I was on BBC earlier today and came across this article on Konza Technology City, a tech center that will be built in Kenya outside Nairobi. In a bit of excitement I posted a comment on Facebook that this could be a boon to investment...then I re-read the article. I think that, indeed, it could be … Continue reading “Africa’s Silicon Savannah”…What will Kenya get from Konza?
Africa
2013 Update: Kenya, TechChange and TC109
So 2013 is off to a roaring start. I just relocated to a new place in the Petworth neighborhood in D.C. and learned that all the staff I worked with at the U.S. Institute of Peace back in the day all live within 5 blocks of me. But the big things on the horizon are … Continue reading 2013 Update: Kenya, TechChange and TC109
Goma, M23, and the success of peacekeeping
The timing of reading Virginia Page Fortna’s Does Peacekeeping Work seemed appropriate as the M83 rebels in eastern Congo (DRC) marched in and took Goma, only to recently withdraw under the auspices of the MONUSCO force currently operating in the DRC. During this series of events I saw a tweet from Oxfam’s Policy and Practice … Continue reading Goma, M23, and the success of peacekeeping
Book review! “Crafting Peace” by Caroline Hartzell and Matthew Hoddie
Caroline Hartzell and Matthew Hoddie make an argument that the most robust form of negotiated peace involves a well-designed power or institution sharing agreement between the parties involved in a civil war. They make this argument in “Crafting Peace” using a statistical analysis of conflict cessation that includes variables covering duration, external intervention and measures … Continue reading Book review! “Crafting Peace” by Caroline Hartzell and Matthew Hoddie
Kenya Trip! Mixed method research on mobile phones for peace
Since the end of the fall semester of 2011, I have been working on a paper that integrates theories of ethnic cooperation and information asymmetries to understand why mobile phones can have a significant effect on conflict prevention. You can find the working paper here. I presented this paper in Australia at the University of … Continue reading Kenya Trip! Mixed method research on mobile phones for peace
Book Review! Scott Strauss’s “The Order of Genocide”
As time passes and we are able to collect more data on the Rwandan genocide, it is becoming increasingly important that we recognize not only the externalities that created socio-political pressure in Rwanda leading up to the genocide, but also systematically study why the perpetrators of violence made the decision to participate. Generally we see … Continue reading Book Review! Scott Strauss’s “The Order of Genocide”
Friday Wrap-up
What's happened in political economy, conflict and tech this week? Every Friday I'm going to take on the personal challenge of writing a wrap-up with a bit of analysis, along with the usual longer posts and book reviews. So without further ado... Mining strikes continue in South Africa after the Lonmin miners' strike in August. … Continue reading Friday Wrap-up
Philippe Le Billon: Wars of Plunder (Columbia University Press: 2012)
Philippe Le Billon’s Wars of Plunder takes previous research on the mathematical relationship between natural resources and conflict and combines this with qualitative understandings of power and space to create a nuanced explanation of how different natural resources relate to conflict. Focusing initially on work done by economists such as Paul Collier and Macartan Humphreys, … Continue reading Philippe Le Billon: Wars of Plunder (Columbia University Press: 2012)
Benghazi part 2
So I was going to do two parts, but upon reflection I decided against it. The second aspect I was thinking about writing on was fairly partisan, and while politics is part of this site's purview I decided in the end it's best to leave the partisanship to the domestic politics folks. I'll have a … Continue reading Benghazi part 2
An Unscientific Look at Stock Market Performance and Mobile Money, Pt.1
I'm still on this "political economy of technology for development/peace" kick. This article came to mind since I've seen a lot of research on mobile money from the mobile telephone access side, but not much on the macroeconomic side (please share if you have good stuff on this!). I do like this piece from William Jack … Continue reading An Unscientific Look at Stock Market Performance and Mobile Money, Pt.1
Charles P. Martin-Shields 