Impacts of ecosystem service message framing and dynamic social norms on public support for tropical forest restoration

The effectiveness of strategic psychology-based marketing techniques for increasing public support for conservation is poorly understood. We assessed how such techniques affect support for tropical rainforest restoration with a controlled online experiment with 1166 nationally representative residents of the United Kingdom. We tested whether support increased when adding ecosystem service (ES) framings to typical nongovernmental organizations' (NGOs) biodiversity-focused messages that emphasize benefits to UK residents or people living near the tropical restoration site and a dynamic social norm nudge that emphasized increasing popularity of environmental restoration. We considered how respondents' psychological traits (nature connection, self-efficacy, psychological benefits of supporting charities, awareness of environmental degradation in the Global South, and climate change skepticism) influenced responses. Outcomes included respondents' reported advertisement sufficiency, sympathetic attitudes, behavioral support, and financial support. The study population typically found advertisements sufficient and exhibited sympathetic attitudes and financial, but not behavioral, support. Younger people exhibited greater conservation support than older respondents. Messages framed solely on biodiversity conservation were as effective as those highlighting additional ES benefits received by UK residents and people near the tropical restoration site. This suggests that framing around ESs, rather than nature's intrinsic value, may not strengthen public support for conservation. The dynamic social norm nudge had perverse effects. It reduced perceived social norms and most outcome variables. Alternative dynamic norm nudges warrant testing, but our results support research suggesting dynamic norm nudges can be ineffective when associated with activism, challenging their use by conservation NGOs. Psychological benefits of supporting charities and perceived self-efficacy increased support for advertisements, highlighting the benefits of including impact statements relating respondents' support to specific outcomes. Climate change skepticism decreased support, whereas nature connection and perceived static social norms increased it, highlighting the need to increase nature connection and pro-environmental social norms to elevate public support for conservation.

Reflective practices at the Security Council: Children and armed conflict and the three United Nations

The United Nations Security Council passed its first resolution on children in armed conflict in 1999, making it one of the oldest examples of Security Council engagement with a thematic mandate and leading to the creation of a dedicated working group in 2005. Existing theoretical accounts of the Security Council cannot account for the developing substance of the children and armed conflict agenda as they are macro-oriented and focus exclusively on states. I argue that Security Council decision-making on thematic mandates is a productive process whose outcomes are created by and through practices of actors across the three United Nations: member states (the first United Nations), United Nations officials (the second United Nations) and non-governmental organizations (the third United Nations). In presenting a practice-based, micro-oriented analysis of the children and armed conflict agenda, the article aims to deliver on the empirical promise of practice theories in International Relations. I make two contributions to practice-based understandings: first, I argue that actors across the three United Nations engage in reflective practices of a strategic or tactical nature to manage, arrange or create space in Security Council decision-making. Portraying practices as reflective rather than as only based on tacit knowledge highlights how actors may creatively adapt their practices to social situations. Second, I argue that particular individuals from the three United Nations are more likely to become recognized as competent performers of practices because of their personality, understood as plural socialization experiences. This adds varied individual agency to practice theories that, despite their micro-level interests, have focused on how agency is relationally constituted.

Military assistance in complex emergencies: what have we learned since the Kurdish relief effort?

After the success of relief efforts to the displaced Kurdish population in northern Iraq following the Gulf War, many in the US military and the international relief community saw military forces as critical partners in the response to future complex emergencies (CEs). However, successes in subsequent military involvement in Somalia, Rwanda, the former Yugoslavia, and other CEs proved more elusive and raised many difficult issues. A review of these operations reinforces some basic lessons that must be heeded if the use of military forces in humanitarian relief is to be successful. Each CE is unique, thus, each military mission must be clearly defined and articulated. Armed forces struggle to provide both security and humanitarian relief, particularly when aggressive peace enforcement is required. Significant political and public support is necessary for military involvement and success. Military forces cannot execute humanitarian assistance missions on an ad hoc basis, but must continue to develop doctrine, policy and procedures in this area and adequately train, supply, and equip the units that will be involved in humanitarian relief. Militaries not only must cooperate and coordinate extensively with each other, but also with the governmental and non-governmental humanitarian relief organizations that will be engaged for the long term.