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This paper explores the links between conflict, land, and indigenous peoples on the island of Mindanao in the southern Philippines. The analysis takes advantage of the unprecedented concurrence of data from the 2020 census, an independent conflict data monitor for Mindanao, and administrative sources on ancestral land titling for indigenous peoples in the Philippines. While evidence elsewhere compellingly links land titling with conflict reduction, we find a more nuanced story in Mindanao using mixed methods. Conflicts, including land- and resource-related conflicts, are generally less likely in districts with higher shares of indigenous peoples. Ancestral domain areas also have a lower likelihood of general conflict but a higher likelihood of land-related conflict. Our econometric findings suggest that ancestral domain titling does not automatically solve land-related conflicts. Only fully awarded ancestral domain titles are—weakly—associated with reductions in land-related conflict. However, when administrative delays occur, titling is associated with sustained, rather than decreased, conflict.

A counterterrorism model is developed where a government and a terrorist allocate resources over two periods. Escalation to period 2 occurs if a threshold for the government’s period-1 damage is exceeded. Without escalation four scenarios exist, including deterrence and nonprovocation. With escalation and unitary contest intensity, both players’ fractions of their resources allocated to period 1 equal the sum of their potential period-1 damages divided by the sum of their potential damages in both periods. As the government’s resource superiority increases, the terrorist allocates all its resources to the period-1 attack, and the government deters escalation. Uniform distributions of the contest intensity and the government’s resource superiority over various intervals are considered. Observing that the terrorist’s utility may be U-shaped in the escalation threshold, the government is enabled to determine both its resource allocation and escalation threshold. The government prefers no threshold when it lacks resources and should always escalate, and when it has abundant resources and can deter. For intermediate resource superiority, the government prefers an intermediate threshold. Six game outcomes are shown where escalation is deterred for two disjoint intervals of the government’s resource superiority.

Priority analysis is one of the most important issues in the trade-off analysis of imprecise conflicting requirements whose elasticity is captured using fuzzy logic. Requirement analysts need to know not only the relative ordering of requirements based on their importance but also how much a requirement is more important than another requirement in order to achieve an effective trade-off. This paper presents a formal approach for reasoning about the relative priority by analyzing the customer’s trade-off preference among imprecise conflicting requirements. A possibilistic reasoning framework for inferring the lower bound of relative priority from case analysis under uncertainty is also developed. Consistency and nonredundancy criteria are established to facilitate the conversion of a possibilistic statement on a lower bound of relative priority into a relative priority. Finally, relative priorities are transformed into weights of importance so that they can be used in the aggregation of conflicting requirements to resolve conflicts.

Evidence theory has been acknowledged as an important approach to dealing with uncertain, incomplete and imperfect information. In this framework, different formal techniques have been developed in order to address information aggregation and conflict handling. The variety of proposed models clearly demonstrates the range of possible underlying assumptions in combination rules. In this paper we present a review of some of the most important methods of combination and conflict handling in order to introduce a more generic rule for aggregation of uncertain evidence. We claim that the models based on mass multiplication can address the problem domains where randomness and stochastic independence is the dominant characteristic of information sources, although these assumptions are not always adhered to many practical cases. The proposed combination rule here is not only capable of retrieving other classical models, but also enables us to define new families of aggregation rules with more flexibility on dependency and normalization assumptions.

Elasticity in an imprecise requirement needs to be captured to enable the trade-off analysis of conflicting requirements. One of the most important issues in the trade-off analysis of conflicting requirements is to understand their priorities. Requirement analysts need to know not only the relative ordering of requirements based on their importance but also how much a requirement is more important than another requirement in order to achieve an effective trade-off between conflicting requirements. Existing formal methods for requirement engineering are limited in addressing these issues. This paper presents a formal methodology for reasoning about their priority by analyzing the customer’s trade-off preference among imprecise conflicting requirements. The elasticity in imprecise requirements is captured using fuzzy logic. Conflicting and cooperative relationships are classified to detect the conflicts between requirements. Multiple requirements are combined based fuzzy multi-criteria decision making techniques. We have also developed a possibilistic reasoning framework for inferring the lower bound of relative priority from case analysis. Consistency and nonredundancy criteria are established to facilitate the aggregation of possibilistic statement on the lower bounds of relative priority. Finally, we describe a process for transforming the lower bounds of relative priority into weights of importance so that they can be used in the aggregation of conflicting requirements to resolve conflicts.

Investing in Technology for Water Sustainability.

Water Policy Response to Water Scarcity and Future Climate Change Impacts.

Recirculation Aquaculture Systems (RAS): An Opportunity for the SE Asian Aquaculture Industry.

This paper looks at society divided into two groups where personal assets as well as group specific values influences the individuals' utility (positively for own group's value and possibly otherwise for the other group's value). Individual resource allocation problem may lead to under investment in production of assets and excessive diversion of resources into wasteful destructive activities. As a result, the net utility is lowered for all individuals. On the economic front, such usage of resource boosts the "black market" economy and results in dead weight loss. Because in equilibrium both the personal as well as social value created is smaller, on the social front these activities encourage social disintegration.

We analyze the pre- and post-election processes as a two-period game between an incumbent and a challenger. Before the election, in period 1, an incumbent allocates resources into production, fighting with the challenger, and providing public goods, which impact the probability of winning an election. After the election, in period 2 the incumbent may accept the election result, or a coalition or standoff may follow. Six outcomes are that the incumbent wins, the challenger wins, and that a standoff or coalition arises after one of the players wins. We analyze the incumbent’s and challenger’s strategic choices, how these choices depend on a variety of parameters, and the impact of the choices. The analysis is mapped to and tested against empirics of 48 African elections during 2009–2015 which are classified into the six outcomes. To test the model empirically, the correlations between three variables (the incumbent’s fighting and public goods provision and the challenger’s fighting, in period 1) and the six election outcomes are determined for 48 African elections.

By means of a simple computational model, we explore a dynamic perspective of social cohesion in populations under stress. Dynamics are driven by the co-evolution of structural and cognitive dimensions. Submitted to sudden variations on its environmental conflict level, the model is able to reproduce certain characteristics previously observed in real populations in situations of emergency or crisis. A closer analysis of the results, observing both structural and cognitive together, uncovers a causal path from the level of conflict suffered by a population to variations on its social cohesiveness.

Aiming at the large group decision-making problem in which every decision maker compares pairwise alternatives with fuzzy preference relations, this paper proposes a fuzzy preference relation decision-making method of large group based on conflicts. Firstly, priority should be given to the preference difference under complex large group environment, so we define the conflict degree of two fuzzy preference relations, which contributes to cluster analysis on preferences of the decision maker and thus forms several different clusters. Based on this, we simulate and analyze the threshold of conflict degree. Then we develop the entropy weight method to get the relevant weight of each cluster, and use the weight to aggregate the cluster preferences in order to attain the large group preference based on fuzzy preference relation. Next, an iteration algorithm is introduced to find a solution which could acquire the group alternatives fuzzy preference relation of a certain conflict level and obtain the ranking result of alternatives. Finally, a case analysis is given to illustrate the effectiveness of the method proposed.

Based on a two-year in-depth case study in an electronics plant in Singapore, this paper examines the interaction between Production (P) and Manufacturing Engineering (ME). This interaction is rather hidden because the roles of P and ME are often consigned or executed within the manufacturing operation. P and ME are responsible for process execution and process development respectively, and for process smoothness jointly; their relationship is asymmetrical from various aspects. These factors, together with the complex market demand and associated multi-prong operational requirements, became the potential sources of short-sighted behaviors and resulting conflicts at the P-ME interface which are illustrated via a system dynamics model. Conflict management would be easier if long-term solutions (operational capability-building and technological innovation) were considered along with short-term solutions (management intervention). A key implication for management is that giving ME an equal bargaining voice and investment in process development can encourage ME to develop more advanced process technologies that enhance the performance of both P and ME.

This study demonstrates how top management team (TMT) conflict impacts new product development (NPD) under cultural differences between Taiwan and the United States. Based on cultural differences, we compare Taiwan and the United States to explore how the heterogeneity of TMT composition leads to team conflict and how TMT conflict affects NPD outcomes in different stages. Several research propositions are presented and indicate that the higher TMT heterogeneity results in a higher degree of team conflict. Furthermore, cognitive conflict positively affects NPD initiation stage, but negative in the implementation stage. From a perspective of cultural differences, managers in Taiwan, compared with those in the United States, tend to sustain organizational cohesion and harmony, emphasize personal relationships, and sidestep direct conflict as much as possible. This cultural characteristic negatively affects NPD initiation, and also wears away the competitive advantages for Taiwanese companies.

Interdependence between Technically Trained Managers and Marketing Managers in new product development (NPD) teams is inherent, though few studies have investigated its effects within such teams. Here, interdependence is disaggregated into two underlying dimensions — the dependence of the Technically Trained Manager on the Marketing Manager, and the dependence of the Marketing Manager on the Technically Trained Manager during the project. Our model is tested using data from 184 Technically Trained Managers from Australian companies involved in NPD. The results suggest that interdependence is an important contextual variable during NPD projects. Senior managers should communicate its importance to NPD team members because of its positive effects within the NPD team. Where the Technically Trained Manager and Marketing Manager recognise their interdependence, they engage in more frequent, and more bidirectional communication. This is important because more effective communication between these two managers positively influences the quality and effectiveness of their working relationships, which in turn can increase NPD project success.

This paper focuses on conflicts of interest faced by technology-based firms which are embedded in an industry network. In the industry situation analysed here, issues have arisen as to how they can innovate effectively when judged from the perspective of their network partners while achieving their own internal objectives of growth and enhancement of innovative capability. The conceptual conclusions derived from the study are assessed for their generalisability to the global context of the oil industry, and to other industries in the United Kingdom (UK) and elsewhere. It is concluded that where a perceived conflict of interest arises in sharing leading edge technology, firms act in ways which are detrmental to the industrial network as a whole and, ultimately, to the technology leader firm itself. In order to maximise the returns to the technology-based firm, it must (i) select the group of clients/suppliers and portfolio of projects which offer the best spectrum of complementary resources in the light of its growth strategy; and (ii) structure its set of relationships to minimise the perceived risk to its competitive position. Thus, it must identify how to select, win and manage a portfolio of appropriately worded contracts, which collectively minimise its own and its multiple partners' conflicts of interest while ensuring that the required complementary resources will be forthcoming for current and future projects.

Social impact assessment (SIA) is applied worldwide to assess social impacts of plans and projects. In Europe, directives on environmental assessment (EA) require attention to social impacts, however, there is a need to investigate the implementation in practise. To this end, we study three Danish cases, which are characterised by debates and conflicts on social issues. Analysis of the EA statements shows inclusion of a broad range of social impacts. However, the EAs do not fully match the concerns of the public, and social impacts are not always analysed in depth, mitigation measures are not suggested or are postponed and the geographical distribution of impacts assessed is biased towards including negative local impacts. We discuss the scope and handling of social impacts, and possible implications. Based on this, we conclude with the view that EA might do the job of handling social impacts in Europe, if practise is improved.

A combination handwritten signature verification system is proposed for managing conflicts provided from each individual off-line and on-line support vector machine (SVM), respectively. Basically, the system is divided into three parts: (i) Off-line verification system, (ii) on-line verification system and (iii) combination module using belief function theory. The proposed framework allows combining the normalized SVM outputs and uses an estimation technique based on the dissonant model of Appriou to compute the belief assignments. Combination is performed using belief models such as Dempster-Shafer (DS) rule and proportional conflict redistribution (PCR) rule followed by the likelihood ratio-based decision making. Experiments are conducted on the well-known NISDCC signature collection using false rejection and false acceptance criteria. The obtained results show that the proposed combination framework using Dezert-Smarandache (DSm) theory yields the best verification accuracy even when individual off-line and on-line classifications provide conflicting results.

Mineral wealth tends to make countries less democratic and more likely to experience a civil war. Many countries also find it hard to use their natural resource revenues to make high-quality, growth-enhancing investments. I argue that these problems are caused, in part, by the unusual qualities of resource revenues — their great size, their non-tax source, their lack of stability, and their secrecy. While there is no universal formula for changing these four qualities, I present a menu of policies that could make natural resource revenues smaller, smoother and more transparent, and hence easier for governments to invest productively.

This paper examines African conflicts and the roles of the African Union (AU) in conflict resolution, focusing on the recent Zimbabwe and Kenya conflicts. Two conflict and conflict resolution theories: Hobessian realism and Burton's human needs theory were considered. This paper finds that ethnicity, elections in Africa, colonial manipulation of Africa's boundary, and longstanding land struggle contribute to Africa's conflicts; employing a comparative perspective however, it contends that the primary cause of the Zimbabwe and Kenya conflicts is the failure of the governments of Mugabe and Kibaki to address the basic needs of the people. This paper concludes that unlike other conflict resolution theories/mechanisms, the AU should stress the improvement of the governance institution in order to persuade the governments in Africa to respond to the basic needs of the populations. This is the major stipulation of needs theory, which is compelling for understanding the causes of conflict and conflict resolution in Africa.

Economic approaches to armed conflict have largely explained rational choice among rebel groups through quantitative analyses that focus on structural variables and ignore agency. This paper is an empirical analysis of decision-making among rebel groups in civil wars focusing on variables that actors influence. The hypothesis was that rebels calculated their expected gains and opportunity costs when deciding to engage in a civil war and that the rebels and government manipulated these expectations intentionally through actions or unintentionally through perception. In two case studies, the governments' actions to increase the opportunity cost and input cost of rebellion, the rebels' actions to lower their input costs and increase their chances of victory, and the rebels' perceptions regarding their probability of victory all influenced decisions. The evidence supported the hypothesis that rebellion is a rational choice and demonstrated that agency and perceptions were more important than structural factors to the decisions.

Empirical evidence suggests that Africa is one of the richest continents in terms of its abundance of natural resources. However, it still remains impoverished amidst its riches. Oil, which is a major driver in world development, is one of the natural resources abundant in about 21 African countries. Incidentally, oil has continued to "under-develop" Africa. In fact, it has often been suggested by scholars that oil has been a source of, and a fuel for some of the conflicts that litter the political history of Africa. With the continued world demand for oil and its further discovery in more African countries, this paper argues that African countries should deploy the vast revenue from its oil resources for the development of the continent within the confines of the sustainable development paradigm. The paper seeks to suggest ways for Africa's management of its resources in a more sustainable manner.