A Comparative Analysis of Combatants' Economic and Social-Political Power during and after War

Lead Research Organisation: University of Edinburgh
Department Name: Sch of Social and Political Science

Abstract

The linkages between poverty and violence are multiple and complex. A wealth of global and regional studies of armed conflict show that while war causes poverty, at both the structural (macro-) and individual (micro-) levels, poverty itself is also a risk factor for violence and civil war. Research, particularly from Africa's LDCs, highlights the corollary to this war-poverty nexus: the importance of natural resources and war economies in sustaining violence. These theories must now be systematically tested at the individual and group levels in order to be fully integrated into development interventions.
This project aims to bridge the gap between causal theories of conflict participation and the growing empirical research on post-conflict development, by measuring subjective and objective empowerment and disempowerment in context. It will answer the overarching question: How do discrepancies between individuals' wartime and peacetime opportunities and experiences affect their socio-economic reintegration, incentives to revert to violence, and pathways out of poverty?
Particular attention will be given to gender relations, military organizational structures, and social networks. The latest research on conflict finds young men caught in cycles of economic and political marginalization, the desperation and frustration of which allegedly spurs participation in violence. Eventual de-escalation of fighting lands them back in further marginalized spaces, without the skills, schooling, or family structures necessary to sustain peacetime livelihoods. This project seeks to explore and test the theoretical assumptions of this cycle through a mixed methods comparative analysis of armed groups and their fighters, followers, and commanders, in Liberia, Sierra Leone, and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). It will elucidate the organizational and survival strategies of armed groups, and identify post-war patterns and risk factors for poverty and violence. Support networks and survival strategies will be investigated for enhancing poverty alleviation and peacebuilding initiatives.
The project will consist of a three-country ex-combatant survey, social network analysis, in-depth elite interviews, and historical analysis. Liberia, Sierra Leone, and the Democratic Republic of Congo have had similar protracted, regionalized conflict profiles - though, crucially, the DRC conflict remains sporadic and intractable - but different post-conflict reintegration policies, particularly vis-à-vis ex-combatant incorporation into armed forces and police, that allow for a rich cross-case comparison. Within-case comparisons across state and non-state armed groups will generate rigorous and effective policy recommendations based on variations in wartime experiences.
A key outcome of the project will be a highly integrative research process bringing together international, regional, and local stakeholders in the design, analysis, and dissemination phases. This integration will be echoed in the empirical investigation, which will range from the lowest levels of armed group support (foot soldiers, 'bush wives', and personal body guards), to commanders and civilian chiefs in individual interviews, surveys, and network analysis; and in qualitative interviews, to the highest levels of regional and international governance. Social network analysis will be used to systematically analyse these multi-layered relationships and power structures, how they change over time, and the economic and social survival opportunities embedded within them. All levels of the project will be parsed out by gender to examine differences between men's and women's survival strategies and opportunities for social and economic empowerment - or exclusion. This marks a key innovation in the analysis of structural inequality and the role of gender in conflict and post-conflict experiences.

Planned Impact

BENEFICIARIES: This research targets a number of key constituencies and stakeholders throughout its design, implementation, analysis, and dissemination phases. The most important beneficiary group as end-users will be national and international practitioners and policy-makers, including research and advocacy officials from international NGOs, UN organizations, and various ministries in Liberia, Sierra Leone, and DR Congo. These beneficiaries will be within the immediate sphere of influence of the project and will be key stakeholders for translating research findings into sustainable policy improvements for poverty alleviation. The second key beneficiary group will be the conflict-affected individuals and households whose economic challenges and structural inequality the project seeks to understand and transform, and the community organizations and local leaders accountable to them. The third beneficiary group will be the interdisciplinary academic audience of scholars studying conflict dynamics and post-war reconstruction (described in the 'Academic beneficiaries' section), including local researchers, research respondents/participants, and community-level development practitioners. Bringing all three stakeholder groups together is integral to the research design, and will take place throughout the project to maximize the relevance and uptake of the findings.
ACTIVITIES TO ENSURE UPTAKE: At the country level, key stakeholder workshops will generate local impact in two stages. During the stage one survey design and planning, a dialectic format will generate joint knowledge production and new information from the outset. Second stage stakeholder workshops will disseminate preliminary findings and discuss policy implications with research design and implementation partners, as well as government and INGO stakeholders. These stakeholders will both inform the development of, and benefit from, policy briefs and guidance outputs. The full report will be presented in public forums to representatives from a range of national and international organizations working on conflict intervention and post-conflict development. Several community-level pilot meetings will be held following high-level stakeholder workshops to return results and build local knowledge and agency for development.
A project advisory board, consisting of academics and practitioners, will provide guidance for the project's duration. Academic impact will by generated by peer-reviewed articles, presentations at leading academic conferences, and a comparative monograph to be published after project completion. An international academic workshop in the final year will present and re-examine the empirical findings and theoretical implications, and develop priorities for future research, emphasizing the importance of mixed methods and practitioner-academic synergies. Open access platforms, including a project website, will ensure these outputs are widely available to practitioners and country-level research teams beyond the lifetime of the project. All data, codebooks, survey instruments, and methodology descriptions will be made publicly available to extend the legacy and impact of the project and encourage further analysis and comparative research.
Finally, to maximize impacts at the local level, the project website will feature local researchers and assistants, providing a professional platform for their skills, improving North-South networking opportunities, and maximizing the potential for domestic and regional ownership of knowledge and engagement. A strong research assistant consortium already exists in DRC; Co-I Zoe Marks will work with local enumerators, assistants, and training institutions in Liberia and Sierra Leone to replicate this model for sustainable employment opportunities and professional development strategies for project staff. This will contribute directly to poverty alleviation, while also ensuring skills, knowledge, and capacity are retained.
 
Description Where there is armed conflict, there is often persistent poverty, under-development and political instability. These are both causes and effects of violence, as individuals are caught in cycles of economic and political marginalization, which allegedly spur violent mobilization. When fighting de-escalates, former armed group participants are often vulnerable to retrenched social and economic marginality, without the schooling or structures necessary for peacetime livelihoods. However, some ex-combatants leverage wartime resources into political power and opportunity. This project examined these cycles of mobilization and violence and how they affect people's wellbeing in Eastern Congo. Our primary findings highlight the persistent social legacies of armed conflict, as entire communities become structured around armed group affiliations - and civilians, left on the sidelines, seek to survive in the shadow of militarized power. Through this grant, we gathered over 400 social network and individual life history and welfare surveys across four target populations in Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo: civilians, former and active militia members, former rebels, and former and active state security personnel (army and police). To undertake this study, we successfully designed and implemented a multi-dimensional methodology for collecting several types of data in one interview. These data include from each survey respondent: demographic information, standardised life histories, livelihoods and welfare data, psychological trauma indices, and qualitative and quantitative social network data. As part of this data collection effort, we designed a new sampling methodology that uses respondent referrals generated through the social network component of the survey (asking people who are their close friends), in order to identify the "hidden population" of former and current armed group affiliates. This enabled us to robustly locate and interview people who may otherwise hide their politically sensitive conflict-related experiences. The sampling method demonstrates the utility of using social network referral sampling (a variation on respondent-driven sampling) to capture a covert/unknown network population. It has proven particularly useful for identifying and gaining access to armed group elites and members of local militias in DRC, which are a hard-to-reach and highly sensitive population. The social network component in particular has been taken up by former project members in new studies hosted at the LSE and in development and conflict related research in DR Congo and Nigeria. Through the data analysis, we discovered that individual and social pathways into armed conflict persist for years and sometimes decades in contexts of continued insecurity and instability. Eastern Congo represents a protracted conflict, whereby despite numerous attempted peace talks and other processes, key actors have not demobilized - and in fact, over the course of our project the number of active armed groups continued to increase, even though large-scale violence has largely ceased in key areas. Our research reveals the social effect of this "not war, not peace" environment. Civilians' friend groups and social networks look dramatically different than the social networks of people who have joined armed groups over the years. Most civilians in our survey had 5 or fewer people they considered close and trusted friends, and over 90% of civilians' friends were other civilians, who had never participated in armed groups. Conversely, both active and former members of armed groups had slightly larger networks (an average of 6 close friends) and had a high ratio of friends who were also in armed groups, both active and demobilized. There are a number of important implications in these findings. First, previous social network research demonstrates that larger and more diverse networks usually have corollary benefits in providing people with more ties to information and opportunities. We believe this is true in Eastern Congo, wherein armed group networks provide current and former members access to various goods and benefits, from security and information, to business and political opportunities, and social ties and status. Civilians, with smaller and more homogenous networks, do not seem to reap the same benefits as armed group members. Secondly, an important finding is the startling similarity between demobilized excombatant social networks, and the networks of active combatants. Through demobilization programs and organic processes of ending violence, we expect people who leave armed groups to begin rejoining civilian society and civilian social life. However, in Eastern Congo, former fighters continue to affiliate with current armed groups as much as do active members of those groups (both state and militia). This suggests that there is a continuing benefit to armed group relationships that is perhaps social and material, and is both an indicator and a driver of an ongoing militarized environment. This analysis helps quantify the social geography and validate other scholars' findings about the relationship between local authority and armed mobilization in Congo. Finally, we had surprising and important findings about the role of social relationships and political participation as pertains to gender and mental health. All of our work was gender-disaggregated and attuned to the varying experiences of men and women in Eastern Congo and in conflict zones more generally. We expected women's social networks to be somewhat different from men's, consistent with previous research. However, much to our surprise, we found that women who had formerly or presently participated in armed groups had social networks (friend groups) that looked more like those of their male peers in armed groups, than they did civilian women's networks. This is an exciting finding for further research in other conflict affected contexts, because it suggests that the process of mobilizing for and participating in war may serve to "masculinize" women's social networks or gender integrate them as compared to status quo civilian women's social ties. Conversely, this may also indicate that women who join armed groups struggle to make and build strong friendships with other women after war. In short, their more gender-diverse networks might indicate social exclusion and stigma. (These findings are discussed in more detail below to preserve previously reported data.) Having collected data on post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), we also examined the effects of protracted and recurrent traumatic experiences on people's social networks and wellbeing. We made the remarkable discovery that PTSD is strongly positively correlated with various forms of political participation, and that across all sub-populations of our survey, people who have PTSD (none of whom know they have or self-identify as having PTSD) are significantly more likely to report being likely to vote, participating in protests or rallies, joining local NGOs and civil society organizations, and more. However, this potentially positive boost in community-level engagement is counterbalanced by a negative relationship between PTSD and people's ability to support their children. The research underpinning the mental health findings remains ongoing, but we suspect that PTSD may lead people to be slightly more risk-seeking or risk-tolerant in public settings, and more cautious or closed off in intimate family relationships. Our finding is consistent with other studies that have been done in other conflict affected societies, where researchers find that people who have experienced violence and victimization are more likely to participate in their communities or engage in politics, such as voting. Our study is potentially the first of its kind to validate that correlation using the PTSD index and to thereby measure the underlying mechanism - psychological trauma and stress - that could drive this potentially positive, pro-social behavior. This has important implications for further research to integrate psychological and social-political approaches to understanding individual and community level dynamics; and it has important implications for the policy world. If health providers and development/political engagement programs and agencies understand the strength and potential that can arise out of trauma, we will be better equipped to treat its devastating consequences, while also engaging people's remarkable capacity for leadership and community engagement. Previously reported summaries--- Our analysis of civilians' and ex-combatants' livelihoods shows indeterminate correlations between social capital and livelihoods strategies. Civilian women and men alike - across both egos and alters - tend to have more diversified livelihoods activities and employment profiles than do ex-combatants, who have a foothold in relatively fewer trades (namely, farming, small trading, and selling local alcohol). This could be caused by a number of different, potentially countervailing, factors. As a survival strategy, livelihood diversification often indicates economic vulnerability and marginality. However, because the top trades are the same for both civilians and ex-combatants, it may indicate civilians have a more robust set of options or economic "ins" than those available to ex-combatants. Women who work in the state security sector as soldiers and police officers (primarily ex-RCD in the ego-net analysis we have done) may face a social trade-off, where their profession provides slightly greater status and economic power, but at the expense of having "normal" friend networks. We also find evidence of endogenous cycles of conflict mobilization, wartime social isolation/in-group cohesion, and post-war socializing and livelihoods patterns all reinforcing ex-combatant women's affinity with other ex-combatants - and likewise, civilians' ties with other civilians. In our first cut analysis of the data, we focused on women's social support networks in particular. The gendered effects of armed group participation have been extensively examined in feminist security studies, however there are mixed findings on whether women and girls suffer greater marginalization and stigma after war, or if they have more success reintegrating than do men. In DRC women and girls have been targeted for sexual and gender based violence, including during major attacks in Masisi and Rutshuru, our field sites. Moreover, Congolese culture is highly patriarchal. The church stresses gender conformity and wives' subservience to the husbands. Local authority is male-dominated, land is held by men, and women are generally expected to defer to men. Yet, there have been significant recruitment drives to incorporate more women into the FARDC and national police (PNC), partly as a result of UN and donor pressure to integrate the security sector. The most important trend to emerge from the ego-net data is the finding that ex-combatant women have larger social friend networks (rafiki proche) than do civilian women, and former RCD women in particular have the largest social networks with 5.9 alters on average, of whom 80 percent are female and 20 percent male. Other former armed-group-affiliated women have 5.5 alters in their friendship network on average, and slightly lower female-to-male ratios (72.2 percent and 27.8 percent, respectively), while civilian women named just 5 alters on average in their close friend networks, 86.9 percent of whom were female. Civilian women are not only overwhelmingly friends with other women, but 78.5% of the average female civilian ego-net is other civilian women (88.7% civilian overall). Comparatively, 6% of alters are ex-combatants of any faction and 5.3% are active militia or military affiliates. In an average ego-net of five alters this means just "half" of one friend has ever had any armed group affiliation, active or demobilised. The demographic profiles of ex-combatant rebel (ex-RCD) women's ego-nets in eastern Congo indicate that female participants in armed conflict do struggle to reintegrate after war. They have by far the lowest rate of civilian friends - less than half the ratio of civilian friends as in female ex-militia members' ego-nets, and less than a third as many civilian alters as other civilians (1.4 : 3 : 4.4 civilian alters per average ego-net sub-population, respectively). Close civilian friendships can be understood as a strong indicator of community level integration, as these communities remain predominantly civilian despite decades of mobilization cycles. Integration with local civilians suggests access to and acceptance of/by dominant social norms, higher levels of mutual trust, and presumably greater access to social and political information from the residential majority. Former rebel women lack these close friendship ties with local civilians, suggesting either social marginalization or continued antipathy between the "host community" and demobilized ex-combatants. The relative dearth of close civilian friendships reflects ex-RCD women's social dislocation as a result of (i) years spent engaged with anti-state armed groups; (ii) increased likelihood of movement and displacement associated with armed group activity; and (iii) historic antagonism between RCD/affiliates and the local Hunde community in Masisi and Rutshuru. (We will be able to measure correlations of each of these variables across the civilian and ex-RCD subpopulations using survey data in future iterations of the analysis.) Meanwhile, female former members and affiliates of other armed groups, mostly local militia, have more than twice as many close civilian friends. However, this does not represent high levels of successful integration so much as it indicates lower levels of marginalization and isolation. This is unsurprising given that most of these women are part of the dominant ethnic group and from the local community. For both ex-RCD and ex-militia/other armed group women, their rafiki proche ego-net profiles could result from positive "pull" dynamics whereby women's armed group ties are more socially, economically, or psychologically valuable than maintaining just civilian friendships. Conversely, there could be "push" factors, like stigma and mistrust, that make it harder for female supporters of armed groups to build and maintain close ties with civilian alters. - How might the findings be taken forward and by whom? At this stage, we have focused on local capacity building and strengthening research networks in DRC. We have discussed the survey method and strategy with local and international colleagues in research workshops located in and focused on DRC and on gender and conflict issues. We have been in dialogue with members of the international community, from the UN level (e.g. IAWG DDR, MONUSCO, UNDP, DPA), donor governments (e.g. DfID, FCO/SU in UK; FBA in Sweden), the INGO community, and local practitioners and stakeholders in DRC. Our research stakeholder workshop was held in Nairobi in December 2017, and we are participating in multiple dissemination workshops in the US and UK in tandem with other programmes/opportunities. This is a cost-saving opportunity that also facilitates reaching the broadest possible audience.
Exploitation Route We published a research note for "African Affairs", the top ranked area studies journal globally, which details the potential and state of the art for social network research in Africa. It uses our project as a reference for how to conduct network research in the field. We have also presented several versions of our data analysis on the ego-networks (individual social support networks) of people in the research area in Eastern DRC where we collected data. These have been entered under the "outputs" section of ResearchFish. A working paper by co-I Zoe Marks seeks to make the definition of reintegration rigorous and narrow so the pros and cons of different post-conflict community-level peacebuilding strategies can be considered and measures. We have also published our findings and methodological considerations in Feminists @ Law journal, shaping the state of the art for gender-related conflict research and offering the network perspective as a key way to understand women's and men's social positions. We anticipate three ways these findings will be taken forward and put to use. 1) The SNA research note will bring SNA research to a much broader audience of area studies scholars and help start a conversation about mixed methods and interdisciplinary opportunities for using network approaches to understand key phenomena in African Studies. It poses an opportunity to build a common vernacular and conceptual framework for talking about and analysing issues related to a range of social phenomena dealing with both personal agency and the structure of our social environment. 2) The research findings on integration, social cohesion, and social mapping contributes methodologically and empirically to how researchers and practitioners can understand integration as a measurable phenomenon, particularly in a post-war setting. Most approaches to understanding integration look at geographic or net demographic settlement patterns, not the strength and content of interpersonal relationships and social networks. Our approach will significantly progress both the theoretical and empirical substance of peace building research, and offer a methodology that bridges relational and material aspects of social cohesion. 3) The gendered analysis brings gender to the fore in a dynamic and nuanced way, rather than the more common "gender-as-variable" approach. It integrates insights from feminist research on the power of social ties for creating opportunities and constraints for women, and exacerbating patriarchal inequalities, with the methodology of social network analysis for empirically measuring this. It does so through the case of the DRC, which has not been seminal in shifting more universal understandings of gender inequality, but instead has largely served as a vehicle for studying exceptional levels of gender based violence. Our piece will strengthen understandings of gender in conflict, while also providing insights on women's and men's post/wartime livelihoods and social wellbeing.
Sectors Communities and Social Services/Policy,Government, Democracy and Justice,Security and Diplomacy
 
Description We have presented our research findings in three important forums for impact. The actual observed outcomes are still developing; however, we feel the engagement is substantive enough to warrant including at this time. First, we presented the findings on integration in Eastern Congo to the UN Inter-Agency Working Group on Disarmament, Demobilisation, and Reintegration (DDR). This is the highest body in the UN system, and in turn in the world, for coordinating best practice and policy requirements for DDR programmes. DDR is the cornerstone of post-conflict transition of armed group members from wartime roles to peaceable members of society. Yet, it has been hampered by a disconnect between the experiences of war and social context, and the relatively short-term programming DDR entails. By presenting our preliminary evidence on persistent social alienation between members of opposed armed groups, we were able to convince members of the IAWG to consider the importance of social networks and network brokers in getting full participation in DDR programmes. We also stressed the value of ensuring that DDR programmes consider social support and other more durable integration mechanisms to bridge the combatant/community divide. This presentation was part of the IAWG workshop in Stockholm, Sweden 20 October 2017, where the group was revising the international guidelines for DDR after ten years. A research-policy exchange was organised by the Folke Bernadotte Academy, of which co-I Zoe Marks is a research affiliate. In addition to a research-to-policy presentation, Dr Marks provided a working paper and accessible powerpoint for broader circulation throughout the UN interagency partners working on DDR. Our presentation reached a wide audience throughout UN agencies, including the Department of Political Affairs, the Department of Peacekeeping, the UN Development Program, the World Bank, and more. This led to the second policy impact, which is a new/emerging relationship with the UN Development Program (UNDP) in Congo and the Great Lakes Region. UNDP is the lead UN body coordinating the Great Lakes regional response across security, development, and justice, including DDR. Dr Marks met virtually and in person (in Nairobi, Kenya at UN Africa HQ on 7 December 2017) with the Director of the cross-agency initiative coordinating all UN activities to discuss how social network insights can improve a local mediation programme. The local stakeholders initiative is a new approach that aims to identify the powerbrokers who hold the keys to peace, or ongoing conflict, at the local level. In addition to discussing our research findings, Dr Marks is continuing a conversation about how the project might contribute to broader programme design and evaluation. Third and finally, the project has fed into DFID's Political Settlements Research Programme, and into related policy/practitioner engagement opportunities. Again, Dr Marks has held meetings with colleagues at DFID's conflict research unit and has participated in several research-to-policy/practice forums to present the findings to a range of stakeholders, including the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO), Saferworld, Oxfam, Conciliation Resources, several international Women's Mediator networks, and other conflict resolution and post-conflict development related organisations. These meetings have been convened by partners on the DFID-funded Political Settlements Research Programme, the Swedish Women's Mediator Network, the British Academy, the RCUK Global Challenges Research Fund, and more. It is too soon to measure impacts and outcomes, but the convening of practitioners interested in evidence based approaches to peace building has precipitated dozens of fruitful conversations. In April 2018, co-I Zoe Marks presented the research design and findings to policymakers at the UN in a workshop convened by the UKRI, GCRF, and UNDP. The UN Departments of Political Affairs, Peacekeeping, and Development Programming were particularly well-represented at the meeting at UN Headquarters in New York City and seized on the idea of using local and personal networks to evaluate post-war integration. Dr Marks also attended a research-policy dialogue workshop in Monrovia, Liberia on Sustainable Peace that was jointly organized by the University of Liberia and the Folke Bernadotte Academy. This marked the first delivery of research findings in West Africa, a valuable stepping stone to implementation of the second phase of data collection planned for Sierra Leone. Dr Marks presented findings from the project to a practitioner and research community over two days in the Liberian capital and held conversations with leaders of national peacebuilding organizations. Particularly resonant were discussions about the salience of conflict-related networks for facilitating peaceful development and ex-combatant wellbeing. In her position at Harvard Kennedy School, Dr Marks meets often with US and international policymakers and military officers. She has shared research findings in numerous advisory sessions, stressing in particular the importance of redeploying personal and organizational networks arising from conflict for non-violent ends. The DRC findings of ongoing militarization show how failure to repurpose networks for non-violence can lead to perpetuation or even escalation of conflict. A related finding that she has shared with military and disarmament-oriented practitioners in particular is the importance of cultivating exit pathways for insurgents to leave armed groups. The nature of such high-level strategic advice make it politically inappropriate to follow-up and ask for evidence of how it has informed their thinking; however, conversations suggest that the research findings resonate with and illumine their direct experiences.
First Year Of Impact 2017
Sector Government, Democracy and Justice,Security and Diplomacy
Impact Types Policy & public services
 
Description ESRC Impact Accelerator Account
Amount £20,000 (GBP)
Organisation University of Edinburgh 
Sector Academic/University
Country United Kingdom
Start 03/2016 
End 07/2017
 
Description ESRC Impact Accelerator Account
Amount £1,700 (GBP)
Organisation University of Edinburgh 
Sector Academic/University
Country United Kingdom
Start 12/2016 
End 12/2016
 
Description Hayter Travel Fund
Amount £1,300 (GBP)
Organisation University of Edinburgh 
Sector Academic/University
Country United Kingdom
Start 07/2017 
End 12/2017
 
Description Political Settlements Fieldwork Grant
Amount £4,500,000 (GBP)
Organisation University of Edinburgh 
Sector Academic/University
Country United Kingdom
Start 09/2016 
End 11/2016
 
Description Research Development Fund
Amount £4,000 (GBP)
Organisation University of Edinburgh 
Sector Academic/University
Country United Kingdom
Start 11/2015 
End 07/2016
 
Description Research Development Fund
Amount £4,000 (GBP)
Organisation University of Edinburgh 
Sector Academic/University
Country United Kingdom
Start 11/2016 
End 07/2017
 
Description Strategic Research Support Fund
Amount £2,820 (GBP)
Organisation University of Edinburgh 
Sector Academic/University
Country United Kingdom
Start 02/2017 
End 07/2017
 
Title DRC Geo-code Dataset with Political Boundary Overlay 
Description We have developed a new dataset of geocoded data for locations in Democratic Republic of Congo that is overlaid with local political boundaries including groupement and chefferie. This dataset will enable use to better analyse our own project data as well as make comparative quantitative analytic methods readily available to other research projects. 
Type Of Material Database/Collection of data 
Provided To Others? No  
Impact Still in progress. 
 
Title Social Networks and Post-Conflict Trajectories in DRC 
Description This is the core empirical dataset for Phase I of the project, capturing both attribute and life history data from n=406 survey participants in North Kivu, as well as ego-net data from members of local armed groups and the civilian population. 
Type Of Material Database/Collection of data 
Provided To Others? No  
Impact Data is being cleaned. 
 
Description Collaborative research with Timap for Justice 
Organisation Timap for Justice
Country Sierra Leone 
Sector Charity/Non Profit 
PI Contribution Co-I Zoe Marks has worked with Timap for Justice to plan phase two data collection and research implementation in Sierra Leone. This has been planned since fall 2018 and is slated to begin in-country in summer 2019.
Collaborator Contribution These collaborators will help with survey translation, enumeration, and community engagement. We are still in the planning stages and have not begun a contractual relationship.
Impact No outputs yet.
Start Year 2018
 
Description MelNet Collaboration 
Organisation MelNet
Country Australia 
Sector Charity/Non Profit 
PI Contribution We have begun working with MelNet, a Melbourne-based consortium of universities expert in social network analysis (SNA). As described on their website, "MelNet conducts research and training in the theory, methods and applications of social networks. The two nodes of MelNet operate from Swinburne University of Technology and The University of Melbourne." We have provided raw pilot data to MelNet to work with them on the analysis of our initial social network analysis of ex-combatant data and research design in DRC.
Collaborator Contribution Dr Johan Koskinen (Manchester), Dr Peng Wang (Swinburne), Dr Dean Lusher (Swinburne) and Prof Garry Robins (Melbourne) met during January 2016 with Dr Pat Stys to discuss the data collection methods and possible future analytic tools for the social network analysis. Upon leaving the project, Stys continued to pursue publication plans with this team.
Impact None as yet. Multidisciplinary: Political Science, Business, Business, Psychology, Social Statistics This collaboration was ultimately unsuccessful.
Start Year 2016
 
Description Political Settlements Research Programme 
Organisation Government of the UK
Department Department for International Development (DfID)
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Public 
PI Contribution We have designed the ESRC-DFID Poverty and Conflict project to feed into the Political Settlements Research Programme (PSRP) funded by DfID and hosted at University of Edinburgh. Dr Zoe Marks is Co-I to PSRP and has consistently contributed to the design and implementation of two pieces of the PSRP research: understanding inclusive peace settlements from a gendered perspective; and examining the role of armed actors in political settlements. These projects remain ongoing.
Collaborator Contribution PSRP is very interested in the findings of Poverty and Conflict and synergies between our research questions and outputs. To support Poverty and Conflict above and beyond the collaboration already built into the project grants, a field research grant of £5000 was made in October 2016 to support extended data collection in DRC.
Impact None as yet. Multidisciplinary, primarily involving: Law, Social Sciences (Political Science, Social Anthropology, Area Studies)
Start Year 2015
 
Description Rift Valley Institute Ethics Workshop 
Organisation Rift Valley Institute
Country Global 
Sector Charity/Non Profit 
PI Contribution We co-hosted a research workshop in Nairobi, Kenya, at the Rift Valley Institute (RVI) headquarters. The workshop focused on lessons learned on recent research undertaken with the Political Settlements/Usalamaa and Poverty and Conflict Research Project. We also brought together Congolese researchers and Congo specialists to discuss future research agenda setting. Zoe Marks was one of the co-hosts; however, unfortunately, due to the security situation in Congo and the preferences of our team members, they did not attend the workshop in person. Instead, an effort was made to learn from lessons of RVI affiliates and also to feed in our own perspectives.
Collaborator Contribution Our research collaborators at RVI co-drafted the programme of discussion for the workshop. They also hosted a complementary panel in the Rift Valley Forum series. Our partners provided an enormous amount of intellectual input and facilitated every session. We facilitated some breakout sessions and took the lead in drafting up some of the discussion for broader circulation (see publications for our blog post on Ethics in Collaborative Conflict Research).
Impact RVI-PSRP Internal Report. Lessons Learned and Research Outlook in DRC. January 2018; Zoe Marks and Emery Mudinga. Conducting Collaborative Ethical Research in Congo. 24 Feb 2018. http://www.politicalsettlements.org/2018/02/24/congo-ethics/
Start Year 2017
 
Description The Impact of Reparations in DRC 
Organisation International Criminal Court
Country Netherlands 
Sector Charity/Non Profit 
PI Contribution We are collaborating with the monitoring and evaluation coordinator for the Trust Fund to help design a strategy for evaluating the impact of reparations in Eastern Congo. At this stage, we have had several meetings and drafted a prospective plan, but are awaiting next steps at the trial chamber before deploying anything in the field.
Collaborator Contribution Our partners at the TFV have hosted Dr Zoe Marks for one week at the Hague to work together on outlining priorities for M&E for reparations. This provides important insights into how international criminal justice is being deployed in post-conflict communities in Eastern Congo, and is the first such reparations case of its kind.
Impact None as yet. Funds to support this collaboration were held at University of Edinburgh, which reclaimed them when co-I Zoe Marks moved to Harvard.
Start Year 2016
 
Description BA/DFID Forum on Education in Conflict and Protracted Crises 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact This was largely an academic event but with key representatives from policy and practice in Education in Conflict situations, including DFID, Oxfam, and Save the Children. Dr Zoe Marks provided the opening statement to frame the discussion and contributions of the day.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
 
Description BA/RCUK GCRF Conference on Protracted Conflict 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact From the organisers: "Protracted Conflict, Aid and Development: research, policy and practice, summarises the findings of a conference, held at the British Academy in October 2017, and organised by Research Councils UK. The conference brought together senior policymakers, high-level representatives of humanitarian aid and development agencies, and outstanding researchers, to look at the potential of new research partnerships in dealing with one of the world's most serious issues....Conference attendees heard many examples of how research is already being used to help deal with the effects of protracted violence, from understanding the roots of conflict and the psychology of combatants, to understanding the effects of humanitarian aid on the economies of conflict-affected countries, and understanding what makes for a successful peace settlement.

At the same time, the conference identified areas where more can be done to harness the power of research, and make it useful to policymakers and humanitarian and development organisations, in their efforts to prevent future conflicts and bring existing conflicts to an end. The conference mapped-out a future research agenda, dealing with the changing nature of violence (with more conflicts happening in urban areas, for example, and growing numbers of non-state armed groups), and helping researchers engage more constructively with governments, and with humanitarian and development practitioners."
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
URL http://www.rcuk.ac.uk/media/news/171219/
 
Description British Academy Roundtable on Negotiating Inclusion 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Other audiences
Results and Impact "British Academy roundtable on Negotiating Inclusion in Times of Transition: This will be a small, invitation-only event. It will bring together approximately 25 leading scholars and practitioners from the UK and overseas to consider the connections between human rights, equality and global justice in times of transition. The discussion will seek to address: 1) the strategies and difficulties of negotiating inclusion in deeply divided violent societies, 2) the connections between the difficulties of negotiating inclusion and ending conflict at the local level, and the (related) transitions and struggles for inclusion and the search for the 'common good' at the international level; and 3) the ways in which human rights and equality are conceptualised, and the wider assertions of a global justice in which they are rooted."
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
 
Description British Academy Roundtable on Violence 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Other audiences
Results and Impact A high-level academic roundtable was convened to discuss Violence from an interdisciplinary perspective for the purpose of sharing knowledge and probing the future research agenda on violence and violence-affected communities and contexts.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
 
Description DFID RED Note meeting on Conflict and Education 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact From DFID: "I am pleased to invite you to an Education in Conflict RED Note Consultation over a sandwich lunch on Thursday 26 October at 12:15-13:30 here at the British Academy.
DFID is currently developing thematic 'RED Notes', or evidence briefs, to underpin DFID's Education Policy Refresh. To ensure that the Education in Conflict RED Note refers to the latest thinking and evidence, DFID is seeking external multidisciplinary expert advice. During the discussion, an outline of the RED Note will be presented and DFID will seek your views on the overall direction of the draft and its focus areas, the strength of available evidence and further resources to consider."
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
 
Description FBA Research-Policy Presentation 
Form Of Engagement Activity A talk or presentation
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact Note from FBA: "We have a lunch seminars series for FBA staff where we invite researchers primarily from our research working groups to present and discuss their work that is of interest and relevance for FBA's work and projects. It's an informal setting, usually we have a presentation of about 40 to 45 minutes, followed by a Q&A. As you know, FBA is working a lot on the issues that you address in your research and is also increasingly involved with projects in some of the countries you focus your research on, particularly DRC and Liberia."
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
 
Description Gothenburg Governance and Local Development Workshop 2017 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact This academic conference included practitioners and policymakers as about half of the participants.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
URL http://gld.gu.se/en/conferences/gld-annual-conference-2017/
 
Description L'Oeil du Cyclone (Film Screening) 
Form Of Engagement Activity A talk or presentation
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach Local
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact Dr Zoe Marks discussed the film 'L'Oeil du Cyclone' as part of the Take One: Action film festival in Edinburgh. The objective was to educate the general public about issues related to armed conflict, child soldiers, and post-conflict and transitional justice systems. Several people commented on their increased understanding and empathy toward people involved in civil war in Africa, and gained awareness about the University's research.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2016
 
Description Liberia FBA Workshop 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact Invited presentation, Sustainable Peace Research Workshop & Research Policy Dialogue, Folke Bernadotte Academy, Monrovia, Liberia
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2018
 
Description Partnership Development Workshop (UoE) 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach Local
Primary Audience Other audiences
Results and Impact 25 colleagues attended a workshop on how to develop ethical and sustainable research partnerships. We shared the multiple layers and sequences of partnership development and how to approach North-South research partnership from an ethical perspective.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2016
 
Description Project Presentation to MelNet colleagues 
Form Of Engagement Activity A talk or presentation
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach Local
Primary Audience Other audiences
Results and Impact A small presentation was held at Swinburne/MelNet to discuss the novel research questions and methods deployed by the project. This led to exciting collaborative opportunities that have been detailed under partnerships, as well as potential synergies for future research.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
 
Description Swedish Women Mediators Network Research Policy Dialogue 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact From the organisers: "On January 18, we are planning to hold a policy workshop together with members from the Swedish and Norwegian Networks for Women Mediators. The aim is to bring together researchers and decision-makers working to realize a Feminist Foreign Policy and WPS in practice with a focus on participation, as well as to discuss current knowledge trends and needs. The Dialogue offers an opportunity to share information and to get a better understanding of the conditions different groups work under in order to try to move forward on key issues together. You should contribute with ideas from your research to that discussion but do not feel that you have to solve the entire problem on your own. Dialogue is the key word."
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
 
Description UCL Institutions in Conflicted and Fragile States 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Other audiences
Results and Impact Institutions in Conflicted and Fragile States
Wednesday, October 25, 2017
Room: Institute of Advanced Studies Common Ground, South Wing, Wilkins Building
Contrary to the common perception that conflict and instability lead to a governance vacuum, recent scholarship has demonstrated the importance and variety of institutions in states affected by armed conflict and violence. The workshop aims to bring together practitioners, policy makers, and academics studying governance institutions in conflicted and fragile states with a focus on three themes: property rights, public goods provision, and justice and reconciliation. A series of three roundtable discussions will create an opportunity for dialogue and discussion of cutting- edge research and new ideas in these areas. The roundtable on property rights will cover topics such as property rights security and displacement in Syria, property rights under authoritarian regimes, and investment in post-conflict states. The roundtable on public goods provision will include discussion of public goods in non-democracies and non-state and armed actor service provision. Finally, the roundtable on justice and reconciliation will cover work on post-conflict peacebuilding and opportunities for justice after conflict.
Each thematic roundtable includes four or five 10-minute presentations of each participant's work/research/ideas, followed by a discussion involving all workshop participants.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
 
Description UN Inter-Agency Working Group on DDR Research-Policy Dialogue 
Form Of Engagement Activity A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Policymakers/politicians
Results and Impact From the organisers: "Purpose
As those of you who are members of our Research Working Groups (RWGs) already know, at our traditional workshops the focus is exclusively academic, and the main aim is for researchers to gain valuable and in-depth feedback on aspects of their on-going research aimed for peer review publications from fellow researchers. For this workshop, this is still true, but with a policy twist.

As already informed, the research workshop will be in direct conjunction to a larger event organized by the United Nations Inter-Agency Working group (IAWG) on DDR in cooperation with the FBA. The IAWG workshop aims at furthering the 10-year review of the Integrated Disarmament, Demobilisation and Reintegration Standards (IDDRS). It will bring relevant expertise from policy and field with the objective to review the IDDRS and draft guidance, which will assist UN and non-UN actors in planning and implementing contextually sound and relevant DDR programmes.

The participants in the IAWG workshop have been invited to extend their stay in Stockholm one additional day and attend the research workshop as a side-event and hence some practitioners working on DDR relevant issues will also join us (see attached list of participants). In the light of this, the ambition is also to contribute to the exchange of knowledge and strengthen collaboration between researchers and practitioners within the field of DDR."
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
 
Description UN Workshop NYC 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact Invited presentation, UN-World Bank Policy and Practice Workshop on "Pathways for Peace: Inclusive approaches to preventing violent conflict", United Nations, New York, NY
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2018
 
Description UNDP Webinar on DDRR 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact Dr Pat Stys participated in an online webinar hosted by the United Nations Development Program to discuss practical aspects of DDR and DDRR in post-conflict contexts. It was part of a discussion and learning forum, feeding back into the project findings, whilst also sharing the project agenda with stakeholder audiences.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
 
Description University of Denver Sie Center Seminar 
Form Of Engagement Activity A talk or presentation
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Other audiences
Results and Impact Sié Center, Josef Korbel School, University of Denver, Denver, Colo. Presented research findings and work in progress to an audience of research colleagues and graduate students.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2018
 
Description W3D Lunch Seminar 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Postgraduate students
Results and Impact Co-I Zoe Marks spoke at the Women in Defense, Development, and Diplomacy seminar to women interested in careers in policy and public service; she shared her research agenda and findings, along with professional advice.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2018