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Genocide Prevention

Announcements and Recent Analysis

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  • Ebola's Potential Effects on the Risk of Mass Atrocities in Guinea

    One of the countries hit hardest by this year's Ebola epidemic, Guinea, is also one of the countries most susceptible to an onset of state-led mass killing, according to our statistical risk assessments. This conjunction is not entirely accidental. And, while the Ebola epidemic almost certainly won’t lead directly to mass atrocities, the effects the epidemic is having on Guinea’s political economy could indirectly increase that risk in coming months.

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  • Zimbabwe Simmers

    This week, the International Crisis Group issued a new briefing on Zimbabwe that portrays a country on simmer. "Zimbabwe is an insolvent and failing state," writes ICG Africa Program director Comfort Ero, "its politics zero sum, its institutions hollowing out, and its once vibrant economy moribund." Without significant changes of course in economic policy and elite behavior, the report warns, the risk of a sharper crisis and deeper collapse will continue to grow.

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  • Occupy Central and the Rising Risk of New Mass Atrocities in China

    Activists have massed by the thousands in central Hong Kong for the past several days in defiance of repeated attempts to disperse them and menacing words from Beijing. This demonstration and the wider Occupy Central movement from which it draws poses one of the sharpest public challenges to Communist Party authority since the Tiananmen Square uprising 25 years ago. In so doing, it clearly raises the risk of a new mass atrocity in China.

  • Rising Risk of State-Led Mass Killing in China's Xinjiang Region

    Xinjiang is China's westernmost region, far removed from Beijing and officially known as the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR). Most residents of the XUAR are Uyghurs, who are Turkic, speak their own language, and are largely Muslim. While the region has periodically been under Chinese rule for centuries, the people are culturally more similar to their Central Asian neighbors. Separatist activity and ethnic tension is not uncommon, but historically there have only been a few incidents of mass violence.

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  • Moving the Needle on Prevention Through Improved Early Warning

    Yesterday, the U.N. Security Council adopted Resolution 2717 (2014), ostensibly committing itself "to better utilizing all tools of the United Nations system to ensure that warning signs of impending bloodshed [are] translated into 'concrete preventative action.'" Among many phrases and clauses, that resolution included the following:

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  • Exploring the Causes of State-Led Mass Killing in Egypt

    A few days ago, the Monkey Cage Blog ran a guest post by sociologist Amy Austin Holmes that wrestled with the question of why Egyptian security forces perpetrated a massacre in broad daylight at Rabaa a year ago. The Rabaa massacre is just one part of a larger episode of state-led mass killing that began in Egypt after the 2013 coup and continues today. As Holmes describes,

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  • Atrocities Early Warning Q&A: Ben Goldsmith

    Ben Goldsmith is an associate professor of political science at the University of Sydney who studies international conflict, international public opinion, and U.S. foreign policy. In 2010, Ben began work on forecasting genocide and politicide. I first met him that year, in New Orleans at the annual meeting of the International Studies Association. We talked over lunch about statistical forecasting of rare and calamitous political events and have stayed in touch ever since. It's been great to see his project develop, and I'm glad to be able to spotlight it here.

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Country Case Studies
Country Case Studies

Find information on historical cases of genocide and other atrocities.