Understanding the Complexities of Violent Extremism In Kosovo, Tunisia, and Kenya

Capstone paper for the fulfillment of the Master of Public Policy degree.In 2015, terrorist attacks resulted in a worldwide average of 2,361 deaths and 2,943 injuries monthly (U.S. Department of State, 2016). More than half of the attacks targeted private citizens and property. These statistics are not only disheartening, but reveal the need for greater study on the causes and attractions of violent extremism (VE), along with methods targeted toward the prevention of violent extremism. This report originated as a Capstone Project Proposal at the Humphrey School of Public Affairs submitted by the staff of the International Republican Institute (IRI), one of four nonpartisan democracy institutes that receive funding from the National Endowment for Democracy to support aspiring democracies worldwide (International Republican Institute, 2017). In accepting this research proposal, our team of five graduate students were commissioned by IRI to explore the web of interdependent factors that contribute to VE within three particular contexts of Kenya, Kosovo, and Tunisia. Additionally, the research proposal called for the recommendations of potential resources, programs, and tools that IRI could leverage for future programming designed to decrease societal and individual susceptibility to VE. Our approach to investigating violent extremism is encapsulated by Douglas Leonard, who states: Intolerance takes root and spreads in failed states where security is lacking, where balances of power are realigning and where fierce competition puts pressure on societies to create inflexible and impermeable alliances defined around the markers of human identity, whether ethnic, religious, linguistic or tribal.... Intolerance is a human tendency in any context of scarcity, whether religious or secular. (Leonard, 2015) As a means of systematically assessing susceptibility to VE across all three contexts (Kenya, Kosovo, and Tunisia) we developed an Assessment Tool that allows the user to identify vulnerable populations within a society. Although we are confident with the assessments made, we recognize that there are limitations to desk research. We believe that using our assessment tool in the location being analyzed alongside local experts will provide practitioners the best systematic means to uncover and assess a society’s susceptibility to VE at the national, local, and individual level

Oiling Of The Continental Shelf And Coastal Marshes Over Eight Years After The 2010 Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill

We measured the temporal and spatial trajectory of oiling from the April, 2010, Deepwater Horizon oil spill in water from Louisiana\u27s continental shelf, the estuarine waters of Barataria Bay, and in coastal marsh sediments. The concentrations of 28 target alkanes and 43 target polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons were determined in water samples collected on 10 offshore cruises, in 19 water samples collected monthly one km offshore at 13 inshore stations in 2010 and 2013, and in 16-60 surficial marsh sediment samples collected on each of 26 trips. The concentration of total aromatics in offshore waters peaked in late summer, 2010, at 100 times above the May, 2010 values, which were already slightly contaminated. There were no differences in surface or bottom water samples. The concentration of total aromatics declined at a rate of 73% y(-1) to 1/1000th of the May 2010 values by summer 2016. The concentrations inside the estuary were proportional to those one km offshore, but were 10-30% lower. The oil concentrations in sediments were initially different at 1 and 10 m distance into the marsh, but became equal after 2 years. Thus, the distinction between oiled and unoiled sites became blurred, if not non-existent then, and oiling had spread over an area wider than was visible initially. The concentrations of oil in sediments were 100-1000 times above the May 2010 values, and dropped to 10 times higher after 8 years, thereafter, demonstrating a long-term contamination by oil or oil residues that will remain for decades. The chemical signature of the oil residues offshore compared to in the marsh reflects the more aerobic offshore conditions and water-soluble tendencies of the dissolved components, whereas the anaerobic marsh sediments will retain the heavier molecular components for a long time, and have a consequential effect on the ecosystems. (C) 2019 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd

The Middle and Late Holocene Geology and Landscape Evolution of the Lower Acheron River Valley, Epirus, Greece

A Thesis submitted to the faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Minnesota by Mark Richard Besonen in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science, August 1997.The lower Acheron River Valley, Epirus, Greece, hosts a rich, archaeological heritage dating back to the Lower Palaeolithic (Dakaris, 1971). Beginning with the Odyssey of Homer in the eighth century BC, numerous ancient authors make reference to the valley and describe a landscape configuration that is significantly different from that of the present. Three notable discrepancies concern: 1.) the size of the Glykys Limen (modern Phanari Bay), 2.) the nature, geometry, and evolution of the Acherousian lake, and 3.) the course of the Acheron River with respect to Kastri during the Classical Period. Are these ancient authors incorrect in their descriptions of the valley, or can a natural sequence of geomorphic evolution account for such discrepancies? To answer this question, an examination of the changing paleogeography and paleoenvironmental configuration of the valley during the past 4000 years was undertaken. Twenty-eight gouge auger sediment cores were taken from various locations in the valley between 1992 and 1994. Selected sediment samples underwent analyses of microfossil assemblages, organic carbon content, grain-size, magnetic susceptibility, and anhysteretic magnetization. Results from these analyses were used along with stratigraphic data and eight radiocarbon dates to reconstruct the middle and late Holocene paleogeography of the valley. The reconstructions suggest that the accounts given by ancient authors are correct, and that the discrepancies are the result of natural landscape evolution. In fact, the picture that emerges shows that recent geomorphic change in the valley has been quite significant with nearly six kilometers of shoreline progradation having occurred during the last 4,000 years

A 1,000 year high-resolution hurricane history for the Boston area based on the varved sedimentary record from the Lower Mystic Lake (Medford/Arlington, Massachusetts)

The Lower Mystic Lake (Medford/Arlington, MA) is a 24 m deep, ectogenically meromictic, low elevation (1 m a.s.l.), coastal lake directly connected to Boston Harbor by the Mystic River. About 1,000 years ago, steadily rising sea level in the Boston area finally reached a point at which occasional marine water delivery events via the river channel could actually reach the lake basin. Since then, such events have continued with enough frequency to maintain the meromictic condition. Meromixis has allowed the Lower Mystic Lake to accumulate an exquisitely laminated, annually resolvable (i.e. varved) archive of sedimentation in the lake over the last 1,000 years. A varve chronology was developed from this record. Multiple lines of robust evidence verify and validate the accuracy of the chronology. A series of anomalous, graded beds was found in the stratigraphy, and they show excellent coordination with known historic hurricanes that have affected the Boston area. The graded beds appear to be the result of intense, hurricane-strength rains which cause erosive overland flow that entrains sediment which is carried into the lake where it is deposited as a graded bed. This is enhanced by hurricane-strength winds which disturb vegetation, and uproot trees to expose fresh, loose sediment. By analogy, similar graded beds in the prehistoric portion of the stratigraphy probably represent similar hurricane events. This record of hurricane activity was compared to a record of sand layers in nearby Belle Isle Marsh (Boston Harbor) which are presumably the result of storm surge overwash events. Such sand layers in low resolution coastal archives are the main form of proxy evidence that paleotempestology studies have used to piece together longer term records of hurricane activity. Even when using multiple techniques, chronologic control in such archives is difficult, and linking sand layers to any particular storm is only tentative at best. Importantly, the Belle Isle Marsh record shows an apparent 600-year quiescent period. However, this is not due to a lack of hurricanes or storms, but to an unknown geomorphic change which affected the marsh, and it therefore serves as a cautionary note for the use of such archives

Proceedings - The Gulf of Mexico Workshop on International Research (OCS Study BOEM 2019-045)

Bureau of Ocean Energy Managemen

Inorganic nitrogen release from sediment slurry of riverine and estuarine ecosystems located at different river regimes

The purpose of the present study was to compare the nature of dissolved inorganic nitrogen (DIN = ammonium (NH4+) and nitrite + nitrate (NO2+3 = (NO2– + NO3–)) release from aerobic sediment slurry at two different hydrologic flow regimes. The watershed of the Guadalupe River–Estuary system receives more freshwater inflow than does the watershed of the Nueces River–Estuary system; thus, the Nueces Estuary is more saline than is the Guadalupe Estuary. Sediment samples were collected using cores, analysed for organic matter and grain size, and used to perform laboratory experiments to measure DIN release. During the experiments, DIN concentrations in overlying water were measured for 48 h in five different salinity treatments. Ammonium concentrations were higher in the Nueces River and Estuary treatments than in similarly treated samples from the Guadalupe River and Estuary. An increase in NO2+3 concentrations along salinity gradients of the Nueces Estuary treatments indicated favourable condition for nitrification. The Guadalupe River sediments that were not exposed to salinity had an increase in NH4+ concentration at 7.5 ppt. The different DIN release among salinity treatments indicated that hydrologic forcing on organic matter deposition and salinity have an important role on the retention and release of inorganic nitrogen at the sediment–water aerobic layers in rivers and estuaries

New insight into Saanich Inlet varved sediments (British Columbia, Canada) from micro-scale analysis of sedimentary facies and micro-XRF core scanning analyses

International audienc

Tell Leilan Akkadian Imperialization, Collapse and Short-Lived Reoccupation Defined by High-Resolution Radiocarbon Dating

The article aims at reconstructing the Akkadian imperialisation at Tell Leilan, North-eastern Syria, presenting new data from excavations of the settlement's acropolis. High resolution C14 dates provide a strong chronological framework for the historical processes detected