فصلنامه سیاستگذاری عمومی
سال نهم شماره 1 (بهار 1402)

This article seeks to explain the technical considerations of theorizing in political science and public policy. One of the achievements of this article is its educational aspect and enlightenment regarding the hierarchical, accumulative and generalization aspect of theorizing. The word "theory" in Old French linguistics means a group or a category: “Des Théories d'hommes et de femmes”. Theory is a group of hypotheses that display a coordinated parade like military groups and sometimes support each other's military confrontation. Theory is also a group of propositions that use each other to explain phenomena in a coordinated manner. Another aspect of this article is demonstrating how big data and artificial intelligence can challenge the manner in which researchers develop their theories to explain social phenomena.

The increasing use of artificial intelligence (AI) in various aspects of human life has forced policymakers in different countries to adopt appropriate policies to increase the advantages of this technology and deal with its development challenges. By examining 18 national documents published by seven countries, the United States, England, China, Australia, Germany, Australia and India, as well as seven international documents published by the European Commission and the OECD in the field of AI policy between the years 2017-2021 and interviews with 15 experts engaged in different sectors of AI policymaking, this research has sought to design a suitable policy package for the development of AI in Iran. By using thematic analysis methods and the fuzzy MCDM model, this research has tried to discover the most important policy objectives and their prioritization, as well as the prioritization of policy instruments to achieve each of these goals. The results show that the most important goals of AI development in the country, in order of priority, are: 1) Economic Growth, 2) Enhancing human capital, 3) Improving infrastructure, 4) Increasing social welfare and improving public services, and 5) Improving research capacities. Also, the most important policy instruments to achieve the discussed policy objectives, in order of priority, are: 1) Regulation and Standardization, 2) R&D Financing, 3) Culture making and education, 4) Networking and cooperation support, 5) Stimulating market demand, 6) Government procurement and 7) Consulting and acceleration. Identifying the most important policy objectives and instruments for the development of AI in the country and their priority will help policymakers make appropriate decisions for the balanced development of the innovation ecosystem of AI in the country.

The main goal of public policies is to change the behavior of the public in line with public interests. In the traditional policy approaches, policy goals were pursued mainly by using coercive mechanisms and by issuing instructions or using economic mechanisms such as price changes and taxation. But in recent years, the models presented in "behavioral politics" have gone towards the use of more complex methods that, while controlling and directing social behaviors, seek more satisfaction of citizens. But the use of this model in policy-making has been accompanied by criticism. The purpose of this article is to identify and explain in detail the challenges proposed regarding this growing pattern in the field of policy making. The results of this research, show that 15 important challenges threaten the efficiency of this policy model, which can be considered under two general headings: the challenges of the guardianship approach and the challenges specific to behavioral mechanisms.

The Internet of Things as a new generation of connection and communication between intelligent objects through Internet is a concept that has recently entered the country's governance literature. Due to the possibility of identification and access to personal information through the analysis and combination of collected data, effective protection of personal data has been proposed as a must in the context of this technology. Iran's legal system lacks a law that is dedicated to the protection of citizens' personal data, only in the resolution of the Supreme Council of Cyberspace dated 2018-10-22, the requirements governing the Internet of Things in the National Information Network have been discussed. Based on the teachings of comparative law, we can benefit from the experiences of other systems to overcome similar challenges. Based on the descriptive analytical method, the current research has extracted the legislative patterns in the discussed field by examining all the laws and regulations of the legal systems of the European Union, the People's Republic of China, and the United States of America and answered the question of which type of legislative model is desirable for the legal system. It seems that among the proposed approaches, a combination of a comprehensive model and self-regulation with a broad definition of personal data can be a suitable option for drafting the law.

With the advent of the Internet and the proliferation of tools based on it, social scientists have raised high hopes for a return to the concept of the Habermas public sphere in new media. The main question for this group of thinkers was, did the Habermas public sphere take on a new life on social media? Following the studies and researches, two categories of results can be mentioned: First, there are studies that emphasize the possibility of forming a public sphere in cyberspace. The second is the research that confirmed the impossibility of forming a public sphere in cyberspace. But a third approach has developed that,  Emphasizing the third approach, we try to examine how the virtual public sphere affects political participation .In this study, while considering these three approaches, with emphasis on the third approach, The purpose of this research is to answer the question of how the virtual public sphere affects the category of political participation. The results obtained in the conducted surveys strengthen the hypothesis that benefiting from the virtual public sphere can be effective in strengthening political participation.

For about a century, the relationship between the two big Muslim neighbors in the Middle East has always had ups and downs and a trend of distance and closeness in the relations between them. Before the victory of the Iranian revolution, these two countries had a conflict with a lower slope, and after the revolution, they had a conflict with a steep slope and were in opposition to each other and in the last decade, they have experienced a complete distance and disconnection. Therefore, the main question of this research is that which approaches of interaction or confrontation can be effective in line with the national interests of the two countries? In fact, we examine and analyze the ways to achieve a peaceful and stable coexistence between the two countries by identifying their proximity and distance factors. However, the main factors of conflict in their one-hundred-year-old relationship have been caused by ideological differences and mutual destruction.