Conceptualising non-state security

Why do states choose to engage with non-state security apparatuses when faced with domestic threats? This research tackles two distinct challenges. First, I seek to understand how non-state security actors are organized and how they operate. Second, I assess the circumstances under which developing states choose to outsource their coercive capabilities to non-state security actors as opposed to their own militaries or other state militaries. I answer these puzzles using a novel dataset on non-state security actors, their characteristics, and their operations. I identify four latent clusters of non-state security actor using unsupervised machine learning techniques. Using this typology, I develop a theory of why states might choose to engage with different forms of non-state security, testing these theories with a number of prediction models. I find suggestive evidence that states with low levels of military diversity are more likely to outsource their coercive powers to non-state security actors who provide multiple services across multiple domains, essentially serving as a surrogate army for a lower cost. Implications are studied and discussed using a comparative case study of four non-state security actors

PGRP reproducible research resources

Various resources used for onboarding new members to the Payments and Governance Research Program's projects. Resources are designed to expose new researchers to the fundamentals of GitHub, version control, and the "best practices" of reproducible research. The development of these resources, and the process of onboarding new RAs to the team, would not have been possible without funding from the Berkeley Initiative for Transparency in the Social Sciences (BITSS), managed by the Center for Effective Global Action (CEGA)

A Robustness Reproduction of Tappin, Berinsky and Rand (2023): "Partisans' Receptivity to Persuasive Messaging is Undiminished by Countervailing Party Leader Cues"

Tappin, Berinsky, and Rand (2023) find that the effectiveness of persuasive messaging is not diminished by countervailing in-party leader cues, using a survey experiment fielded in the United States. In this robustness reproduction, we briefly summarize the original design and results before blindly reproducing the main results and conducting several additional robustness checks. We find that the original results are reproducible and robust to several additional checks. In so doing we contribute to the collaborative effort between the Institute for Replication (I4R) and Nature Human Behaviour to replicate recent findings published in the latter, and more broadly to advancing replication in political science

Direct Replication and Additional Sensitivity and Robustness Analyses for Frederiksen (2022): A Replication Report from the Nottingham Replication Games

We replicate the analysis conducted by Frederiksen, 2022a. We focus on assessing the computational and robustness replicability of their work. We find that their main exhibits and supplementary analysis are replicable, both when running their original Stata replication package, and when we attempt to replicate their findings from scratch in R. We also conduct additional robustness checks by estimating additional specifications and by subsetting the dataset by the time taken by the respondent to complete the survey. We again find that their work is robust to our battery of alternative specifications

Reproduction and Robustness of Kao et al. (2024): "Female Representation and Legitimacy". A Report from the 2024 UC Berkeley Replication Games

Kao et al. (2024) use phone-based survey experiments in Jordan, Tunisia and Morocco to test whether established theories about the effect of descriptive representation on perceived democratic legitimacy hold in the Middle East. They find that the presence of women in deliberative bodies legitimizes decision-making even in more socially conservative, less democratic societies. We blindly reproduced their study, and then extend their analysis with five additional robustness checks. We find that their analysis is reproducible and robust in several ways, although there were ambiguities in the original text which prolonged this process. Finally, we also extended their analysis by using iterative machine learning models to study heterogeneous treatment effects. We find that marital status as well as pre-treatment attitudes on related issues affect the response to the treatment

Impact of Combat Deployment on Psychological and Relationship Health: A Longitudinal Study

Although previous research has indicated an elevated prevalence of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and other mental health problems among veterans of Operations Iraqi Freedom and Enduring Freedom following deployment, most of this research has been cross-sectional and has focused on a limited range of military groups and outcome criteria. This investigation was a longitudinal study of U.S. Air Force security forces assigned to a year-long high-threat ground mission in Iraq to determine the degree to which airmen\u27s emotional and behavioral health and committed relationships were adversely impacted by an extended deployment to a warzone. Participants were a cohort of 164 security forces airmen tasked to a 365-day deployment to train Iraqi police. Airmen completed study measures both prior to and 6–9 months following deployment. Rates of deterioration in individual and interpersonal adjustment were both significant and medium to large in magnitude of effect, d = 0.43 to 0.90. Results suggest that the negative effects of deployment are related to levels of traumatic experiences and do not spontaneously remit within the first 6–9 months following return from deployment—particularly among those service members having relatively lower levels of social support