July 15, 2020

Best Practices for Supporting the Reintegration and Rehabilitation of Chidlren from Formerly ISIS-Controlled Territories

This brief contributes to this growing body of work by providing a specialized psychosocial approach based in child trauma theory and intervention research that directly addresses the multilevel needs of children returning from formerly ISIS-controlled territories.

July 10, 2020

DOD Awards Minerva Program Grants to Study Peer and Near-peer Competition and Foreign Malign Influence

The Department of Defense has awarded $6.7 million in grants to four university-based Minerva faculty teams to support research in social and behavioral science. Congress funded these awards to examine issues related to peer and near-peer competition and foreign malign influence.

July 6, 2020

Machine Learning Can Help Get COVID-19 Aid to Those Who Need it Most

Joshua Blumenstock, a Minerva-funded researcher had a conversation with government officials from the Togolese Republic in West Africa in regards to how big data machine learning might help them to identify households who have been impacted by COVID-19 in order to provide financial assistance.

June 23, 2020

The Department of Defense Announces Awards of $20,000 each for the 2020-2021 Cohort of the Minerva-U.S. Institute of Peace, Peace and Security Dissertation Fellows

The Department of Defense Minerva Research Initiative is pleased to announce the 2020-2021 cohort of the Minerva-USIP, Peace and Security Dissertation Fellows.

June 22, 2020

New Owl in the Olive Tree post "Military Means and Political Ends"

Minerva-funded researchers, Erik Gartzke and Jon R. Lindsay's Owl in the Olive Tree post "Military Means and Political Ends". The portfolio of military options available to policymakers and commanders today is large and growing. U.S. military power increasingly relies on a many different types of platforms and capabilities from different services. Threats to U.S. military dominance are becoming more complex as well. As the 2017 U.S. National Security Strategy asserts, “State and non-state actors place the safety of the American people and the Nation’s economic vitality at risk by exploiting vulnerabilities across the land, air, maritime, space, and cyberspace domains.”

June 3, 2020

Mia Bloom's new article "The Forgotten Children of ISIS Fighters"

In Bloom's article she discusses children from war zones, who now find themselves without country, citizenship, protection or much compassion. The countries from which ISIS children originate are confronted with a grave humanitarian crisis. Leaving children to languish and die in refugee camps and prisons is an unconscionable abuse of human rights.

May 12, 2020

Minerva-funded Researchers on COVID-19

Several of the Minerva-funded researchers are conducting research and initiatives related to COVID-19. As technical experts in their various fields, each of their research helps bring light to the long term social implications of the impact of the virus.

May 4, 2020

Mia Bloom's new article "From Pawn to Knights: The Changing Role of Women's Agency in Terrorism?"

Minerva-funded researcher, Mia Bloom's new article "Mia Bloom's new article "From Pawn to Knights: The Changing Role of Women's Agency in Terrorism?". As terrorist groups became more technologically advanced with their media campaigns, the global audience began to see pictures of women in black burkas pledging allegiance to the so-called Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) and posing with guns. Although there is a backlash against such change that we see reflected in the ideologies of violent extremism; the shifts in gender relations within these groups are significant to examine.

April 30, 2020

Mariya Omelicheva's new article, "When Does the Crime-Terror Nexus Fail to Materialize? Drug Trafficking, Militants, and the State in Russia"

Minerva-funded researcher, Mariya Omelicheva's new article "When Does the Crime-Terror Nexus Fail to Materialize? Drug Trafficking, Militants, and the State in Russia". What are the conditions that obstruct the formation of a crime-terror nexus? To answer this question we carry out a quantitative and qualitative analysis of Russia's North Caucasus (2008–2016) where no durable crime-terror nexus materialized despite the presence of conditions conducive to the emergence of linkages between criminals and militants.

April 16, 2020

New Owl in the Olive Tree post "National Security Implications of the COVID-19 Crisis:The Urgent Need to Build State Capacity"

Minerva-funded researchers, Cynthia Buckley, Ralph Clem, and Erik Herron's Owl in the Olive Tree post "National Security Implications of the COVID-19 Crisis: The Urgent Need to Build State Capacity". Beyond the devastating and widely discussed humanitarian and economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, the current global crisis also exposes the dangers inherent in governmental shortcomings to provide for their citizens’ welfare adequately. In other words: the downside is almost universally a failure of state capacity. In its broadest sense, state capacity refers to....