouraged to review and leverage their resources and engage with the call for action of global agendas to improve public health.

This paper presents the global policy backdrop for action and investment in inclusive sport, physical education and physical activity. It presents a fresh new health and well-being perspective aligned to wider interdisciplinary agendas, on which sport organisations can make a significant contribution.

The idea of relating health, education and other social sector variables with growth and development, or trying to find any convergence among similar countries with respect to such macroeconomic indicators is the basic idea of this chapter, which explores the concept of enhancing welfare through a subjective route, specifically by way of expenditure in health care. By way of testing σ- and β-convergence of current healthcare expenditure per capita of the BRICS countries for the period 2006–2018, it has been found that these countries catch up with significant convergence. It has also been obtained through panel data analysis that such convergence is significantly explained by gross domestic product (GDP) per capita, life expectancy at birth, elderly ratio, CO₂ emissions and prevalence of undernourishment, all of which are in accordance with conventional hypotheses. This chapter claims that, by way of convergence, the BRICS nations may emerge as a new economic power, and expenditure on health care is one of the major areas, among other social sector variables that will play an important role.

The purpose of this study is to explore the perceptions of Afghan female engineers regarding opportunities and barriers to starting their own engineering/construction company in Kabul through three career trajectory chokepoints related to training through higher education, the engineering workplace and entrepreneurship, through the lens of feminist theory.

Semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted. A Web-based survey was also conducted to collect data from participants who were not able to participate in the in-depth interviews. Thematic content analysis was used to analyze the collected data.

As a result of the analysis, three main themes were developed related to “chokepoints” that Afghan female engineers face along the path to starting their own construction companies: “entering and studying engineering,” “career development” and “starting her own engineering business”; the authors address the subthemes of barriers and opportunities confronted by Afghan women at each chokepoint.

Due to civil unrest, the authors are only able to reach a sample of Afghan female engineers working in the capital city of Kabul.

Afghanistan shows, perhaps, the most severe underrepresentation of female engineers of all countries in the world, yet no research gives them a voice to explain the challenges their face to starting their own engineering/construction businesses. The authors are able to report their perceptions and articulate recommendations to encourage female entrepreneurship in the engineering/construction sector in Afghanistan.

Afghan women face significant barriers to having meaningful careers in the science, technology, engineering and medicine professions. The findings provide information for regulators regarding why Afghan women do not start their own engineering firms.

As physical security and resource constraints generate difficulty in accessing Afghan women in general, this is the first paper to report the perceptions of Afghan female engineers regarding the barriers and opportunities they perceive on the path to engineering entrepreneurship.