Abstract for: Simulation Environment for Understanding and Preventing Genocide

Genocide and mass atrocities are a serious problem worldwide, and have several health impacts: • Directly through deaths and major injuries • Massive dislocations of population who often end up in refugee camps where they suffer from contagious disease, malnutrition, and violence • Damage to the health care infrastructure that has lasting effects for the entire population Genocide is a dynamic phenomenon and is difficult to stop unless there is an intervention at an early stage. Gary Hirsch is working with an organization called Bellwether. Their focus is educating about and preventing genocide and helping groups that have been victims of genocide such as the Yazidi’s in Iraq who were persecuted by ISIS. Economic development is an important part of their mission, both for genocide prevention and recovery from genocide. The work is also integrating insights from subject matter experts in genocide studies. We’re developing a dynamic model that simulates how genocides and other mass atrocities develop over time. We envision the model together with a user interface being used in workshops to give various stakeholders a visceral understanding of how genocides and mass atrocities develop, various points in the process at which to intervene, and how important it is to intervene as early as possible. Our ideas about how to model genocide were inspired by an article by Scott Straus, a leading genocide scholar now at U Cal Berkely. Straus describes genocide as a multi-stage process that a country or region might go through, subject to factors of escalation and restraint. These forces of escalation and restraint translate readily into SD concepts of reinforcing and balancing feedback loops.