Researching Environmental Conflicts | Integrating Intelligence Analysis
Lecturer | Dr. Matthew W. King
Conflict Analysis | Environmental Security
Course Title: Researching Conflict | Integrating Intelligence Analysis
Class Schedule: January 2012 – May 2012
Office hours: Available by appointment
Email: environment@me.com
Cell: 202-386-1414

Biographical Sketch: Dr. Matthew W. King
Matthew is a Lecturer of Conflict Analysis | Environmental Security. Matthew is an international practitioner who has lived in multiple countries and worked in over a half dozen. In 1999 he was competitively selected to become a U.S. Presidential Management Fellow under the Clinton Administration where he served until 2001. Subsequently, he served as the Senior Program Manager for Latin America | Caribbean with the US Department of Commerce, NOAA Research’s Office of International Activities between 2001 and 2007. Matthew completed his Ph.D. in the Department of Geography at the University of Cambridge, England. As a researcher in the Political Ecology of Development (PED) Research Group, he developed an innovative approach to analyze environmental conflict, particularly within the context of natural resource scarcity and climate insecurity by focusing on a case in Honduras, Central America from 1973 to 2006. Geographically, his work is focused on the US, Latin America, and the Caribbean. He is a bilingual practitioner, particularly interested in the issues associated with the politics, management, and human ecology of natural resources, particularly environmental conflict and governance. His experiences in public service, academia, and as a practitioner in the private sector have made his approach to some of the most critical social and environmental challenges incisive. A creative thinker, he specializes in conflict analysis, institutional design, and complex interventions related to forestry, fisheries, agriculture, mining, and energy conflicts in the US and abroad. He is the CEO of Living GREEN | Global Research | Expeditions | Education Network

tags
global conflict analysis | international peace building | environmental security | commodity chains and conflict |
institution building | researching conflict | society | environment | international development
Teaching Aims
My courses are designed to encourage the active practice of critical reasoning through reading, academic writing, and communication. Courses are structured for focus on addressing matters of controversy within the field of study, and in society at large. Systemic factors are analyzed and theoretical lenses used to reveal to students the institutional and ideological landscapes in which they seek to practice. Students learn how to construct, defend, and criticize arguments; identify and assess tacit assumptions; and gather and evaluate evidence.

Critical thinking is emphasized as a means of acquiring knowledge, understanding key arguments in the discipline of conflict analysis and international affairs, and problems of interpreting original literature and data. In addition, students are required to subject arguments within the discipline to scrutiny from competing cultural, social, or methodological perspectives.

Students must practice sustained critical thinking and demonstrate it in written form and discussions. Your ability to understand the literature is the focal point. The aim is for students to increase their repertoire of knowledge in the field to inform the various skills they will accumulate in their professional life. In other words, you’ll get your money’s worth in knowledge; and you’ll have the rest of your life to try and understand it in practice – a beautiful process – one I still enjoy to this day.
Student Development | Core competencies | Skills

• Intellectual: critical thinking, analysis, synthesis, problem solving, evaluation.
• Communication: dialogues in seminar format; speaking, listening, reading, writing, presenting (oral/
written), giving and receiving feedback.
• Organizational: self-assessment, working independently, responsibility, initiative, time-management, and increased awareness of career options within the field.
• Interpersonal: teamwork, leadership, negotiating, networking, co-managing teams and time.

Skills Emphasized

• Logical and critical thinking – the ability to extract key principles from a collection of sources and to analyze key points resulting in written materials;
• Ability to interpret texts, extracting relevance, pertinent data or information from texts;
• Computing skills basic computer applications such as word processing programs, data management, and online collaboration; and
• Research skills gained through the weekly exercises and assignments.
Researching Conflict | Integrating Intelligence Analysis
In this course, students and instructors will together conceptualize, design and carry out a mixed methods research study on a topic connected to violence. The students and instructors will decide on a research problem to be studied. The goals for this elective is to help students deepen their understanding of quantitative and qualitative research, and hone their research skills. The course will be a collaborative effort, building on the experience, knowledge, expertise, and interests of all of the participants. Critical reasoning, evaluation, and routine analysis are used to illuminate environmental conflict and violence by researching conflicts using a variety of methods drawing on intelligence collection and analysis. Skills will be grounded by focusing on violence resulting from increased competition over scarce resources in the context of climate insecurity. The course meets three hours weekly, where students will be trained to conduct rigorous conflict research and analysis, produce briefs, and synthesize open source information to contextualize the nature of violence and conflict by focusing on a portfolio of focal points chosen by the student. State Department cables (written intelligence reports sent from Embassy to Washington DC) will be used to produce analysis resulting from weekly collection; supplemented by two important readings that pertain to violence and the environment.

The course examines the concept of violence and the environment by focusing on collection of germane research materials, analyzing, coding, and structuring information in a format that is useful to decision makers at a number of scales, both inside and outside of the conflict research and intelligence community. The relevance of specific theoretical ideas and methods are covered. By directing attention toward the Wikileak Cables released in 2010 students will be exposed to basic concepts in intelligence gathering and analysis that informs conflict research. Specific attention will be directed toward reducing cognitive bias when producing objective, neutral briefs. Wikileaks will be used as a source of initial Data, which can be downloaded: http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2010/nov/29/wikileaks-cables-data#data

• Skills relevant to group work through individual and group projects you will learn to plan, collaborate, and complete conflict research related to a portfolio developed in the first class.
• Communication skills verbal skills developed in class and during the presentation; writing skills developed through individual briefs, group projects, essays, and the final paper, which require writing and communicating clearly and effectively;
• A multi-disciplinary approach towards understanding the contested nature of the concepts of sustainable development in relation to global commodities and associated conflicts;
• Experience developing teamwork skills, independence, stamina, sociability, decision making, and responsibility all of which are essential for most careers;
• Theability to meet deadlines and work under pressure gained from class participation, assignments, essays, and the blue book exams.

Specifics regarding weekly conflict research:
Weekly briefs (approximately 10 in total, minimum 500 words 8×11, 11 font Times New Roman 1.5 spaced
?% of your grade) Requirements for the essays: 500 words: excluding footnotes, title, and citations in text
(Author, Year: Page Number) – due electronically prior to class.
Research Briefs will focus on a range of topics related to the extraction of specific natural resource commodities within a region of your choosing; or a group of countries that you would like to focus on in your individual portfolio. Your essays will be assessed based on:

• The general area of investigation, i.e. the wider geographical context and issues (e.g. background of the commodity, the region and country where it is produced;
• The specific issues confronted;
• The methodology, information and sources that you use;
• The kind of analytical and interpretative approaches that you use to address key questions;
• References to relevant literature that you plan to use to answer your key questions; andf
• There will be a combination of dialogues in a seminar format, brief lectures and presentations.
Readings
Readings have been selected from a number of sources and compiled for E-Reserves, when possible. LINK to Library E-Reserves Course Readings

Conflict Assessment and Intelligence Analysis: Commonality, Convergence, and Complementarity – by
Lawrence Woocher USIP

Conflict_Assessment Intelligence USIP.pdf
June 2011 | Special Report by Lawrence Woocher

Summary

• A wide consensus has emerged in recent years that successful policymaking and programming in conflict situations must start with an accurate understanding of local context, conflict actors, causes, and the dynamic relationships among them.
• This recognition has led to a plethora of new analytic initiatives, but little evident effort to exploit potential synergies between conflict assessment and national security intelligence analysis.
• Conflict assessment and intelligence analysis have different origins, aims, and methods but also a number of important elements of commonality. They both aim to enhance understanding of complicated sociopolitical situations to support better decision making and face many common challenges, including accuracy, precision, timeliness, and relevance.
• Conflict assessment is marked by its action orientation, its flexibility, and its emphasis on collaborative methods to elicit views on the conflict from diverse perspectives. These attributes may lead conflict assessment processes to be especially able to pick up “weak signalsâ€? and to promote cooperation and enhance understanding of the “other side’sâ€? perspectives.
• These strengths of conflict assessment may at times come at the cost of analytic rigor, precision, and sensitivity to the possibility that some stakeholders could provide misleading information.
• Intelligence analysis is designed to produce objective assessments for government national security decision makers through rigorous evaluation of “all sourceâ€? data (including classified information) in a competitive environment. Intelligence analysts’ independence from policymakers and their adherence to explicit standards of analytic tradecraft should help lead to high- quality analytic products.
• Potential pitfalls of intelligence analysis include being too reliant on data from clandestine and highly technical sources, being subject to political pressure, and being insufficiently collaborative.
• Three important global trends tend to push conflict assessment and intelligence analysis toward convergence: the changing nature of national security, the increasing salience of “open sourceâ€? information, and the growing recognition of the limitations of lone analysts.
• Deliberate efforts to draw on the methods of both conflict assessment and intelligence analysis will yield fuller and more useful analysis, which should in turn improve the formulation of conflict management, peacebuilding, and national security strategies. Using tools of conflict assessment and intelligence analysis in tandem is one specific step toward fully realizing the complementarity of these two analytic approaches.
About the Report

To be effective, policymaking and programming in conflict situations must start with an accurate understanding of local context, conflict actors, causes, and the dynamic relationships among them. The report argues that complex conflict situations can be better understood by tapping the potential synergy between two distinct approaches to analyzing conflictsconflict assessment and intelligence analysis. This report originates from the United States Institute of Peace Center for Conflict Management, which conducts research, identifies best practices, and develops new tools for conflict prevention, management, and resolution.

About the Author

Lawrence Woocher is a senior program officer at the United States Institute of Peace. The author benefited from many discussions with practitioners of conflict assessment and intelligence analysis, especially at an Institute roundtable meeting on November 10, 2010, and wishes to thank Jennifer Sims and Abiodun Williams for their helpful comments on an earlier draft.

• Critique conflict research and explain its strengths and limitations;
• Evaluate the validity of claims surrounding a specific issue;
• Identify the means by which conflict and intelligence research occurs;
• Openly and actively debate the merits of intelligence produced through research; and
• Ground the principles of intelligence research within the context of actual historical events where both conflict and resistance can be analyzed.

Note: Please ensure that you check online to receive course information.

Environment, Scarcity, and Violence
Thomas F. Homer-Dixon
The Earth’s human population is expected to pass eight billion by the year 2025, while rapid growth in the global economy will spur increasing demands for natural resources. The world will consequently face growing scarcities of such vital renewable resources as cropland, fresh water, and forests. Thomas Homer- Dixon argues in this sobering book that these environmental scarcities will have profound social consequences-
-contributing to insurrections, ethnic clashes, urban unrest, and other forms of civil violence, especially in the developing world.

Homer-Dixon synthesizes work from a wide range of international research projects to develop a detailed model of the sources of environmental scarcity. He refers to water shortages in China, population growth in sub-Saharan Africa, and land distribution in Mexico, for example, to show that scarcities stem from the degradation and depletion of renewable resources, the increased demand for these resources, and/or their unequal distribution. He shows that these scarcities can lead to deepened poverty, large-scale migrations, sharpened social cleavages, and weakened institutions. And he describes the kinds of violence that can result from these social effects, arguing that conflicts in Chiapas, Mexico and ongoing turmoil in many African and Asian countries, for instance, are already partly a consequence of scarcity.

Homer-Dixon is careful to point out that the effects of environmental scarcity are indirect and act in combination with other social, political, and economic stresses. He also acknowledges that human ingenuity can reduce the likelihood of conflict, particularly in countries with efficient markets, capable states, and an educated populace. But he argues that the violent consequences of scarcity should not be underestimated– especially when about half the world’s population depends directly on local renewables for their day-to-day well-being. In the next decades, he writes, growing scarcities will affect billions of people with unprecedented severity and at an unparalleled scale and pace.

Clearly written and forcefully argued, this book will become the standard work on the complex relationship between environmental scarcities and human violence.

Violent environments
Nancy Lee Peluso, Michael Watts

Do environmental problems and processes produce violence? Current U.S. policy about environmental conflict and scholarly work on environmental security assume direct causal links between population growth, resource scarcity, and violence. This belief, a staple of governmental decision-making during both Clinton administrations and widely held in the environmental security field, depends on particular assumptions about the nature of the state, the role of population growth, and the causes of environmental degradation.The conventional understanding of environmental security, and its assumptions about the relation between violence and the environment, are challenged and refuted in Violent Environments. Chapters by geographers, historians, anthropologists, and sociologists include accounts of ethnic war in Indonesia, petro-violence in Nigeria and Ecuador, wildlife conservation in Tanzania, and “friendly fire” at Russia’s nuclear weapons sites. In Violent
Environments, the book portrays violence as a site-specific phenomenon rooted in local histories and societies, yet connected to larger processes of material transformation and power relations. The authors argue that specific resource environments, including tropical forests and oil reserves, and environmental processes (such as deforestation, conservation, or resource abundance) are constituted by and in part constitute the political economy of access to and control over resources. Violent Environments demands new approaches to an international set of complex problems, powerfully arguing for deeper, more ethnographically informed analyses of the circumstances and processes that cause violence.
Course Requirements
• Weekly readings drawn from two books/supplemented by primary resources.
• Always write using the .doc extension; if you use a Mac simply change the extension from .pages to
.doc – 8×11, 11 font Times New Roman 1.5 spaced
• Always save files with your first and last name, topic, and date 01.01.11 format (e.g.
MatthewKingViolence08.22.11.doc)
• Post articles relevant to the subject matter in online forums to share knowledge with peers. (Participation)
• Synthesize knowledge and produce high quality written material. (Writing)
• Two blue book exams (Mid-Term and Final)
• Online or in-class discussions

Structure

Grading will be based on participation, gathering sources, writing briefs in cable format, completing any blue book exams, or short papers, as assigned. All assignments are due on the date shown on the syllabus, before class as electronic files and should be sent via email to the professor at environment@me.com Students will be called upon to discuss the assigned readings in class, as well as actually practice intelligence analysis as a great method for researching conflicts.

• The topics discussed will draw on the readings, previous lectures, or your individual and group assignments.
• Students must attempt to answer all questions during the course using any method of reasoning
• I require that you try and provide a reasoned answer when asked a question in class. That is, I consider the reasoning process more important than pre-conceived facts or beliefs.
• If I make errors of logic or fact, it is acceptable for a student to correct me.
• My overall objective is to facilitate discussion, encourage students to reason rather than comply, or attempt to appeal to any supposed authority.
Grading

Weekly Readings | Reviews = (?) Mid-Term Blue Book and Final Blue Book Exam = (?) Class Participation = (?)

Honor Code and Joint Work. Each student is responsible for his or her own work. Please review the university guidelines on plagiarism.

Blue book examination: The mid-term will be a conventional blue book examination, as well as the final. Candidates will be asked to select at least two statements to discuss in writing. The statements will be drawn from weekly readings. Approximately one week will be allotted for you to discuss each of your choices, with time for a break between. The length is at the discretion of the student; the challenge for the student is to demonstrate their understanding of the material in an academically coherent form; be able to elucidate why the readings are relevant, and be able to critically assess differing arguments and present knowledge with minimal cognitive or emotive bias.

Specifics

You will be required to use standard 8.5 X 11inch paper. You must use 11 font, 1.5 spaced, and number the pages on all written material.

DO NOT hand me anything that is hand written, it must be typed.
Since these briefs are about the research, you must indicate the primary sources for your research as relevant. This is done with footnotes (or endnotes), references within the text, and a bibliography. There are very specific
rules to follow when including references within a paper:
A footnote looks just like this.
Joseph Des Jardins, Environmental Ethics: An Introduction to Environmental Philosophy,? (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Publishing, 2001), p. 92. If you continue to reference the same book you can repeat the authors last name and show the new page. Des Jardins, pp. 117-118.

Quotations should be copied exactly, and referenced in the footnote. If you must shorten a quotation, indicate that sections were removed by using the ellipses, those three dots “…â€? which translate to “Something has been omitted here.? If you interject language into a quote you should enclose the interjection within a set of [].

Quotations of fewer than four typed lines are placed within quotation marks, and introduced by a comma or a colon. Quotations of four typed lines or longer are also introduced by a comma or a colon, but are set off from the text by triple spacing, and indented five lines on either side; they should also be single-spaced.

The footnotes and/or endnotes are ordered references indicated by a superscript number after a paraphrase or quotation that is not your own. Make sure that you check out the example below.
The bibliography is a list of all the works used in compiling a research paper. If you have used a book or article for information it belongs in your bibliography, even if you have not directly cited it. Do not list books you did not use. YOU MUST USE a majority of non-internet based sources for the essays. If you have used footnotes or endnotes you should list the works in alphabetical order without numbers. Bibliographical entries are constructed different from footnotes. Here is what a bibliographical entry should look like:

Des Jardins, Joseph. Environmental Ethics: An Introduction to Environmental Philosophy,? Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Publishing, 2001.

Your essays will need to include the following components:
A title page that includes your name, the topic, the course date and time, and the date that it is due to be handed in electronically. A bibliography.

Participation is defined as actively engaging in the class discussions, asking questions and contributing to the dialogue of the course online and in person, sharing primary sources and information when appropriate. You will be required to specialize individually, and then work in groups to improve analysis through collective group intelligence. The level of participation each evening will be assessed, and account for a portion of your grade. You will be evaluated on the aforementioned criteria. You will be assessed as either having participated or having not participated. Obviously, if you miss class or do not turn in assignments you were not participating.

Attendance Policy

It is the students responsibility to attend all classes, complete readings, and assignments. If the student is ill, fails to attend, or misses class for any reason they continue to be responsible for the material. It is imperative that the student keep-up-to- speed on the topics being read, discussed, and written about throughout the course of the term. The world doesn’t stop when you do. Regardless of personal issues that arise, you will need to hand in required materials on time, electronically.
Resources
Wikileaks Data for Download: http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2010/nov/29/wikileaks-cables- data#data

These books are not generally fun to read, with the possible exception of The Elements of Style, but they contain useful information for writers.

Guide to Reference Books, American Library Association.
MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers, Theses, and Dissertations, Modern Language Association. William Strunk and E.B. White, The Elements of Style, Macmillan.

If you have any trouble, please visit the writing center and seek a consultative session to address any issues that might arise. Students are required to visit the writing center at least once during the course of the term.