Month: April 2014

#Propaganda

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mkhmarketing via Compfight In the last several years, there have been numerous examples of government officials placing limits on social media sites in order to prevent citizens from criticizing government behavior and organizing anti-government protests. Most recently, Turkish citizens, world leaders, and international organization have criticized the Turkish government  for shutting down Twitter in Turkey. Now it seems as though government officials have learned that instead of limiting access to social media sites, they can also use these sites to their advantage. Since it is now possible to purchase friends and followers on Facebook and Twitter for a very low cost, political parties and government leaders Continue reading #Propaganda→

What is Terrorism?

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The recent shootings in Kansas, as well as various events over the past few years involving individual acts of violence, have led people to ask why some of these events are considered to be merely crimes (homicides), some considered hate crimes, and others considered to be terrorism.  Anthony Lemieux engages this question directly over at Psychology Today in response to yesterday’s events. Every semester that I teach International Relations, we spend a week dedicated to dissecting global terrorism (we spend longer on the issue when I teach Civil War and Terrorism as a full class) and we spend part of that Continue reading What is Terrorism?→

QP LIVE! Where to Find Us at MPSA 2014

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It's the time of year that I affectionately call "conference season," i.e. the springtime one-two punch of the annual meetings of the International Studies Association and the Midwest Political Science Association.  This week, thousands of political scientists will descend upon Chicago hoping to learn about new research, present some research of their own, and/or connect with old friends and new colleagues.  Your trusty bloggers here at the Quantitative Peace will be among those making the trek, so, in case you are interested in seeing the kind of stuff we work on when we're not blogging, I've put together a schedule Continue reading QP LIVE! Where to Find Us at MPSA 2014→