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Book
Crossing the Digital Divide: Applying Technology to the Global Refugee Crisis
Authors: --- --- --- ---
ISBN: 1977403883 9781977403889 1977403956 Year: 2019 Publisher: Santa Monica, Calif. RAND Corporation

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Abstract

In the past two decades, the global population of forcibly displaced people has more than doubled, from 34 million in 1997 to 71 million in 2018. Amid this growing crisis, refugees and the organizations that assist them have turned to technology as an important resource, and technology can and should play an important role in solving problems in humanitarian settings. In this report, the authors analyze technology uses, needs, and gaps, as well as opportunities for better using technology to help displaced people and improving the operations of responding agencies. The authors also examine inherent ethical, security, and privacy considerations; explore barriers to the successful deployment of technology; and outline some tools for building a more systematic approach to such deployment. The study approach included a literature review, semi-structured interviews with stakeholders, and focus groups with displaced people in Colombia, Greece, Jordan, and the United States. The authors provide several recommendations for more strategically using and developing technology in humanitarian settings.


Book
Russia, NATO, and Black Sea security
Authors: --- --- --- --- --- et al.
Year: 2020 Publisher: Santa Monica, Calif. RAND Corporation

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The Black Sea region is a central locus of the competition between Russia and the West for the future of Europe. The region experienced two decades of simmering conflicts even before Moscow's illegal annexation of Crimea in 2014, and Russia has used military force against countries in the region four times since 2008. The Kremlin is seeking to establish a sphere of privileged influence over countries in the region and limit their integration into Euro-Atlantic structures while enhancing Russia's regime stability and improving military capabilities for homeland defense and wider power projection into the Eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East. Despite this instability and conflict, U.S. and European officials and analysts have not given nearly as much attention to the region's security challenges as they have to those in Northern Europe. In this report, the authors first assess how Russia is employing a variety of nonmilitary and military instruments to advance its goals. They then consider how the three North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) allies (Bulgaria, Romania, and Turkey) and five NATO partners (Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Moldova, and Ukraine) in the Black Sea region perceive and are responding to Russia's activities and where those countries' interests align and diverge. Finally, the authors identify possible elements of a Western strategy to protect mutual interests, counter Russian malign influence and aggression, and foster regional stability.


Book
The Risk-Mitigation Value of the Transportation Worker Identification Credential: A Comprehensive Security Assessment of the TWIC Program
Authors: --- --- --- --- --- et al.
Year: 2020 Publisher: Santa Monica, Calif. RAND Corporation

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The Transportation Worker Identification Credential (TWIC®) is one of multiple measures that the Maritime Transportation Security Act (MTSA) introduced to enhance security at U.S. ports. Anyone with unescorted access to a secure area at an MTSA-regulated facility, vessel, or outer continental shelf (OCS) facility must have a TWIC. Congress established TWIC to help prevent transportation security incidents. TWIC's primary function is to establish that the holder has passed a Transportation Security Administration (TSA) security threat assessment (STA); the TWIC card can also serve as identification. Each secure area at each regulated location must maintain an access control program and verify three things at every access point: identity, presence and validity of the TWIC card, and whether the person has a business purpose at that facility. Currently, facilities are required only to conduct visual verification of the TWIC card, either at each time of entry or at time of enrollment into a facility physical access control system (PACS). A pending regulation, which we call the TWIC-reader rule, would require that any high-risk facility electronically inspect the card and, using biometrics, match it to the holder. The governing legislation requires that an assessment of TWIC determine the program's value in mitigating the risk of terrorism and crime at ports. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security commissioned the Homeland Security Operational Analysis Center to complete that comprehensive assessment. In this report, the authors establish factors that increase or decrease TWIC's security value and determine what TWIC's value would need to be to offset the costs of establishing further access control requirements for facilities.

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Book
Turkey's nationalist course : implications for the U.S.-Turkish strategic partnership and the U.S. Army
Authors: --- --- --- --- --- et al.
Year: 2020 Publisher: Santa Monica, Calif. RAND Corporation

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For more than six decades, the United States has maintained a strategic partnership with the Republic of Turkey as a key element of U.S. strategy in Eurasia and the Middle East. This partnership was forged at the outset of the Cold War to check Soviet expansionism, and Turkey remains a powerful North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) ally at the nexus of three regions important to U.S. security. The United States and Turkey have long cooperated on a range of global issues, including countering terrorism and violent extremism, enhancing energy security, and promoting prosperity and development. However, the partnership has become strained in recent years because U.S. and Turkish interests and assessments of various challenges are not as aligned as they once were, and significant disagreements have emerged on policies to address many of these challenges. Tensions in Turkey's relations with Europe and other neighbors have exacerbated these strains. In this report, RAND researchers assess the key challenges confronting the U.S.-Turkish partnership over the coming decade and recommend possible initiatives to sustain it during what is likely to be a turbulent period. The researchers focus on the political, social, and economic trends that are changing Turkey's internal dynamics and global interests; explore Turkey's changing relations with key neighbors and partners; and compare how Turkey's interests and those of its neighbors and partners converge, diverge, or are in conflict. Finally, the researchers assess the implications of these trends for Turkey's future course, U.S. defense planning, and the U.S. Army.


Book
Opportunities for all : mutually beneficial opportunities for Syrians and host countries in Middle Eastern labor markets

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The Syrian Civil War has displaced 60 percent of the country's population. Six million refugees live in neighboring countries in the Middle East. Such a large refugee influx has been a severe strain to these countries' labor markets, public services, and social cohesion. This RAND report examines the problems of and opportunities for the labor market for displaced Syrians in Turkey, Jordan, and Lebanon. The authors used multiple methods: interviews with stakeholders, focus groups with Syrian and host country workers, in-depth interviews with firms, and surveys of firms and Syrian households. The existing skill sets of the Syrians are compared to the needs of each country's labor market; and the steps needed to improve the overall economic climate and strategies for preserving and improving social cohesion of refugees and host communities are examined. Each country has its specific challenges. For example, in Turkey a key barrier for the refugees was the ability to speak the language. In Jordan and Lebanon, the existing economic slowdowns and lack of jobs were exacerbated by the arrival of the refugees. Working legally was a challenge in all countries. The authors conclude with recommendations tailored to each country. Some of these include offering language classes (in the case of Turkey); assessing geographic areas where jobs are needed and enabling migrants to move to these regions; improving each country's worker certification process so that qualified migrants can get jobs within their area of expertise; investing in infrastructure projects and better training courses; and improving the business environment for all.


Book
Tailoring medical standards for Air Force personnel

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Service members must meet medical standards set by the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) to ensure that they are fit to serve in the U.S. military. However, the individual services establish additional standards for specific career field categories. To meet critical skill needs in the future, the U.S. Air Force is interested in better ways to assess and align personnel to career fields. Part of that interest focuses on tailoring medical standards to meet the needs of highly technical career fields with fewer physical demands. Tailoring medical standards involves the systematic development of alternative standards (or tests) or exemptions for one or more medical conditions for individuals or groups of individuals who otherwise meet all other requirements for military service. Although tailoring medical standards may help the Air Force and specific career fields meet manpower requirements, such changes may not be uniformly supported across the Air Force. Given these concerns, the Air Force is exploring alternative ways to assess and align personnel to career fields and jobs using medical standards, such as weight and hearing. As part of this project, the authors examined potential barriers in Air Force culture that could affect the successful implementation of tailored medical standards. This report describes the analysis of these barriers, which could limit the effectiveness of any effort to tailor medical standards. The survey also addressed perceptions related to other medical conditions (such as asthma or depression) and potential uses for genetic testing.


Book
Manpower alternatives to enhance total force capabilities : could new forms of reserve service help alleviate military shortfalls?

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Changes in employment stability, family structure, and economic pressures since the development of the U.S. military reserve component (RC) in the twentieth century have created challenges and opportunities for how the RC is used. Sustaining an operational RC demands committed reservists and guardsmen, and since, at present, the population is not meeting that demand under traditional models, the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) has begun to look for ways to access and retain ready participants under alternative programs. Modified assumptions about Reserve duty have the potential to improve RC member recruitment, performance, development, and retention in critical occupational fields — and it could stem projected manpower losses or provide alternative service options in fields with highly competitive civilian industries. The research team employs an iterative, qualitative analytical process to develop a list of possible workforce constructs aimed at enhancing innovation in U.S. military personnel processes. The findings in this report will be relevant and applicable primarily to U.S. military leaders and U.S. government policymakers. The authors provide specific recommendations and more general analysis that will be immediately applicable in developing and administering programs to facilitate access to civilian human capital to help meet DoD's most pressing requirements. This research will also be applicable to broader U.S. academic and policymaking communities that seek to understand how organizations are adapting to changes in the workforce and labor market.

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