Science and Technology

The unprecedented pace of scientific and technical innovation has provided conflict managers with a range of new tools and opportunities, from the social networks that coordinated activists during the Arab Spring to the crowd-sourcing technologies that helped prevent election violence in Kenya. USIP focuses on harnessing these technologies to prevent conflict.

Water Security and Conflict Prevention Summit

Tue, 09/10/2013 - 08:30

Tue, 09/10/2013 - 14:00

On September 10, 2013, U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP), the Association of the United States Army (AUSA), and the U.S. Water Partnership (USWP) hosted a summit on the growing concerns in water security and the risks for increased conflict.

Read the event coverage, USIP Hosts International Gathering on Water Security and Conflict Prevention

View the conference agenda here

Water is an undeniable, un-substitutable, and powerful factor in everyone’s life, from sustaining individual lives to defining both economic and social policies and practices. As populations and demand expand while supplies decline, access to water will become increasingly difficult, raising the prospects for conflict over this precious resource. By 2025, experts estimated that 1.8 billion people will be living in countries or regions of absolute water scarcity.

Experts:

Jim Marshall

Issue Areas:

Conflict Analysis and Prevention

Economics

Science and Technology

Type of Event or Course:

Countries:

Democratic Republic of the Congo

Liberia

Côte d'Ivoire

Mali

Disaster Risk Reduction and Conflict Prevention

Thu, 04/18/2013 - 13:00

Thu, 04/18/2013 - 15:00

As the United Nations debates a new set of development priorities for the post-2015 revision of its Millennium Development Goals, USIP's Center of Innovation for Science, Technology & Peacebuilding and the National Academy of Engineering jointly invite you to a discussion of the new challenges for peacebuilders presented by the interplay of "natural" and political risks.

Natural disasters and extreme environmental events – hurricanes, floods, droughts, crop failures – are expected to increase in number and severity on a global scale, even within this decade. Demographic trends are leading to enlarged urban and coastal populations at heightened risk of major casualties, economic disruption and political tensions, even from normal patterns of climate, seismic and epidemic volatility. Major disasters could degrade key sources and supply chains of the global economy, affecting essential supplies of food, water, energy, medicine, and traditional incomes.

12:30 pm | Registration Opens

1:00 pm | Welcome & Introductory Remarks

Jim Marshall, President, United States Institute of Peace

1:05 pm | Keynote Address

Helen Clark, Administrator, United Nations Development Programme

1:20 pm | Audience Q&A

1:45 pm | Panel Discussion

John Steinbruner, Director, Center for International and Security Studies at Maryland; Co-author, NAS/NRC Report on Climate and Social Stress
Sherri Goodman, Senior Vice President and General Counsel, CNA; Former Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Environmental Security
Frederick S. Tipson, Jennings Randolph Senior Fellow (2011-2012), United States Institute of Peace; Special Adviser to the Center of Innovation for Science, Technology & Peacebuilding
Proctor Reid, Director of Programs, National Academy of Engineering (Moderator)

Experts:

Frederick S. Tipson

Issue Areas:

Science and Technology

Type of Event or Course:

Events

Peace Efforts Cannot End After 24 Hours

For 35 years, the International Day of Peace on September 21 has served as a rallying point for governments, organizations and ordinary people working to help end violent conflict around the world.

This year, in spite of the violence and terrorism that dominate our news, it is critical that we remember that the world is also seeing great feats of peace. Colombians have signed a peace accord to end a 52-year-old war, and will vote on ratifying it in just a few weeks.

Nancy Lindborg

Wed, 09/21/2016 - 19:42

Issue Areas:

Conflict Analysis and Prevention

Countering Violent Extremism

Mediation and Facilitation

Post Conflict Reconstruction

Religion

Rule of Law

Science and Technology

Security Sector Governance

Training

Youth

Type of Article:

News Release

Can Your PlayStation Stop a War?

Video games are being used for everything from helping find cures for HIV to losing weight. It's time to start using them to make peace.

Derek Caelin

The question of whether violent video games cause violence in the real world has been around pretty much since they were introduced. It’s a controversial issue and one that has prompted at least six reports by the U.S.

Mon, 02/08/2016 - 10:16

Issue Areas:

Science and Technology

Type of Article:

Peace Channel

Afghanistan Post-2014

Geospatial analysis and mapping have a critical role to play in reconstruction efforts in conflict-affected regions. This report explains the core problem in typical data collection techniques: bias. Data is collected only where collection is safe and thus is not representative. To be more effective, development programs need more in-depth analysis of their reconstruction efforts, even in the most insecure spaces.

Summary

Current methods of monitoring and evaluation in conflict-affected environments such as Afghanistan have typically focused on achievements in more secure and accessible areas where international investment is higher and the population has historically been more attuned to the interests of the state.
The institutional interests of donors and an overreliance on quantitative data collection techniques, such as polling, has led to this bias in assessing the impact of programs.

Center for South and Central Asia

David Mansfield

Thu, 11/12/2015 - 10:48

Issue Areas:

Conflict Analysis and Prevention

Science and Technology

Countries:

Afghanistan

After the Dust Settles: Social Media in Political Transitions

Tue, 09/29/2015 - 09:00

Tue, 09/29/2015 - 13:00

When Egyptians, Ukrainians and others massed to demand democracy in recent years, the world noted their use of social media to build these movements. But after a government is changed and the crowds go home, social media may help spur political and social polarization amid a country’s difficult political transition. On September 29 a forum was held to discuss the latest Blogs & Bullets report on social media’s role in this relatively un-examined transitional phase. The report explores how dangerous polarizing trends might be overcome to give transitions a greater chance of success. Michael Posner, the former Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor delivered a keynote speech.

For the past five years, the PeaceTech Lab at the U.S. Institute of Peace and George Washington University have partnered on the Blogs & Bullets initiative, a series of studies examining the role of social and digital media in global political protest movements.

Highlighted Sessions

Michael Posner (keynote speaker), Former U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor (DRL), currently a Co-Director for the Center of Business and Human Rights at New York University’s Stern School of Business

Blogs and Bullets Research Team

Marc Lynch, Professor of Political Science and International Affairs; Director, Project on Middle East Political Science, George Washington University
Sean Aday, Associate Professor of Media and Public Affairs and International Affairs; Director, Institute for Public Diplomacy and Global Communication, George Washington University
Deen Freelon, Assistant Professor of Communication Studies, American University

Experts' Panel: Egypt

Alexandra Siegel, Department of Politics, New York University; Graduate Student Researcher, NYU Social Media and Political Participation (SMaPP) Lab
Sahar Mohamed Khamis, Associate Professor, Department of Communication, University of Maryland, and former Head of the Mass Communication and Information Science Department in Qatar University
Tarek Radwan, Associate Director for Research, Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East, Atlantic Council
Alex Hanna, Department of Sociology, University of Wisconsin-Madison

Experts' Panel: Comparative Cases

Joshua Tucker, Professor of Politics, New York University; Co-Director, NYU Social Media and Political Participation (SMaPP) Lab
Adrienne Lebas, Associate Professor, Department of Government, American University

Type of Event or Course:

Events

Issue Areas:

Media and Conflict

Science and Technology

From Conflict in the Streets to Peace in the Society

Even when they are non-violent, mass movements often are confrontational, using strikes, boycotts or civil disobedience to sharpen conflict with authoritarian or corrupt systems of governance. On July 16, USIP gathered social justice and peacebuilding practitioners to discuss how that sharpening of conflict can be meshed with the peacebuilders’ role in resolving disputes.

Pakistan's Power Crisis: The Way Forward

Pakistan’s energy shortages disrupt daily life in the country, and protests and demonstrations against the shortages often turn violent, creating a risk that Pakistan’s energy crisis could threaten peace and stability. Incorporating official and donor perspectives, this report examines the factors in Pakistan’s energy crisis and what can be done to address it.

Rashid Aziz and Munawar Baseer Ahmad

Center for South and Central Asia

Summary

Pakistan is currently facing a severe and multifaceted energy crisis. Electricity shortages exceeded 7,000 megawatts in 2011; the gas shortfall is 2 billion cubic feet per day. The energy shortages are estimated to cost around 2 percent of GDP annually. This shortfall is the result of the failure, over successive governments’ tenures, to invest enough to expand power system capacity. Low and declining investment and savings rates (including in power) reflect macroeconomic weaknesses.

Mon, 06/22/2015 - 14:00

Issue Areas:

Conflict Analysis and Prevention

Economics

Science and Technology

Countries:

Pakistan

Key Links:

Partners (HTML):

Featured (HTML):

Iraqi Activists, Officials ‘SpeedGeek’ Their Way to Solutions

Even as Iraq’s Kurdish region copes with a flood of displaced Iraqis fleeing the “Islamic State” extremist group, some Kurds continue to pursue a long-planned constitution of their own. How these two very different challenges are met will help define the future of the semi-autonomous area. PeaceTech Lab is equipping civic groups and authorities with the tech savvy they need to fortify both kinds of campaigns.

Fred Strasser

The gateway to this technological power opened in a hotel conference room in Kurdistan’s second-largest city, Sulaimania, last month. While battles with the self-styled “Islamic State” continued across large swaths of Iraq in early May, the U.S. Institute of Peace partner organization SANAD for Peacebuilding in Iraq pulled together 29 activists for a three-day immersion in Sulaimania focused on how low-cost, widely available technologies can be deployed to support citizens’ campaigns.

Tim Receveur

Mon, 06/22/2015 - 13:43

Type of Article:

In The Field

Issue Areas:

Media and Conflict

Science and Technology

Countries:

Iraq

Radio Days in South Sudan

To reach people in a conflict, sometimes low-tech is the best tech.

While mobile phones and online social networks are pervasive in South Sudan’s urban areas, in the country’s rural regions many people still rely on traditional means of communication – primarily radio. Nearly three-quarters of the population listen on a daily basis.

Theo Dolan

Center for the Middle East and Africa

Theo Dolan

Thu, 05/14/2015 - 09:39

Issue Areas:

Media and Conflict

Science and Technology

Youth

Type of Article:

Peace Channel

Countries:

South Sudan

Articles & Analysis

Peace Efforts Cannot End After 24 Hours

By:

Nancy Lindborg

For 35 years, the International Day of Peace on September 21 has served as a rallying point for governments, organizations and ordinary people working to help end violent conflict around the world.

Pro-democracy protesters stand in a formation after coming under assault in the Mong Kok neighborhood of Hong Kong, Oct. 3, 2014. Demonstrators in two parts of Hong Kong came under attack on Friday from men seeking to break apart their encampments, surrounding them and tearing down their tents.

From Conflict in the Streets to Peace in the Society

By:

James Rupert

From Hong Kong’s boulevards and Nairobi’s Uhuru Park to the maidans of Kyiv, Cairo and Tunis, millions of people have massed in recent years to demand greater democracy and transparency from their governments. Dozens of similar campaigns have been fought more quietly. A quarter-century of...

Iraqi Activists, Officials ‘SpeedGeek’ Their Way to Solutions

By:

Fred Strasser

Videos & Webcasts

Wielding Technology to Combat Dangerous Speech in Myanmar

Myanmar continues to experience intermittent violence and power struggles that threaten its progress toward sustainable peace, even as the country has made progress in its democratic transition....

USIP: In Review and Looking Forward (Video)

From a campaign for peaceful elections in Afghanistan to a...

Managing Conflict in a World Adrift

The recent eruptions of violence in the Middle East, parts of Africa and Eastern Europe illustrate the high hurdles of conflict management amid rapidly shifting power dynamics. Join USIP for a...