Who researches the researchers?

In a standard class on research methods, you will learn about biases that the researcher can introduce into the research. Researchers, we are taught, sometimes unconsciously influence respondents to give answers that make for results that are convenient to them. At the same time, respondents may give different answers to a question depending on the age, gender, ethnicity or nationality etc. of the researcher

Does security imply safety? On the (lack of) correlation between different aspects of security

This paper investigates to what extent different aspects of security correlate. It distinguishes four concepts covered by the term ‘security’: technical safety, perceived safety, technical security and perceived security. It is shown that these concepts need not correlate conceptually. Furthermore, the paper shows empirically that these concepts correlate weakly in two cases. This has implications for policy and research. First, it leaves open the possibility that interventions targeting one aspect of security do not affect, or even adversely affect, another aspect of security: an expression of a security gap. Second, research is commonly motivated by individual-level arguments relating to safety, whilst relying on aggregate indicators more likely capturing security

Off the hook: can mobile phones help with statebuilding?

Lady Gaga thinks the telephone is pretty much a one-way street: “Call all you want, but there’s no one home—and you’re not gonna reach my telephone,” she sings, together with Beyoncé in the aptly-named song “Telephone”

Anouk Rigterink and Mareike Schomerus, “The World Development Report 2015: One step forward, one step back”

Moving Beyond the Rational, Returning to the Apolitica

Mareike Schomerus and Anouk Rigterink, “Off the hook: Can mobile phones help with statebuilding?”

Even though the phone stands for communication, it only works if both ends play along — which is a good way to describe the dilemma about mobile phones and politics

South Sudan's long crisis of justice: merging notions of socio-economic justice and criminal accountability

South Sudan’s peace agreements offer two versions of justice: The Comprehensive Peace Agreement includes justice as a description of a better future with more equality. The Agreement for the Resolution of the Conflict in the Republic of South Sudan focuses on justice as individual criminal accountability for war crimes. However, the South Sudanese demand for justice combines and goes beyond these two conceptions of justice. Using structured and openended interviews conducted in January 2014, the chapter argues that justice is used to describe holistic accountability. This means accountability is understood not as individual accountability for crimes, but additionally as holding leaders formally to account for failing to deliver socio-economic justice and equality, as evoked by the spirit of the CPA. It is a request of sorts to bring leaders to justice for their lack of collective social and economic responsibility in a system where elections do not function as a way to hold leaders to account

Can community monitoring save the commons? Evidence on forest use and displacement

Rapid deforestation is a major driver of greenhouse gas emissions (IPCC, 2019). One proposed policy tool to halt deforestation is community forest management. Even though communities manage an increasing proportion of the world's forests, we lack good evidence of successful approaches to community forest management. Prior studies suggest successful approaches require a number of `design conditions' to be met. However, causal evidence on the eectiveness of individual design conditions is scarce. This study isolates one design condition, community-led monitoring of the forest, and provides causal evidence on its potential to reduce forest use. The study employs a randomized controlled trial to investigate the impact of community monitoring on forest use in 110 villages in Uganda. We explore the impact of community monitoring in both monitored and unmonitored areas of the forest using exceptionally detailed data from on-the-ground measurements and satellite imagery. Estimates indicate that community monitoring does not aect our main outcome of interest, a forest use index. However, treatment villages see a relative increase in forest loss outside of monitored forest areas compared to control villages. This increase is seen both in non-monitored areas adjacent to treatment villages, and in non-monitored areas adjacent to neighboring villages not included in the study. We tentatively conclude that at least part of the increase in forest loss in non-monitored areas is due to displacement of forest use by members of treatment villages due to fear of sanctions. Interventions to reduce deforestation should take this potentially substantial eect into consideration

JSRP survey report on Western Equatoria, South Sudan

Our new report describes the findings of a survey conducted by the Justice and Security Research Programme (JSRP) in Western Equatoria State, South Sudan, in 2013. The survey is based on a representative sample of 433 individuals in the Ezo County and the two southern-most payams of Tambura County

Diamonds and violence in Africa. Uncovering relationships and mechanisms.

This paper investigates whether an increase in the international price of diamonds impacts violent activity in African countries that are diamond abundant and if so, through which mechanism(s). It concludes that an increase in the diamond price is positively related to violence in countries abundant in primary diamonds, but unrelated to violence in countries with secondary diamonds. This result makes it possible to distinguish between two potential theoetical mechanisms connecting resources and violence: insecure property rights raising the returns to conflict and the wage rate changing the opportunity costs of conflict. The findings support the latter, but not the former. Results are robust to using different diamond prices, instrumenting for diamond price and controlling for cyclical effects, but no to controlling for the presence of other resources