In class we talked about the role of government in stepping in when violence arises in other countries. I brought it up because of one of the required readings for this week focused on violence and its implications. Violence can become huge public health issues such as suffering injuries directly from the violence or even from being a refugee stuck in an overcrowded, low policed refugee camp. Pedersen (2002) wrote: "It seems paradoxical that there are effective international mechanisms in place for monitoring and possible preventing economic or financial crisis in the world markets, but there is no set of indicators directed to monitor conflict and crises in the political sphere nor a system that will detect potential deadly conflicts in the world today. Ethnic conflicts leading to massive killing and retaliation, such as the one experienced in Rwanda, could have been easily prevented. Security must be framed within an effective global system of advanced conflict warning, independent from official state bodies and based on accurate databases to track the stage at which conflict begins to take shape (1)." 

When I first read this it sounded great in theory but the ideas was not well thought out.  In practice, I do not see how this would ever happen. First, Pederson calls for a system that is independent from official state bodies. I feel that state bodies have the resources to great such a system if it was possible and I don’t know how you could make it completely independent from governments. If there was such a system who would be in charge of it? If a crisis was indicated who would handle it, an independent body or a specific country or government body? Would that government trust the information? I think these questions would need to be very well thought out when pursuing trying to create such a system.

The second thing that I have issue with is even if such a monitor system was in place how effective would it actually be. While the hypothetical system may have indicated that there was unrest in the Middle East (which I think most already knew that to some extent), I don’t think it could have predict that a frustrate man setting himself on fire in Tunisia would have started the Arab Spring or how wide spread the protests would have become (2). A year after it had started, presidents and leaders have been removed from Egypt, Tunisia, Yemen and Libya. I don’t know if a model or system could have predicted the outcome of one localized action.

While the Arab Spring example may not be what Pedersen had in mind of what to monitor, I think it shows just how fast something can occur. The Rwanda genocide was given as an example of a situation that could have benefited from a monitoring system. However, with the increased globalization and increases in social media one would think that a similar situation would receive much more global attention. Perhaps social media is our current monitoring system.

(1) Pedersen, D. (2002). Political violence, ethnic conflict, and contemporary wars: broad implications for health and social well-being. Social science & medicine,55(2), 175-190.

(2) http://www.npr.org/2011/12/17/143897126/the-arab-spring-a-year-of-revolution