Tag: Statistics

Ceasefires Don’t Work: We Have the Numbers to Prove It

Ceasefire by Juana Alicia
Courtesy Steve Rotman/Flickr

This article was originally published by War is Boring on 31 October 2016.

On Sept. 10, 2016, the U.S.-brokered a ceasefire with Russia and Syria in the besieged city of Aleppo. Although low-intensity fighting never really stopped, the ceasefire didn’t begin to fall apart until a week later, when U.S. aircraft mistakenly killed about 80 Syrian troops.

The killings heightened tensions between the United States and Russia, who had agreed to the ceasefire with the aim of negotiating a combined effort against Islamic State and Al Qaeda-linked fighters. By Sept. 21, the ceasefire collapsed — and the following day, the Syrian government announced a new military offensive to retake Aleppo.

The offensive featured some of the most intensive ground combat and bombing of the entire war, costing hundreds of lives within the span of just a few days. The humanitarian cost on the ground was described by U.N. humanitarian chief Stephen O’Brien as “a level of savagery that no human should have to endure.”

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65 Years of Military Spending: Trends in SIPRI’s New Data

Money Pile
Courtesy Kenny Cole/Flickr. CC BY 2.0

This article was originally published by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) on 21 November 2016.

Today, SIPRI is launching its new extended military expenditure data—free to download from our website—with consistent data going back as far as 1949.

It may seem curious that, although SIPRI has published military expenditure data almost since its creation, starting with data from 1950 in the very first SIPRI Yearbook of 1969/70, for the past 20 years or so we have only been able to provide data going back to 1988. Varying methodologies meant that we could not guarantee consistency between data collected before 1988 and data collected after 1988, and so no meaningful comparisons between these data sets could be made. Until now.

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Categories
Humanitarian Issues

Many Refugees, Poor Data: Development Cooperation Requires Higher-quality Data

Rowing boat on a house roof
Courtesy Norbert Nagel/Wikimedia Commons

This article was originally published by the German institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP) in August 2016.

In June 2016, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) presented his latest annual report on the situation of refugees and displaced persons around the world. Once again, this account documents new record levels in refugee numbers, both in industrialised and in developing countries. For governments and aid organisations, these statistics constitute an important basis for addressing displacement-related challenges in a more effective manner. However, the data provided by UNHCR is often incomplete and marked by a number of shortcomings. Increasingly high expectations are being placed on development cooperation in terms of tackling the root causes of forced displacement. Meeting these expectations requires reliable data.

Refugee crises can only be adequately addressed on the basis of comprehensive and reliable data. Displaced persons must be able to register as refugees in order to receive access to international protection and the related legal rights and aid. Host countries and communities depend on data pertaining to current displacement situations in order to plan the required services and provide the necessary administrative, personnel and material resources. The credibility of international aid organisations’ appeals for donations also rely on substantiated information about displacement situations.

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Categories
Terrorism

Gary LaFree: Public Policy and (Myths About) Terrorism

9/11
9/11. Photo: 9/11 Photos/flickr.

On 22 May 2013, the ISN hosted the latest in a series of roundtable discussions on international relations or security-centered events. After analyzing the present status of Political Islam in last month’s roundtable, the topic of discussion this time around was Public Policy (and Myths) about Terrorism, which featured the University of Maryland’s Dr. Gary LaFree.

In his preliminary remarks, Dr. LaFree first observed that counterterrorism policy agendas are too often set by a small number of high-profile yet ultimately atypical events. In other words, terrorist strikes such as 9/11 and the recent Boston Marathon bombing have had a disproportionate impact on the development of counterterrorism policy in the US and elsewhere. That such “black swan” events have influenced policy as they have then led Dr. LaFree to raise his second point. Actual terrorism is more akin to ordinary criminal activity than not. In fact, terrorist incidents tend to be highly concentrated in time and space. They are rarely isolated in nature and tend to occur in small, self-repeating clusters or “bursts”. They echo, in short, the “near-repeat” phenomena seen in criminal activity.

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