Understanding police use of lethal force requires the collection of reliable data. Due to bias present in police-use-of-lethal-force databases, researchers typically triangulate using multiple data sources to compensate for this bias; however, triangulation is restricted when the bias present in each database is unknown. This study investigates three government-funded and three independent police-use-of-lethal-force databases to identify methodological sources of bias present in the major U.S. data-collection systems. Bias was coded based on nine categories, including misclassification bias, broad conceptualization, narrow conceptualization, overlap bias, coverage bias, voluntary response bias, observer bias, gatekeeping bias, and self-report response bias. Findings suggest that all six databases had at least three different types of methodological bias present. Generally, public, government-sponsored databases exhibit bias through data self-reporting by law enforcement and varying victim race determination methods. Private databases reveal bias through media-based reporting and the triangulation of data from multiple sources, which is further complicated by lack of transparency in the databases' design and administrative procedures. All six databases have a unique position to the State, which should also inform researcher data selection. I argue that selecting data sources that complement each other based on these identified biases will produce a more complete image of police-use-of-lethal-force and enhance finding accuracy in future research. / Master of Science / Understanding incidents where a civilian dies due to the actions of police officers requires the collection of reliable data. Due to bias—flaws in the data collection methods or data presentation—which lead to varying results when using different databases, researchers typically use multiple data sources to make up for these flaws; however, this method is restricted when the bias present in each database is unknown. This study investigates three government-funded and three independent police-use-of-lethal-force databases to identify sources of bias present in the major U.S. data-collection systems. Findings suggest that all six databases had at least three different types of flaws present. Generally, public, government-sponsored databases exhibit bias through police self-reporting lethal force, where an officer's department reports the officer's actions and there is no individual or group outside of the police reporting these incidents. Additionally, there is a flaw in how police record the race of a victim, who dies through police use of lethal force; Varying procedures in how race is recorded, whether recorded based on the officer's opinion or where a victim self-reports their own race prior to death on a government data system such as the Department of Motor Vehicles, also impacts the race data included in public databases. Private databases reveal bias through collecting incident data from news reports and using data from multiple sources such as law enforcement reports, medical examiner reports, and media reports simultaneously; this is further complicated by lack of transparency in the databases' design and administrative procedures, where there are no documents detailing the steps databases take in collecting and presenting data. All six databases have a unique position to the U.S. Government, where some are funded by the Government and where some are motivated by recent high profile police killings, which should impact researcher data selection. Ideally, the databases used should hold multiple perspectives or positions to the Government to provide an more complete image of lethal force. I argue that selecting data sources that complement each other based on these identified biases will produce a more complete image of police-use-of-lethal-force and enhance finding accuracy in future research.

Traditional technologies are revelations of knowledge, skill, and wisdom of ancestors that have been used to facilitate and enhance the performance of socio-economic activities, overcome environmental challenges, and magnify symbolic presentations of cultural and spiritual engagements. Traditional technologies are still practiced in many communities despite the strides made in the advancement of modern technologies. The socio-economic significance of traditional technologies in the context of Ethiopia is even more profound. There are hardly social, economic, and spiritual activities that are not, directly or indirectly, influenced by the application of traditional technologies. The irony is, however, they are not appreciated and conserved in spite that they have been proving a sustained significance across generations while, to the contrary, modern technologies are even staggering to outlive the stage of product introduction. Although still proving to be useful, traditional technologies have been marginalized as if they are symbols of backwardness belonging to the past as irrelevant to the modern day settings. It was, therefore, the urge to look into this dilemma that became the basis for the initiation to conduct a research on the captioned topic. The study has endeavored to address how traditional technologies, specifically that of Ethiopia, are able to sustain contrary to extant theoretical predictions of technologies, and investigate why they have been deterred from getting the conservation and transformation they deserve in spite of the socio-economic significant role they have continued to play as capitulated in the statement of the problem. In addressing the statement of the problem, the paradigm of the world outlook within which the research was situated is found to be related to the Critical Theory paradigm. As a result, a qualitative research methodology based on a case study design was framed and a longitudinal field study on the sampled cases was conducted. The data generated from the study were ix filtered, coded, organized, categorized, and ultimately analyzed and interpreted using apparent analytic models until saturated and triangulated findings were established. Accordingly, the core constructs that has been defining the fate of traditional technologies were induced and their impact in deterring or promoting the conservation and transformation of traditional technologies were synthesized. Based on the outcomes of data analysis and interpretation, appropriate methods of reshaping the societal attitude and orientation in terms of conserving and transforming traditional practices are proposed as induced recommendations ultimately requiring a timely intervention. / Business Management / D. Litt. et Phil. (Business Leadership)