Human Terrain & Anthropology (merged thread)

[marct]

Common systems analyst joke. "The system ends/fails at the squishy keyboard to chair interface".

I'd respond with the classic "how do you tell a real Post Modernist from a Post Modernist manque, but it would be pulled .

For another look at the Marlowe piece, see here.

[wm]

Good point. At the same time, one has to wonder what the CA people think about the HTTs? Since they operate with an overlap, I suspect that there is some organizational friction involved.

Thanks Marc. Since Marlowe spent spent time within the CA world first, your point might well be a second reason for her less than kind words about the HTT. I suspect the traditional CA and PSYOPS organizations are feeling some turf challenges from the HTT.

My perception of what the HTTs are trying to do is to a) figure out what the specific local systems are, b) identify their isomorphic vectors (feedback loops pulling them in certain directions towards catastrophe points), and c) offer suggests on how to steer local systems back towards a homeostatic point that can be called "peace".

In my view, the HTT is an entity very much like the engineer topographic/terrain team that used to support me --its mission was to provide terrain analysis support as part of the intel prep of the battlefield (IPB) process. We had a an acronym for the militarily significant aspects of (geographic) terrain--OCOKA--Observation and fields of fire, Cover and concealment, Obstacles, Key terrain, Avenues of approach. (I guess the acronym has been slightly realigned based on posts I've seen from RTK.)

I see your list above as a first cut at trying to list out the militarily significant aspects of human terrain. I think we might view the HTT work as identifying another OCOKA--Organizational structures, Common traditions and language, Other ethnic considerations (religion e.g.), Key actors, Affiliations (alliances, family and tribe/clan structures for example). I admit this is a very rough first cut at something that is much more detailed. I hope the doctrine developers are expending a lot of effort in developing and vetting such a list. Without such, I think each HTTs will do a lot of wheel spinning as it truies to figure out exactly what it is up to in its deployed location

[Stan]

Thanks, Marc !
Fantastic reading material

I'd respond with the classic "how do you tell a real Post Modernist from a Post Modernist manque, but it would be pulled .

For another look at the Marlowe piece, see here.

Going toe-to-toe with an academic on sources, especially as a lay freelancer with, frankly, sketchy or no credentials at all, does take balls—I will give Ms. Marlowe that much. Afterall, she is “as neocon as they come”—surely that gives her some cachet, somewhere.

Ouch !

[Tom Odom]

Thanks Marc. Since Marlowe spent spent time within the CA world first, your point might well be a second reason for her less than kind words about the HTT. I suspect the traditional CA and PSYOPS organizations are feeling some turf challenges from the HTT.

I believe you are very correct. CA's mission is civil military operations and yes that clearly implies working with locals. It does not, however, make them regional specialists in any sense of the words. That said, CA as an institution tends to take on the cultural specialist mantle when it suits CA to do so. That tendency gets them into trouble in the field and in the rear. HTTs are most definitely a challenge to that inclination.

best

Tom

[wm]

Article from DoDhere about FAOs and AFRICOM support, FYI.

[Stan]

A quick and interesting update from Wired's Blog Network. Some good links and a little history as well.

This is the first official dispatch I've seen out of Iraq on the Human Terrain program -- the Army's controversial effort to embed social scientists in combat units. It's unusually informative, for a military public affairs release. And it sheds light on how American armed forces are slowly learning to tap Iraq's social networks, with some seemingly positive results. Here's a snippet:

Even though Operation Iraqi Freedom is in its fifth year, Villacres said many in the U.S. military still fail to appreciate the differences between Arab and Western culture.

“We try to find the assumptions and motivations behind what people do,” Matsuda said.

[Surferbeetle]

I would like to run through some quick data points that I am aware of: FEST Teams ( http://www.hq.usace.army.mil/cepa/pu...04/story12.htm http://findarticles.com/p/articles/m...02/ai_n9521476 ), RTI Teams (http://www.usip.org/pubs/specialreports/sr185.pdf ), FBI Teams (http://www.fbi.gov/page2/june07/iraq062907.htm ), PMC Teams (http://www.blackwaterusa.com/ ), DOS PRT’s (http://www.army.mil/professionalwrit...07/9_07_2.html ) and HTT’s (http://iraqht.blogspot.com/ )

Each of these teams in addition to bringing desperately needed specialized knowledge to the battlefield are also evidence that the actual execution of the oft spoken DIME concept is moving forward…..however haphazard the execution has been.

As a CA Bubba I say “GO TEAM GO!” We sure as hell need all the help we can get, and I am glad to see that people are starting to recognize the need for highly trained folks to help fight the 'graduate level of war'.

Steve

[Beelzebubalicious]

Not much new here, but I did like the quote about clubbing seals...

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080109/...hropologist_dc

[Stan]

Not much new here, but I did like the quote about clubbing seals...

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080109/...hropologist_dc

Great post ! And on a positive note, what I did like reading was:

"I'm a Californian. I'm a liberal. I'm a Democrat," he says. "My impetus is to come here and help end this thing."

"There's been a knee-jerk reaction in the anthropology community, that you've been co-opted, that you're a warmonger, like you're clubbing baby seals or something," he said. "I came here to save lives, to make friends out of enemies."

Short, sweet, and to the point.

[Mike Innes]

There I was about to start querying SWC on the HTT issue, when I stumbled across this thread. It looks like it's been kicking since October of last year, and has maybe died off in the last few weeks. Not necessarily looking to resurrect it, except to state that I'm researching HTTs in general, and will eventually be looking to mine this thread for all its worth.

As a fair exchange, I offer the following: http://www.terraplexic.org/human-ter...eams-readings/. It's essentially a bibliography of readings and resources either directly pertaining to HTTs or informing the issue. I don't believe a similar resource exists anywhere else. The media section is far from complete - I do have a day job I have to go to sometimes - but the peer-reviewed/formally published literature section is fairly comprehensive.

[marct]

Hi Mike,

There I was about to start querying SWC on the HTT issue, when I stumbled across this thread. It looks like it's been kicking since October of last year, and has maybe died off in the last few weeks. Not necessarily looking to resurrect it, except to state that I'm researching HTTs in general, and will eventually be looking to mine this thread for all its worth.

Sounds like a plan. I'll be interetsed in seeing your research, since I am very interested in the HTTs.

As a fair exchange, I offer the following: http://www.terraplexic.org/human-ter...eams-readings/. It's essentially a bibliography of readings and resources either directly pertaining to HTTs or informing the issue. I don't believe a similar resource exists anywhere else. The media section is far from complete - I do have a day job I have to go to sometimes - but the peer-reviewed/formally published literature section is fairly comprehensive.

Excellent! Thanks for posting it.

Marc

[Mike Innes]

Hi Mike,

Sounds like a plan. I'll be interetsed in seeing your research, since I am very interested in the HTTs.

Marc

Groovy, we can share.

I'm just getting started with it, but essentially it'll be one thread of three woven through the book I'm working on (under contract with Hurst & Co Publishers), the other two "terrains" being material/physical and cognitive (broadly understood). Another way of looking at it is in terms of the "cultural turn", "geo" turn, etc., in the way researchers, investigators and military planners navigate the shoals of extremism and political violence.

I've been beating the "terrain complexity" mantra in a couple other threads, which is an outgrowth of research and writing I've been doing on sanctuaries. Basically, so the logic goes, one can't look at "sanctuary" without looking at the system/context/environment from which it sets itself apart (in turn based on the notion that sanctuary is as much process/condition as it is place/space, all of which are metaphors for exemption/exception/intermediacy).

[Rex Brynen]

I've been beating the "terrain complexity" mantra in a couple other threads, which is an outgrowth of research and writing I've been doing on sanctuaries. Basically, so the logic goes, one can't look at "sanctuary" without looking at the system/context/environment from which it sets itself apart (in turn based on the notion that sanctuary is as much process/condition as it is place/space, all of which are metaphors for exemption/exception/intermediacy).

Indeed. Moreover, the socio-political processes that provide "sanctuary" to insurgent groups are not only paramilitary enablers (that is, creating sheltered physical space within which military preparations can be made), but those processes themselves may be linked to insurgent interests that are primarily non-military in nature (for example, growing economic interests, or a political space within which insurgent decision-making can occur relatively free from external pressures and constraints).

Marie-Joelle Zahar (Université de Montreal) has done interesting (and largely unpublished) work on the Lebanese Forces and Serb militias which points to the growing role that institutional and economic interests can play in efforts to preserve militia cantons. You might also want to take a peek at my own work on the PLO's management of insurgent-sanctuary relations in Lebanon in the 1970s and 1980s.

[Mike Innes]

Marie-Joelle Zahar (Université de Montreal) has done interesting (and largely unpublished) work on the Lebanese Forces and Serb militias which points to the growing role that institutional and economic interests can play in efforts to preserve militia cantons. You might also want to take a peek at my own work on the PLO's management of insurgent-sanctuary relations in Lebanon in the 1970s and 1980s.

Hi Rex

Right on. Zahar's works sounds like a very close match to what Peter Andreas at the Watson Institute/Brown has been working on wrt to clandestine political economies (BiH), the criminalizing consequences of sanctions, embargo busting (Serbia), etc. He's done quite a bit of work on it, outgrowths of the greed and grievance school.

Wrt yours: Sanctuary and Survival! I know it well and have become intimate with it over the years. I've been trying to find a hardcopy that I can call my own, but no luck so far.

[marct]

FYI

Military spies invade anthropology conferences?

The U.S. military is not only interested in employing anthropologists. Now, they have started attending anthropology conferences. Anthropologist Caroline Osella from the University in London and one of the editors of Social Mobility In Kerala, is worried.

Much more here

See also

Final report launched: AAA no longer opposes collaboration with CIA and the military

ASA Globalog category n Counterinsurgency

Marc

[Mike Innes]

Activism is activism, no? If I'm a qualified anthropologist and professional academic committed to objective scholarship, then I shouldn't allow my services or knowledge to be directly deployed through me in a military environment... but I can engage in protest politics at will? My unconsidered, knee-jerk thought is that a lot of this is nothing more than left/right BS, not justifiable concern with ethical and professional standards.

[Beelzebubalicious]

Wait, isn't this big news?

Final report launched: AAA no longer opposes collaboration with CIA and the military

What happened? I suspect that the Anthropology Establishment realized that the military can be a source of employment. I mean, practically, there aren't a whole lot of savages left...the new frontier of savageness is the military! Okay, I'm being tounge and cheek here, but what was the turning point?

[marct]

Wait, isn't this big news?



What happened? I suspect that the Anthropology Establishment realized that the military can be a source of employment. I mean, practically, there aren't a whole lot of savages left...the new frontier of savageness is the military! Okay, I'm being tounge and cheek here, but what was the turning point?

Yes and no - in general, it isn't opposed, but I have yet to find a single specific where it is encouraged . BTW, the HTS is now verbotten.

In the context of a war that is widely recognized as a denial of human rights and based on faulty intelligence and undemocratic principles, the Executive Board sees the HTS project as a problematic application of anthropological expertise, most specifically on ethical grounds. We have grave concerns about the involvement of anthropological knowledge and skill in the HTS project. The Executive Board views the HTS project as an unacceptable application of anthropological expertise.

The Executive Board affirms that anthropology can and in fact is obliged to help improve U.S. government policies through the widest possible circulation of anthropological understanding in the public sphere, so as to contribute to a transparent and informed development and implementation of U.S. policy by robustly democratic processes of fact-finding, debate, dialogue, and deliberation. It is in this way, the Executive Board affirms, that anthropology can legitimately and effectively help guide U.S. policy to serve the humane causes of global peace and social justice.

More here...

[Mike Innes]

Is that this is mostly left/right BS....

In all seriousness - well, not seriousness, since I was serious before, just a bit more measured now - I can understand the concerns in principle, but it strikes me as egregiously short sighted and wrong-headed. It also sets an interesting precedent.

Questions:

How many PhDs are there in government/service?

What's the breakdown by discipline (ie. how many historians, political scientists, sociologists)?

How many professional academics are also military reservists?

How many of those belong to professional or discipline-specific associations?

How have other professional or discipline-specific associations addressed or dealt with this, if it all?

What's the view/position from across the academy? (I include non-social science disciplines here as well - like mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology, engineering, etc.)

What's their view of the AAA's report/position?

How have other disciplines dealt with problems/issues/subjects related to the war? (I'm thinking of, for example, how legal scholars have tangled directly with some very thorny issues).

If one were to survey all of the above on other issues, eg. political belief or patterns of voting behaviour, what would we find in terms of distribution across the disciplines?

Does it matter? In purely academic terms, I'm curious.

Again, I'm looking forward to writing up the HTS study. Someone is sure to be shocked to find that abstractions and ethical concerns of people sitting in offices will only be one part of the story.

[marct]

Gottta say, Mike, they are interesting questions. I don't know if we will ever get the answers to hem, though...

Marc