Another Humanitarian Crisis in Somalia?: Learning from the 2011 famine - Interim Paper

An interesting paper looking at the 2011 Somalia crisis, Maxwell and Majid's "Another Humanitarian Crisis in Somalia?: Learning from the 2011 famine" goes straight to the point. An easy read that serves also as a primer for humanitarian dynamics in the country.

Intro:
"In July 2014, humanitarian agencies and the government of Somalia warned of a new severe drought in Somalia, only three years after more than 250,000 people died in a deadly famine. In a report for Tufts University and the Rift Valley Institute, Daniel Maxwell and Nisar Majid examine the lessons arising from the international response to the famine in 2011 on how to prevent and mitigate a similar crisis."  

Key points from the paper:
- Early Warning was there despite some recent complains on the quality/reliability of the data. The failure points more to the humanitarian framework, that has a bias towards response rather than prevention/mitigation. How much is forecasting really integrated into planning and funding still remains to be seen, and as we have seen in previous papers, take up of forecasting is different by sector (El Nino oscillations) even if the potential positive preventive effects are quite high (Violence in Liberia). In some cases we do enter in a Chronic Early Warning that lead to an institutionalization of preparedness, mitigation and response (a humanitarian example is Haiti and the Hurricane Season), but I don't believe Somalia is there yet.
- Risk Management, Access... and of course Al-Shabaab. While Al-Shabaab's behavior (internal taxes and blocking of external aid) did exacerbate the crisis, the risk management mechanisms of international actors also limited the response. Reliance on local organizations of variable quality and allegiance coupled with limited direct implementation/monitoring capacity, has meant that many of the interventions were/are shaped by risk management rather that needs and effectiveness. 
- Us, us , us. Most of the discussions around the 2011 crisis are around the international response; yet, in a time were resilience is the buzzword of the day, very little attention is given to the Somali response and how it can be further strengthened. The paper also points out the reinforcement of marginalization for certain clans through the crisis (that further feeds into Somalia's instability by clan competition and Al-Shabaab comparative appeal).
 
Following Amartya Sen's thinking, we can say that famine is not a food failure but rather a political failure (in the wider sense of governance and allocation of resources).

Investigating El Niño‐Southern Oscillation and Society Relationships - Working Paper

"Investigating El Niño‐Southern Oscillation and Society Relationships" by Zebiak et al, looks into climate forecasting on three sectors: water, agriculture and health. It shows the role that forecasting can have as part of planning and response in areas that have large societal impact (beyond the extreme weather events associated in the media with El Niño or La Niña). Abstract:  

"Throughout at least the past several centuries, El Niño‐Southern Oscillation (ENSO) has played a significant role in human response to climate. Over time, increased attention on ENSO has led to a better understanding of both the physical mechanisms, and the environmental and societal consequences of the phenomenon. The prospects for seasonal climate forecasting emerged from ENSO studies, and were first pursued in ENSO studies. In this paper, we review ENSO's impact on society, specifically with regard to agriculture, water, and health; we also explore the extent to which ENSO‐related forecasts are used to inform decision making in these sectors. We find that there are significant differences in the uptake of forecasts across sectors, with the highest use in agriculture, intermediate use in water resources management, and the lowest in health. Forecast use is low in areas where ENSO linkages to climate are weak, but the strength of this linkage alone does not guarantee use. Moreover, the differential use of ENSO forecasts by sector shows the critical role of institutions that work at the boundary between science and society. In a long‐term iterative process requiring continual maintenance, these organizations serve to enhance the salience, credibility, and legitimacy of forecasts and related climate services."

ENSO studies started in the 80's with an important growth in the 90's that led to a better understanding of its consequences and also the development of forecasting tools. How have these tools translated into improved decision-making? By looking at three sectors that are affected by ENSO in a wider geographical area (from the Indian Ocean to the American continent, the authors show the different societal intake of forecasting tools.

Sectors that have previously used weather forecasting (like agriculture and water management) have been the ones that adapted ENSO modelling the most. Previous knowledge of similar tools allowed for users to be comfortable with the models and were conceptually more ready. Entering forecasting in sector that have not previously used it may require a tailored approach with simple quick wins over a longer period of time rather than complex models.

Institutions matter (a much repeated point in development literature), not only their presence (by using already established networks to distribute knowledge like agricultural extension) but also their design (focus on policy, research, awareness raising, best practice implementation, centralized vs decentralized, etc...). Tools have to be seen as relevant to the user, institutional design tell us not only the mandate or objectives but, maybe more importantly, who the user actually is.

Linked to the previous point, forecasts are a decision-making tools should help those making decisions. These seems obvious, but we have to remember that in many instances the users of forecasts are not the final beneficiaries of a decision. For example, a water management board makes decisions that affect water users by managing water flows. The forecasts itself will have to compete with other dynamics within the institution in order to be effective. On the other hand, in the case of agriculture, the farmer may be the recipient of the forecast, the decision-maker and the final beneficiary. That shortened decision-making process may help to explain why it is in agriculture where the uptake of ENSO forecasting tools has been the strongest as the incentives are aligned.

 

Whether we are interested in climate events or not, this paper does point out interesting issues on the usage of forecasting in different settings and sectors, and present lessons learnt that could be transferred to other sectors. Maybe the title is over-ambitious with the "society relationships" part.  

Keep the Kids Inside: Juvenile Curfews, Bad Weather, and Urban Gun Violence - Working Paper

Carr and Doleac make an interesting comparison between imposed curfew and 'natural' curfew in "Keep the Kids Inside: Juvenile Curfews, Bad Weather, and Urban Gun Violence". 

Abstract:     

"Gun violence is an important problem in many American cities, large and small. Due to limited data, it has been difficult to convincingly test the impacts of government policies on the quantity and geography of gunfire. This paper is the first to use a new source of data on gunfire incidents, which does not suffer from selective underreporting common in other crime datasets. We test the incapacitation effects of two interventions in Washington, DC: (1) juvenile curfews, and (2) rain. Both work primarily by keeping would-be offenders indoors. The former is a common, but extremely controversial, policy used in cities across the United States, and its impact is highly sensitive to how it is enforced. The latter is an intervention over which we have no control, but can be thought of as a perfectly-enforced incapacitation "policy": anyone who stays outside during a rainstorm gets wet. We use exogenous variation in the hours affected by each intervention to estimate its causal impact on gun violence and reported crime. We find minimal evidence that juvenile curfews are effective, but rainstorms result in large, statistically-significant reductions in gun violence and other crime. It thus appears that it is possible to remove would-be offenders from the streets, but juvenile curfews do not have this effect. We interpret these results as evidence that incapacitation works as a crime-prevention tool, and a reminder that implementation and enforcement are key determinants of a policy’s success".

The study serves as a proof-of-concept for 'incapacitation' while at the same time showing that one of the tools used, juvenile curfew, is not really effective. Policy implications are interesting. Is rain-making technology a useful tool during crime waves? Seeing that juvenile curfew is not effective, which is the key failure of the curfew? what other tools should we be looking at in terms of incapacitation? Not to forget that incapacitation could also be understood from a positive perspective, that is kids are not on the streets because they are doing something else.