The effects of political protests on youth human capital and well-being in Egypt

Protests are one of the most common expressions of modern political conflict, and the wave of demonstrations that marked the onset of the Arab Spring contributed to a global increase in protest activity. Yet few studies have examined the effects of exposure to protests on population well-being even though such exposure may have profound and lasting effects, especially if experienced at critical stages of development over the life course. The aim of our study is to estimate the effects of exposure to political protests on the human capital accumulation and well-being of youth during the tumultuous political transition experienced in Egypt from 2011 to 2014. For a nationally representative panel of youth captured in the 2009 and 2013/2014 waves of the Survey of Young People in Egypt (SYPE), we exploit exogenous geospatial variation in the occurrence of political protests from the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data (ACLED) Project to estimate individual-level changes in social trust, uncertainty, education, and health outcomes for youth exposed to protests. In our panel, 31.1% of the sample lived in districts where riots or protests occurred. Exposure to protests increased overall perceptions of uncertainty about the future. Young men ever exposed to protests were slightly more likely to report good overall health, but experienced sizable worsening in mental health compared to young women ever exposed. Differences by own and family participation in protest events were found for perceptions of uncertainty and mental health. In the aftermath of the Arab Spring and other mass protest movements around the globe, these findings highlight the importance of examining the population-level impacts of different forms of political conflict, particularly as substantial numbers of youth in Middle East and North Africa and elsewhere progress to adulthood under conditions of political instability.

Suicidal Risk evolution in Tunisia, five years after the Jasmine Revolution

INTRODUCTION

Since the revolution of January 2011, there was an increase in suicide and attempted suicide in Tunisia, particularly among young people.

AIM

To establish the suicide risk rate evolution eleven years after the SMPG 2005 survey in Tunisia, which was used to estimate the prevalence of suicide risk at 13.9%.

METHODS

We reproduce the survey SMPG of 2005. A sample of 300 people representative of Ariana's area was determined by the method of quotas according to gender, age and level of education. The questionnaire consisted of sociodemographic data and the Mini International Neuropsychiatric Interview (M.I.N.I) in its portion suicidal risk.

RESULTS

The sex ratio was 1.01. The mean age was 42 ±2.26 years. The prevalence of suicide risk was 22.7%: mild (90%), medium (6%) and high (4%). The suicide risk's prevalence had increased by 8.8% compared to the first survey SMPG in 2005. The suicide risk rate was higher among women (p = 0.01), among the unemployed (0,008) and those with an income below 850 Tunisian Dinar / month (p = 0.01).

CONCLUSION

Given the increase in suicide risk between 2005 and 2016, specific preventive measures should be implemented by the Tunisian authorities to reduce this risk.

Axiological-Identitary Collective Action Model (AICAM): A new integrative perspective in the analysis of protest

Current predictive models of collective action have devoted little attention to personal values, such as morals or ideology. The present research addresses this issue by incorporating a new axiological path in a novel predictive model of collective action, named AICAM. The axiological path is formed by two constructs: ideology and moral obligation. The model has been tested for real normative participation (Study 1) and intentional non-normative participation (Study 2). The sample for Study 1 included 531 randomly selected demonstrators and non-demonstrators at the time of a protest that took place in Madrid, May 2017. Study 2 comprised 607 randomly selected participants who filled out an online questionnaire. Structural equation modelling analysis was performed in order to examine the fit and predictive power of the model. Results show that the model is a good fit in both studies. It has also been observed that the new model entails a significant addition of overall effect size when compared with alternative models, including SIMCA. The present research contributes to the literature of collective action by unearthing a new, independent path towards collective action that is nonetheless compatible with previous motives. Implications for future research are discussed, mainly stressing the need to include moral and ideological motives in the study of collective action engagement.

Civil conflict, domestic violence, and poverty as predictors of corporal punishment in Colombia

BACKGROUND

With lingering effects from more than 50 years of war, young children in Colombia are exposed to multiple risk factors such as poverty, civil conflict, and domestic violence. In addition to these environmental stressors, public and legal support for corporal punishment remains high, which is shown by the high prevalence of young children exposed to corporal punishment in Colombia.

OBJECTIVE

The purpose of this study is to identify individual, family, and municipality-level predictors of corporal punishment (i.e., hitting with objects and spanking) in Colombia in order to inform prevention and intervention strategies.

PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING

We use information gathered in 2015 from a representative sample of 11,759 mothers of children younger than five in Colombia.

METHODS

We employed multi-level models to account for the clustering of families in 217 municipalities.

RESULTS

Results show that mothers' prior exposure to corporal punishment by their own parents (β=0.229;p<0.01), attitudes towards domestic violence β=0.013;p<0.05, municipality homicide rates β=0.028;p<0.05 and presence of armed groups β=0.031;p<0.05, household poverty β=0.030;p<0.01 and poverty of the municipality β=0.022;p<0.05 predicted mothers' hitting their young children with an object. However, family β=-0.028;p<0.05 and municipality poverty β=-0.016;p<0.05 had a negative association with mothers' use of spanking.

CONCLUSIONS

These findings suggest that both family and neighborhood level factors have simultaneous associations with parents' use of corporal punishment. Given the accumulating evidence concerning the adverse effects of corporal punishment on child well-being and development, legislative efforts aimed at reducing and ultimately banning corporal punishment are warranted.

The Critical Periphery in the Growth of Social Protests

Social media have provided instrumental means of communication in many recent political protests. The efficiency of online networks in disseminating timely information has been praised by many commentators; at the same time, users are often derided as "slacktivists" because of the shallow commitment involved in clicking a forwarding button. Here we consider the role of these peripheral online participants, the immense majority of users who surround the small epicenter of protests, representing layers of diminishing online activity around the committed minority. We analyze three datasets tracking protest communication in different languages and political contexts through the social media platform Twitter and employ a network decomposition technique to examine their hierarchical structure. We provide consistent evidence that peripheral participants are critical in increasing the reach of protest messages and generating online content at levels that are comparable to core participants. Although committed minorities may constitute the heart of protest movements, our results suggest that their success in maximizing the number of online citizens exposed to protest messages depends, at least in part, on activating the critical periphery. Peripheral users are less active on a per capita basis, but their power lies in their numbers: their aggregate contribution to the spread of protest messages is comparable in magnitude to that of core participants. An analysis of two other datasets unrelated to mass protests strengthens our interpretation that core-periphery dynamics are characteristically important in the context of collective action events. Theoretical models of diffusion in social networks would benefit from increased attention to the role of peripheral nodes in the propagation of information and behavior.

The effects of temperature on political violence: global evidence at the subnational level

A number of studies have demonstrated an empirical relationship between higher ambient temperatures and substate violence, which have been extrapolated to make predictions about the security implications of climate change. This literature rests on the untested assumption that the mechanism behind the temperature-conflict link is that disruption of agricultural production provokes local violence. Using a subnational-level dataset, this paper demonstrates that the relationship: (1) obtains globally, (2) exists at the substate level — provinces that experience positive temperature deviations see increased conflict; and (3) occurs even in regions without significant agricultural production. Diminished local farm output resulting from elevated temperatures is unlikely to account for the entire increase in substate violence. The findings encourage future research to identify additional mechanisms, including the possibility that a substantial portion of the variation is brought about by the well-documented direct effects of temperature on individuals' propensity for violence or through macroeconomic mechanisms such as food price shocks.

Has protest increased since the 1970s? How a survey question can construct a spurious trend

The literature on political participation asserts that protest has increased over the last four decades, all over the world. This trend is derived from surveys asking questions about participation in various forms of protest, including demonstrations, boycotts, and unofficial strikes. The latter question made sense in the context in which it was formulated, Britain in the early 1970s, and with regard to the original methodological aim, measuring 'protest potential'. The absence of a generic question on strikes, however, distorts our understanding of protest. Two sources of data on Britain in the 1980s and 1990 s - a population survey and an event catalogue - comprehensively measure strikes. They show that strikes greatly outnumbered demonstrations and other forms of protest. Another claim in the literature, that protesters are highly educated, no longer holds once strikes are properly counted. Strikes in Britain, as in many countries, have dramatically declined since the 1980s. This decline more than offsets any increase in demonstrations and boycotts, meaning that the total volume of protest has decreased. The episode illustrates how survey questions, when replicated without scrutiny, can misconstrue social trends.

Global civil unrest: contagion, self-organization, and prediction

Civil unrest is a powerful form of collective human dynamics, which has led to major transitions of societies in modern history. The study of collective human dynamics, including collective aggression, has been the focus of much discussion in the context of modeling and identification of universal patterns of behavior. In contrast, the possibility that civil unrest activities, across countries and over long time periods, are governed by universal mechanisms has not been explored. Here, records of civil unrest of 170 countries during the period 1919-2008 are analyzed. It is demonstrated that the distributions of the number of unrest events per year are robustly reproduced by a nonlinear, spatially extended dynamical model, which reflects the spread of civil disorder between geographic regions connected through social and communication networks. The results also expose the similarity between global social instability and the dynamics of natural hazards and epidemics.

Managing the urban commons: the relative influence of individual and social incentives on the treatment of public space

All communities have common resources that are vulnerable to selfish motives. The current paper explores this challenge in the specific case of the urban commons, defined as the public spaces and scenery of city neighborhoods. A theoretical model differentiates between individual incentives and social incentives for caring for the commons. The quality of a commons is defined as the level of physical (e.g., loose garbage) and social (e.g., public disturbances) disorder. A first study compared levels of disorder across the census block groups of a single city; the second compared the disorder generated by individual addresses in two neighborhoods. Each study found that homeownership, an individual incentive, was the main predictor of disorder. Owner-occupied parcels generated less disorder than their renter-occupied neighbors, but both parcel types produced less disorder in a neighborhood with greater homeownership. The results emphasize the need for considering both individual and social incentives for group-beneficial behaviors.

Lifetime prevalence of mental health disorders and delay in treatment following initial onset: evidence from the Northern Ireland Study of Health and Stress

BACKGROUND

The current study provides the first epidemiological estimates of lifetime mental disorders across NI based on DSM-IV criteria. Risk factors, delays in treatment and the experience of conflict are also examined.

METHOD

Nationally representative face-to-face household survey of 4340 individuals aged > or =18 years in NI using the composite international diagnostic interview. Analyses were implemented using SAS and STATA software.

RESULTS

Lifetime prevalence of any disorder was 39.1% while projected lifetime risk was 48.6%. Individuals who experienced conflict were more likely to have had an anxiety, mood or impulse-control disorder. Treatment delays were substantial for anxiety and substance disorders.

CONCLUSIONS

Results from this study show that mental disorders are highly prevalent in Northern Ireland. The elevated rates of post-traumatic stress disorder in relation to other countries and the association of living 'in a region of terror' disorders suggests that civil conflict has had an additional impact on mental health. Given substantial delays in treatment, further research is required to investigate the factors associated with failure and delay in treatment seeking.

Conflict induced internal displacement in Nepal

Nepal has witnessed a humanitarian crisis since the Maoist conflict began ten years ago. The plight of internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Nepal has received little international attention despite being rated one of the worst displacement scenarios in the world. An estimated 200,000 people have been displaced as a result of the conflict, with the far-western districts of Nepal being the worst affected. Internal displacement has stretched the carrying capacity of several cities with adverse physical and mental health consequences for the displaced. Vulnerable women and children have been the worst affected. The government has adopted a discriminatory approach and failed to fulfil its obligations towards IDPs. Non-governmental organisations and international agencies have provided inadequate services to IDPs in their programmes. Tackling the issues of IDPs requires co-operation between government and development agencies: acknowledging the burden of the problem of IDPs, adequate registration and needs assessment, along with health and nutritional surveys, and development of short-term emergency relief packages and long-term programmes for their assistance.

Health services utilization in Jerusalem under terrorism

OBJECTIVE

The authors explored the effects of an escalation of terrorism on the help-seeking behavior of the general population in Jerusalem, a city that offers an adequate supply of medical and psychiatric services.

METHOD

Time-series analyses were applied to examine the utilization of health services (primary medical care and ambulance calls) and mental health services (clinics, hospitals, and telephone hotlines) by Jerusalem residents before and during part of the current intifada. The authors assessed seasonality, general linear trends (from factors such as health education and increased access), short-term intifada impact (reflecting reactions that peaked at the third month and ended 1 year thereafter), and long-term impact (starting at the intifada outbreak and reflecting a more stable population behavior).

RESULTS

Adult psychiatric outpatient visits did not change except for the elderly in ongoing care who had both short- and long-term increases. The proportion of recorded ICD-10 diagnoses reflecting intifada-related reactions remained generally stable. Short-term effects included an increase in psychiatric readmissions. First contacts to substance abuse clinics remained unchanged. While long-term effects included a decrease in new psychiatric hospitalizations, the rate of monthly general practitioner visitors and the number of monthly ambulance and hotline calls increased.

CONCLUSIONS

Except for the elderly and previously hospitalized persons, Jerusalem residents did not increase their use of psychiatric services but did increase their use of some other health services. These results suggest that this terrorism-affected population did not perceive their mental and social suffering as requiring specialized intervention.

Effects of armed conflict on access to emergency health care in Palestinian West Bank: systematic collection of data in emergency departments

OBJECTIVE

To assess the impact of restrictions in access to hospital services imposed on the civilian population during the armed conflict in the Palestinian territories occupied by Israel.

DESIGN

Consecutive registration of demographic and medical data, with information about transportation time, delay in access to hospital, and course of hospital contact.

SETTING

Three hospital emergency departments in Bethlehem and Nablus, in the occupied Palestinian West Bank, during one week in each hospital.

PARTICIPANTS

All patients seeking health care in the three hospitals during the study period.

RESULTS

A total of 394 of the 2228 emergency department contacts reported being delayed at checkpoints or by detours on their way to the emergency department. Hospital admission was significantly more common for these patients: 32% (n = 125) compared with 13% (n = 205) among those who were not delayed.

CONCLUSION

18% of the emergency department contacts were delayed because of the occupation. The higher hospital admission rate in this group suggests that restrictions in access to hospital services influence the severity of the medical conditions presented.

The prevalence of depression in two districts of Uganda

BACKGROUND

Little information is available on the prevalence of depression in Uganda. Given the recent political history of Uganda, depression may be common.

METHOD

The aim was to estimate the point prevalence of probable clinical depressive disorder among the general population in two contrasting districts of Uganda. Translated versions (in Madi and Lusoga) of the 13-item Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) were administered to a systematic sample of adult residents in the Adjumani and Bugiri districts of Uganda.

RESULTS

The overall prevalence of probably clinically significant depression (BDI score of 20-39) was 17.4%. Significantly higher rates were found in women and in Adjumani District.

CONCLUSION

Depression is common in Uganda and particularly in the more troubled and less socially cohesive district of Adjumani.

Impact of long-term civil disorders and wars on the trajectory of HIV epidemics in sub-Saharan Africa

From the mid-1970s, seven countries in sub-Saharan Africa have experienced civil disorders and wars lasting for at least 10 years. In two-- Sierra Leone during 1991-2002, and Somalia from 1988 and continuing--adult HIV prevalence remained below 1%. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, HIV prevalence appears to have stabilised during post-1991 civil disorder and war. Limited information from Angola (civil war 1975 -2002) and Liberia (civil disorder and war from 1989 and continuing) suggests low HIV prevalence. Mozambique's HIV prevalence was near 1% after its 1975 - 1992 civil war, but increased dramatically in the first post-war decade. Across African countries with long-term wars, HIV seems to have spread more slowly than in most neighbouring countries at peace. This evidence contributes to the ongoing debate about the factors that explain differential epidemic trajectories, a debate which is crucial to the design of HIV prevention programmes. One possible explanation for slow epidemic growth in wartime is that unsterile health care accounts for an important proportion of HIV transmission during peacetime, but much less when wars disrupt health services. However, other explanations are also possible. The roles of sex and blood exposures in HIV epidemics in war and peace await empirical determination.

Papers show U.S. role in Guatemalan abuses. In declassified documents, diplomats describe massacres, CIA ties to Army

Recently declassified U.S. intelligence documents reveal the close ties between the United States and the Guatemalan military and security forces during Guatemala's 36-year civil war, even though U.S. officials were aware of the government's and army's massive human rights abuses.

Mortality associated with use of weapons in armed conflicts, wartime atrocities, and civilian mass shootings: literature review

OBJECTIVE

To determine the implications of variation in mortality associated with use of weapons in different contexts.

DESIGN

Literature review.

SETTINGS

Armed conflicts and civilian mass shootings, 1929-96.

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE

Mortality from wounds.

RESULTS

During the fighting of war the number of people wounded is at least twice the number killed and may be 13 times as high; this ratio of the number wounded to the number killed results from the impact of a weapon system on human beings in the particular context of war. When firearms are used against people who are immobilised, in a confined space, or unable to defend themselves the wounded to killed ratio has been lower than 1 or even 0.

CONCLUSIONS

Mortality from firearms depends not only on the technology of the weapon or its ammunition but also on the context in which it is used. The increased mortality resulting from the use of firearms in situations other than war requires a complex interaction of factors explicable in terms of wound ballistics and the psychology of the user. Understanding these factors has implications for recognition of war crimes. In addition, the lethality of conventional weapons may be increased if combatants are disabled by the new non-lethal weapons beforehand; this possibility requires careful legal examination within the framework of the Geneva Conventions.

Parade and prejudice

Nurses at Craigavon hospital near Drumcree braved bomb threats and violence during the Orange parades weekend to carry on with their work. Adrian O'Dowd was invited to join them.

Major incidents in Britain over the past 28 years: the case for the centralised reporting of major incidents

STUDY OBJECTIVES

To describe the incidence and epidemiology of major incidents occurring in Britain over the past 28 years.

METHODS

Major incidents were identified through a MEDLINE search, a hand search of journals and government reports at the Home Office Emergency Planning College, newspaper reports, a postal survey of ambulance emergency planning officers, and through requests for information posted on the internet.

MAIN RESULTS

Brief incidents profiles from 108 British major incidents are presented. Most major incidents pass unreported in the medical literature. On average three to four major incidents occur in Britain each year (range 0-11). Sixty three of 108 (59.2%) of incidents involve public transportation. The next two largest groups are civil disturbance 22 of 108 (20.3%) and industrial accidents 16 of 108 (14.8%). Although incidents at sports stadiums are rare they produce large numbers of casualties. The data currently available on major incidents are difficult to find and of questionable accuracy.

CONCLUSIONS

The lack of data makes planning for major incidents and exercising major incident plans difficult. Casualty incident profiles (CIPs) may assist major incidents exercises and planning. CIPs from future major incidents should be collated and made available to all major incident planners.

Domestic protests and rates of personal violence (suicide and homicide)

The number of protests in West Germany from 1965 to 1989 was not associated with suicide or homicide rates, which failed to replicate results previously reported for Canada.

Posttraumatic stress reactions after single and double trauma

This study evaluated the severity and symptom profile of posttraumatic stress reactions of 202 adults exposed in 1988 to political violence in Azerbaijan and/or the earthquake in Armenia. High rates of severe posttraumatic stress reactions were found among the most highly exposed individuals, irrespective of the type of trauma. There was no difference in symptom profile for subjects exposed to earthquake versus violence. These similarities in severity and symptom profile may be attributable to common features of the exposures, which included experiencing life-threat and witnessing injury, multilation and death. Recent prior exposure to violence contributed to the severity of reaction to the earthquake. The high rates of chronic and severe posttraumatic stress reactions in Armenia constitute a major public mental health problem.

The impact of the April 1992 civil unrest on the Los Angeles REI WIC program and its participants

This paper discusses the findings of a study conducted in south central Los Angeles in August 1992 among women in the Special Supplemental Food Program for Women, Infants, and Children. The goals of the study were to determine the current demographics of WIC participants; examine the financial hardship, need for relief services, and extent of hunger resulting from the civil unrest of April 1992; look at the effects of the unrest on different ethnic groups; determine the unmet need for WIC services; and evaluate the State and local WIC responses to the unrest. The 1,189 respondents were approximately 77 percent Latina, 20 percent African American, and 3 percent white. Half or more were recent immigrants, 19 percent were pregnant and parenting adolescents, 74 percent were school dropouts, and 56 percent were single mothers. Only 1 percent had any problems using WIC vouchers after the unrest, although more than half of their grocery stores had closed. Thirty-five percent experienced food deficits in their households, and 33 percent of those who applied for emergency food stamps had trouble getting them. Four percent said their children had gone to bed hungry in the last week, and 9 percent said they, the respondents, had as well. Only 2 percent needed shelter, and 1 percent became homeless, but 6 percent had family members who lost jobs due to the unrest. This study suggests that the chronically substandard conditions under which many families in south central Los Angeles live affect them more profoundly than did the dramatic consequences of the civil unrest.