Stanford University

Measuring Internet Penetration @ Scale: Problems and solutions when measuring internet connectivity in developing countries

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Abstract

The Internet has already changed many aspects of peoples’ lives in developed economies and has provided far-reaching economic and social benefits. Extending these opportunities is critical to accelerating economic and social growth in developing economies as well. Many international organizations have set ambitious plans to promote Internet access globally; they pore over reports and expend considerable money, time and talent exploring new ways to connect the unconnected (e.g., blimps, drones, satellites). But raw enthusiasm and aggregate statistics fail to capture the reality of the digital divide in the developing world. Facebook’s commitment to connecting the developing world includes a desire to understand the complexity of the issue as it relates to the cultural, structural and technological inequalities between and within countries. This approach requires bringing together insights from large number of publicly available data sources that employ different methodologies to understanding the multi-faceted nature of the digital divide, even when the assembled sources of data reach different conclusions.

In this talk, researchers from Facebook will discuss the difficulties and limitations often faced by aggregating numerous country-specific data sources together to measure the extent, cause and consequences of differences in Internet adoption between countries and populations. They will explain how Facebook evaluates the quality of existing publicly available data sources (e.g., national statistics, academic studies and industry reports), aggregates multiple sources to obtain relevant estimates and supplement data “holes” with original data collection efforts. The multi-faceted approach allows Facebook to conduct scalable and comprehensive comparative analyses at multiple levels, which in turn leads to more culturally-sensitive and context-specific approaches for bridging the digital divide.

Speaker Bio

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Lauren Bachan is a quantitative researcher on the Growth Population and Survey Science team at Facebook. Her current research focuses on understanding the social and cultural barriers to Internet use in developing countries. More broadly, she’s interested in how new technologies change social life and are adapted to fit long-standing cultural norms. Lauren received her PhD in Sociology and Demography from Penn State University, where she studied extended family childcare systems in sub-Saharan Africa. Lauren also holds a BA in International Relations from Mount Holyoke College and has previously worked in the fields of international development and market research.

 

 

Wallenberg Hall

Building 160, Room 124, Stanford, CA 94305

Lauren Bachan Growth Research Facebook
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Liberation Technology Seminar Series

Deservingness, Self-interest and the Welfare State

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ABSTRACT

A common assumption in political economy is that voters are self-regarding maximizers of material goods, choosing their preferred level of social spending accordingly. In contrast, students of American politics have emphasized the key role of an other-regarding motive that makes support for social transfers conditional on the perceived deservingness of recipients. The two motives often conflict as large portions of the poor (rich) find recipients undeserving (deserving). I argue that material self-interest overruns perceptions of deservingness when the share of income affected by social transfers is high. Using European data, I show that low (high) income individuals are less (more) likely to be driven by considerations of deservingness. Cross-nationally, the more working-age benefits are evenly spread across income groups, the less deservingness considerations  permeate public debates on welfare state reform.  This framework has important implications for understanding attitudinal change in two high inequality countries, the United States and Great Britain.

 

 

SPEAKER BIO

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Charlotte Cavaille is a research fellow at the Institute of Advanced Studies in Toulouse. She received a PhD in Government and Social Policy from Harvard University in November 2014. Her work examines changes in mass attitudes toward redistributive policies in advanced capitalist countries. Her dissertation focuses on the disconnect between rising income inequality and stable levels of support for income redistribution in Great Britain and the United States. Some of her findings have been published in the Journal of Politics.

Deservingness, Self-interest and the Welfare State
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Charlotte Cavaille Research Fellow, Institute of Advanced Studies in Toulous Research Fellow, Institute of Advanced Studies in Toulous
Seminars

Conflict and Crisis: Implications of Ongoing Human Rights Violations in Syria

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**To RSVP, please email Jessie Brunner at jbrunner@stanford.edu.**

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Abstract

As the protracted and chaotic conflict in Syria continues into its fifth year, Syrians of all backgrounds are being subjected to gross human rights violations. A growing number of parties to the conflict, including the Government and the Islamic State, display disregard for international legal conventions and employ tactics such as sexual violence, murder, and torture that have resulted in mass civilian casualties, large-scale displacement, and the destruction of Syria’s cultural heritage.

Peter Bouckaert

Peter Bouckaert is Human Rights Watch’s emergencies director, coordinating the organization’s response to major wars and other human rights crises. A Belgian-born Stanford Law School graduate, Bouckaert has conducted fact-finding missions around the world, including currently documenting Syrian refugees in Europe.

Sareta Ashraph

Sareta Ashraph specializes in international criminal, humanitarian, and human rights law and has served since 2012 as the Senior Analyst on the UN Commission of Inquiry on the Syrian Arab Republic, investigating and reporting on violations of international law in the context of ongoing events in Syria.

To RSVP, please email Jessie Brunner at jbrunner@stanford.edu.

Peter Bouckaert Director, Emergencies, Human Rights Watch
Sareta Ashraph Senior Analyst, UN Commission of Inquiry on the Syrian Arab Republic
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Intelligence in the Cyber Age: (r)Evolution?

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- This event is offered as a joint sponsorship with the Hoover Institution - 

 

Abstract: Writing on matters relating to the cyber era dominate government and academia alike.  Much of the focus tends to be on either the technical aspects or questions about cyber threats and warfare. Much less attention has been on the advent of the cyber era for the intelligence community. While there can be no doubt that the technological age in which we find ourselves today is new, there is a related question about the extent to which it has changed the work of the intelligence community. This talk argues that to find an answer, it is imperative to consider previous technological revolutions and consider how the intelligence community adapted. Only by doing so is it possible to address the issue of whether intelligence is the cyber era is a revolution or evolution.

About the Speaker: Professor Michael S. Goodman is a Professor in ‘Intelligence and International Affairs’ in the Department of War Studies, King's College London.  He has published widely in the field of intelligence history, including most recently The Official History of the Joint Intelligence Committee, Volume I: From the Approach of the Second World War to the Suez Crisis (Routledge, 2014), which was chosen as one of The Spectator’s books of the year.  He is series editor for ‘Intelligence and Security’ for Hurst/Columbia University Press and is a member of the editorial boards for five journals, including the three main intelligence ones. He is currently on secondment to the Cabinet Office where he is the Official Historian of the Joint Intelligence Committee.

Michael Goodman Professor in Intelligence and International Affairs Speaker King's College London
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Criss-crossing Red Lines in the South China Sea: The Destroyer, the Court, and the Future

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Last Tuesday in the hotly contested South China Sea (SCS), ignoring fierce objections coming from China, the American guided-missile destroyer USS Lassen cruised within 12 nautical miles of Subi and Mischief Reefs.   One day later, in The Hague, the Permanent Court of Arbitration ruled unanimously that it does have jurisdiction over a “suit” brought by the Philippines against China regarding China’s claims in the SCS.  The court must now approve or reject Manila’s position that Beijing’s (in)famous “nine-dash line” (actually now a ten-dash line) is incompatible with the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea—that the line is, in effect, illegal under international law.  The court must also adjudicate Manila’s additional request for rulings on the status of certain land features in the SCS that are controlled by Beijing.  Beijing’s efforts to prevent the maritime penetration and the judicial judgment have failed.

Will these events be remembered as having marked the start of a Sino-American Cold War II?  What do they imply for China’s relations with the five other parties that claim land features and/or sea space there, i.e. Brunei, Malaysia, Philippines, Taiwan, and Vietnam?  Was the US wrong to have breached China’s red lines and the court also wrong to have accepted jurisdiction?  Why?  Why not?  And how will these events impact the imminent Association of Southeast Asian Nations Summit and Related Summits, as well as the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation Leaders Meeting—gatherings to be held, respectively, in Kuala Lumpur and Manila between 18 and 22 November?

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Donald K. Emmerson is a Senior Fellow Emeritus in the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI).  At Stanford he also works with the Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law and the Abbasi Program in Islamic Studies.  His latest writing on the SCS is “Reading between the Lines: China & the South China Sea,” CSIS cogitASIA [Washington, DC], 21 July 2015, http://cogitasia.com/reading-between-the-lines-china-the-south-china-sea/.  Before coming to Stanford, he taught at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.  His degrees are from Yale (Phd) and Princeton (BA).

Donald K. Emmerson

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Senior Fellow Emeritus at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies
Affiliated Faculty, CDDRL
Affiliated Scholar, Abbasi Program in Islamic Studies
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At Stanford, in addition to his work for the Southeast Asia Program and his affiliations with CDDRL and the Abbasi Program in Islamic Studies, Donald Emmerson has taught courses on Southeast Asia in East Asian Studies, International Policy Studies, and Political Science. He is active as an analyst of current policy issues involving Asia. In 2010 the National Bureau of Asian Research and the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars awarded him a two-year Research Associateship given to “top scholars from across the United States” who “have successfully bridged the gap between the academy and policy.”

Emmerson’s research interests include Southeast Asia-China-US relations, the South China Sea, and the future of ASEAN. His publications, authored or edited, span more than a dozen books and monographs and some 200 articles, chapters, and shorter pieces.  Recent writings include The Deer and the Dragon: Southeast Asia and China in the 21st Century (ed., 2020); “‘No Sole Control’ in the South China Sea,” in Asia Policy  (2019); ASEAN @ 50, Southeast Asia @ Risk: What Should Be Done? (ed., 2018); “Singapore and Goliath?,” in Journal of Democracy (2018); “Mapping ASEAN’s Futures,” in Contemporary Southeast Asia (2017); and “ASEAN Between China and America: Is It Time to Try Horsing the Cow?,” in Trans-Regional and –National Studies of Southeast Asia (2017).

Earlier work includes “Sunnylands or Rancho Mirage? ASEAN and the South China Sea,” in YaleGlobal (2016); “The Spectrum of Comparisons: A Discussion,” in Pacific Affairs (2014); “Facts, Minds, and Formats: Scholarship and Political Change in Indonesia” in Indonesian Studies: The State of the Field (2013); “Is Indonesia Rising? It Depends” in Indonesia Rising (2012); “Southeast Asia: Minding the Gap between Democracy and Governance,” in Journal of Democracy (April 2012); “The Problem and Promise of Focality in World Affairs,” in Strategic Review (August 2011); An American Place at an Asian Table? Regionalism and Its Reasons (2011); Asian Regionalism and US Policy: The Case for Creative Adaptation (2010); “The Useful Diversity of ‘Islamism’” and “Islamism: Pros, Cons, and Contexts” in Islamism: Conflicting Perspectives on Political Islam (2009); “Crisis and Consensus: America and ASEAN in a New Global Context” in Refreshing U.S.-Thai Relations (2009); and Hard Choices: Security, Democracy, and Regionalism in Southeast Asia (edited, 2008).

Prior to moving to Stanford in 1999, Emmerson was a professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he won a campus-wide teaching award. That same year he helped monitor voting in Indonesia and East Timor for the National Democratic Institute and the Carter Center. In the course of his career, he has taken part in numerous policy-related working groups focused on topics related to Southeast Asia; has testified before House and Senate committees on Asian affairs; and been a regular at gatherings such as the Asia Pacific Roundtable (Kuala Lumpur), the Bali Democracy Forum (Nusa Dua), and the Shangri-La Dialogue (Singapore). Places where he has held various visiting fellowships, including the Institute for Advanced Study and the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. 



Emmerson has a Ph.D. in political science from Yale and a BA in international affairs from Princeton. He is fluent in Indonesian, was fluent in French, and has lectured and written in both languages. He has lesser competence in Dutch, Javanese, and Russian. A former slam poet in English, he enjoys the spoken word and reads occasionally under a nom de plume with the Not Yet Dead Poets Society in Redwood City, CA. He and his wife Carolyn met in high school in Lebanon. They have two children. He was born in Tokyo, the son of U.S. Foreign Service Officer John K. Emmerson, who wrote the Japanese Thread among other books.

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Director, Southeast Asia Program, Shorenstein APARC
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Biomedical Innovation in Japan - Creating Environment for Innovative Research

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Kan Suzuki holds professorships at both the Graduate School of Public Policy at The University of Tokyo and the Graduate School of Media and Governance at Keio University. He has also served as a visiting researcher at the University of Sydney, part-time lecturer in policy studies at Chuo University and associate professor at Keio University’s Faculty of Environment and Information Studies.

Mr. Suzuki received his bachelor’s degree in law from The University of Tokyo in 1986 and worked at Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI). After leaving METI, he was a member of Japan’s House of Councilors for 12 years. He served two terms as senior vice minister of Japan's Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT), and is currently an executive committee member of the Japan Football Association.

Mr. Suzuki’s publications include “Advice on Deliberation Processes” (2013), “Policy Formulation Process in Japan’s Central Government” (1999) and “The Birth of the Voluntary Economy” (1998).
 
 
RSVP Required

 

Agenda
4:15pm: Doors open
4:30pm-5:30pm: Lecture, followed by discussion
5:30pm-6:00pm: Networking

 

For more information about the Silicon Valley-New Japan Project please visit: http://www.stanford-svnj.org/

 

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Philippines Conference RoomEncina Hall, 3rd Floor616 Serra StStanford, CA 94305
Kan Suzuki, Professor, University of Tokyo and Keio University
Seminars
Stanford Silicon Valley-New Japan Project

Syria today, Syria tomorrow: Politics, security, and society

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Abstract:

The Syrian crisis continues to grind on without a viable settlement to the conflict in sight. The problems spurred by the crisis, from refugees to extremist groups, have become a tangible concern for the West, not just Middle Eastern countries. Meanwhile, from Russia to Iran to Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Qatar, several countries have turned Syria into a political and military playground. The lack of strategy to end the conflict on part of the USA, Europe, and the United Nations has paved the way for those state and non-state actors to increase the scope of their actions in Syria. The continuation of this dynamic can only mean further instability across the Middle East and beyond.

This talk links the international relations, security, and social dimensions of the Syrian conflict to address how and why the crisis has reached the level it is at today, with a focus on the role of external stakeholders as well as of rising extremist groups. It will reflect on how a settlement to the conflict might be reached and what the implications of a settlement would be for the Middle East.

Bio:

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Lina Khatib is a Senior Research Associate with the Arab Reform Initiative. She was formerly the director of the Carnegie Middle East Center in Beirut and before that a co-founder of the Program on Arab Reform and Democracy at Stanford University’s Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law. Her research focuses on the international relations of the Middle East, Islamist groups, and foreign policy. She has written extensively on Syria over the past two years, especially on armed groups like the Islamic State, and has also published seven books including Taking to the Streets: The Transformation of Arab Activism, an edited collection (with Ellen Lust; Johns Hopkins University Press, 2014) based on work produced by CDDRL’s Program on Arab Reform and Democracy. She is also a Research Associate at SOAS, University of London.

 

This event is sponsored by CDDRL's Program on Arab Reform and Democracy.

 

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CISAC Central Conference Room
Encina Hall, 2nd Floor
616 Serra St
Stanford, CA 94305

Lina Khatib Arab Reform Initiative
Seminars

Is there a future for the EU? Europe After the Euro Crisis

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Abstract

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Professor Sergio Fabbrini will present highlights from his most recent book Which European Union? Europe After the Euro Crisis. He puts forward an argument for interpreting the European Union (EU) from a comparative perspective. The aim is to bring Stein Rokkan to Brussels, that is to interpret the structuring and functioning of the EU according to the basic analytical concepts of the literature on comparative politics. Which European Union? not only repositions the EU in a comparative context, but also conceptually innovates the tool-kit of comparative politics. Based on a reinterpretation of the literature on comparative federalism, the book conceptualizes two species of the ‘federal political system’ genus, i.e. federal states arising from the disaggregation of previously unitary states and federal unions arising from the aggregation of previously independent states.

 

Speaker Bio

sergio fabbrini photo personal2
Sergio Fabbrini is Director of the School of Government and Professor of Political Science and International Relations at the LUISS Guido Carli University of Rome, where he holds the Jean Monnet Chair. He is also Recurrent Visiting Professor of Comparative Politics at the Department of Political Science and Institute of Governmental Studies, University of California at Berkeley. He has published fourteen books, two co-authored books and fourteen edited or co-edited books. His most recent publications in English include Compound Democracies: Why the United States and Europe Are Becoming Similar, 2nd edn (2010) and America and Its Critics: Vices and Virtues of the Democratic Hyperpower (2008).

 

This event is hosted by the Bill Lane Center for the American West and co-sponsored by the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law. 

 

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Sergio Fabbrini LUISS Guido Carli University of Rome LUISS Guido Carli University of Rome
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Catching Up, Forging Ahead, and Falling Behind in Southeast Asia: The Abramovitz Hypothesis Revisited

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Co-sponsored by the Stanford Center for International Development

In 1986 then-Stanford professor Moses Abramovitz argued in a seminal article that all countries that are relatively backward in their levels of productivity had the potential for rapid advance, and indeed could quickly catch up with the leading economies if they could realize that potential. Their ability to catch up was to a large extent determined by their “social capability.” Although a number of European economies and Japan had narrowed the productivity gap with the USA in the post-1950 era, few low or middle income economies had managed to do this. Prof. Booth will examine the record inside Southeast Asia, where the gap in per capita GDP between Singapore and Malaysia compared with the region’s other economies has not narrowed much since 1960, and compared with some of them has actually widened. A particular puzzle concerns the Philippines, which was well ahead on most economic and social indicators in 1960 compared with Thailand and Indonesia, but fell behind over the ensuing 50+ years. Prof. Booth will explore the reasons for this.

anne booth
Anne Booth has been an Asia-focused professor of economics in the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, since 1991. She studies the modern economic history of Southeast Asia with emphasis on the 20th century. Her many writings in this field include Colonial Legacies: Economic and Social Development in East and Southeast Asia. Her latest book, Economic Change in Modern Indonesia, is due from Cambridge University Press in April. Before coming to SOAS, she held research and teaching positions in Singapore and Australia. Her degrees are from Victoria University of Wellington (BA) and the Australian National University (PhD). Before 1991 she held research and teaching positions in Singapore and Australia. She grew up in New Zealand.

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Anne Booth 2015-16 NUS-Stanford Lee Kong Chian Distinguished Fellow on Southeast Asia, Stanford University
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Jihad as Grand Strategy: Islamist Militancy, National Security, and the Pakistani State

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Abstract: This book seeks to understand the connection between Pakistan and Islamist militancy. The book argues that, since Pakistan’s founding in 1947, it has used religiously motivated non-state actors as strategic tools to compensate for acute political and material weakness. Over time, this policy has become so important as to constitute a central pillar of Pakistani grand strategy. Contrary to conventional wisdom, Pakistan’s militant strategy has not been wholly disastrous. Over the decades, it has achieved important domestic and international successes, helping Pakistan to strengthen its domestic political foundations, confront stronger adversaries, undermine South Asia’s territorial status quo, and shape the strategic environment in Afghanistan. Recently, however, these successes have given way to severe problems, as Pakistan has lost control of its proxies, been forced to make damaging resource tradeoffs, and risked inciting catastrophic war with an increasingly powerful India. These problems undermine regional stability and threaten the survival of the Pakistani state. The weakness that originally made Pakistan’s militant strategy useful has now made support for militancy extremely dangerous. If Pakistan does not abandon its strategy of jihad it may face catastrophe.

About the Speaker: S. Paul Kapur is Professor in the Department of National Security Affairs at the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School. He is also an Affiliate at Stanford University’s Center for International Security and Cooperation, and a Visiting Fellow at the Observer Research Foundation in New Delhi. Previously, he was on the faculties of the U.S. Naval War College and Claremont McKenna College, and was a visiting professor at Stanford University’s Center for International Security and Cooperation. His research and teaching interests include the strategic use of militancy, nuclear weapons proliferation, deterrence, and South Asian and Pacific Ocean regional security. Kapur is author of Dangerous Deterrent: Nuclear Weapons Proliferation and Conflict in South Asia (Stanford University Press, 2007) and co-author of India, Pakistan, and the Bomb: Debating Nuclear Stability in South Asia (Columbia University Press, 2010). His articles have appeared in leading journals such as International Security, Security Studies, Asian Survey, Washington Quarterly, and in a variety of edited volumes. Kapur manages several strategic engagement projects for the U.S. Department of Defense. He received his Ph.D. in political science from the University of Chicago and his B.A. from Amherst College.

Professor in the Department of National Security Affairs U.S. Naval Postgraduate School
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