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The Defenders. Vol. 1, Diamonds are forever
Daredevil! Luke Cage! Jessica Jones! Iron Fist! Individually, these four heroes have been on the front lines of the battle to keep the streets of the city safe and secure! But now, with a deadly enemy from the dim past making a major move to unite the underworld, they will need to become more - they will need to become DEFENDERS!
Book
The nature of peace: trajectories of environmental peacebuilding between dominant narratives and power relations
Peacebuilding initiatives play an important role in the reconstruction of political, economic, and social conditions after internal armed conflicts. If these initiatives also account for environmental aspects, they have the potential to address both ecological damages and resource-related conflict causes. The sprawling literature on environmental peacebuilding therefore stresses the need for a holistic perspective to study conditions for sustainable peace. Recent scholarly work has directed attention to peace trajectories that draw connections between political, socioeconomic, and environmental dimensions of peacebuilding processes. We contribute to this growing research field by synthesizing key findings from the inter-disciplinary research program the “Nature of Peace” and related studies. Our goal is to identify, explain, and understand the trajectories that environmental peacebuilding processes may take in societies after an internal armed conflict. We first introduce the theory-based analytical framework that guided our studies. Based on this, we study trajectories that lead from the integration of environmental concerns in peacebuilding efforts to environmental and social consequences of these efforts and to chances for sustainable peace. We apply this framework to a range of geographical contexts, drawing, inter alia, on Colombia since the signing of the peace agreement in 2016, and environmental peacebuilding efforts in Uganda since 2002. We find that both constellations of power and dominant narratives considerably shape the routes that environmental peacebuilding may take. In particular, dominant nature-neglecting, instrumentalizing, and extractivist narratives have far-reaching impacts on the trajectory of peace processes. This is not only with regard to their environmental implications, e.g., deforestation and biodiversity loss, but also social consequences, e.g., threats to livelihoods of vulnerable communities, and, ultimately, old and new forms of physical, structural, and cultural violence. Thus, although addressing power asymmetries remains an important step for environmental peacebuilding, it is essential to counter narratives that instrumentalize nature to open new alleys for sustainable peace.
Journal Article
Cooperative defense of a territorial-constrained target in a target-attacker-defender game
Multi-player pursuit-evasion games are crucial for addressing the maneuver decision problem arising in the cooperative control of multi-agent systems. This paper presents a cooperative defense strategy involving cooperation and confrontation among the target, attacker, and multiple defenders based on location information only. The primary objective of the attacker is to capture the target while avoiding being captured by multiple defenders. Meanwhile, the target is confined to a restricted area and can only move within its boundaries. The proposed cooperative defense strategy aims to prevent the attacker from capturing the target while minimizing the time required to neutralize the threat. Therefore, the multiple defenders are classified into two categories: the primary defender and the auxiliary defenders. The primary defender is to prevent the attacker from approaching the target by predicting the intention of the attacker. On the other hand, the auxiliary defenders adopt a surround-shrink-capture strategy to reduce the time consumption to capture the attacker. Numerical simulations have been conducted to validate the effectiveness of the proposed strategy.
Journal Article
Attacker-defender models and road network vulnerability
The reliability of road networks depends directly on their vulnerability to disruptive incidents, ranging in severity from minor disruptions to terrorist attacks. This paper presents a game theoretic approach to the analysis of road network vulnerability. The approach posits predefined disruption, attack or failure scenarios and then considers how to use the road network so as to minimize the maximum expected loss in the event of one of these scenarios coming to fruition. A mixed route strategy is adopted, meaning that the use of the road network is determined by the worst scenario probabilities. This is equivalent to risk-averse route choice. A solution algorithm suitable for use with standard traffic assignment software is presented, thereby enabling the use of electronic road navigation networks. A variant of this algorithm suitable for risk-averse assignment is developed. A numerical example relating to the central London road network is presented. The results highlight points of vulnerability in the road network. Applications of this form of network vulnerability analysis together with improved solution methods are discussed.
Journal Article
Assessing and Improving the Operational Resilience of a Large Highway Infrastructure System to Worst-Case Losses
This paper studies the resilience of the regional highway transportation system of the San Francisco Bay Area. Focusing on peak periods for commuter traffic, traffic patterns are computed from a model that includes nonlinear increases in travel times due to congestion and reflects actual travel demands as captured by U.S. Census demographic data. We consider the consequences associated with loss of one or more road, bridge, and/or tunnel segments, where travelers are allowed to reroute to avoid congestion or potentially not travel at all if traffic is bad. We use a sequential game to identify sets of road, bridge, or tunnel segments whose loss results in worst-case travel times. We also demonstrate how the model can be used to quantify the operational resilience of the system, as well as to characterize trade-offs in resilience for different defensive investments, thus providing concise information to guide planners and decision makers.
Journal Article
A NATIONAL STUDY OF ACCESS TO COUNSEL IN IMMIGRATION COURT
Although immigrants have a right to be represented by counsel in immigration court, it has long been the case that the government has no obligation to provide an attorney for those who are unable to afford one. Recently, however, a broad coalition of public figures, scholars, advocates, courts, and philanthropic foundations have begun to push for the establishment of a public defender system for poor immigrants facing deportation. Yet the national debate about appointing defense counsel for immigrants has proceeded with limited information regarding how many immigrants currently obtain attorneys and the efficacy and efficiency of such representation. This Article presents the results of the first national study of access to counsel in United States immigration courts. Drawing on data from over 1.2 million deportation cases decided between 2007 and 2012, we find that only 37% of all immigrants, and a mere 14% of detained immigrants, secured representation. Only 2% of immigrants obtained pro bono representation from nonprofit organizations, law school clinics, or large law firm volunteer programs. Barriers to representation were particularly severe in immigration courts located in rural areas and small cities, where almost one-third of detained cases were adjudicated. Moreover, we find that immigrants with attorneys fared far better: among similarly situated removal respondents, the odds were fifteen times greater that immigrants with representation, as compared to those without, sought relief, and five-and-a-half times greater that they obtained relief from removal. In addition, we show that involvement of counsel was associated with certain gains in court efficiency: represented respondents brought fewer unmeritorious claims, were more likely to be released from custody, and, once released, were more likely to appear at their future deportation hearings. This research provides an essential data-driven understanding of immigration representation that should inform discussions of expanding access to counsel.
Journal Article
Exploring marketing control mechanisms from a strategy perspective
PurposeManagement is constantly looking for ways to show how exactly the competitive advantage can be enhanced to achieve the desired results. As such, control mechanisms that are designed to ensure that the desired results are achieved play an important part in the successful implementation of a business strategy, which is why, in this study, the authors analyze how formal and informal control levels are deduced from the marketing decisions that operationalize the organizational strategy.Design/methodology/approachThe authors conducted a cross-section survey among 301 marketing managers. To determine which types of strategies are prevalent, the authors performed a hierarchical cluster analysis using the IBM SPSS Statistics 24 software and then constructed an ANOVA table to see whether there are differences in the characteristics of the different clusters. To determine the configuration of marketing control across strategy typologies, the authors conducted a mean difference test, aligning marketing control mechanisms with the strategies under study, significantly changing the intensity levels from one to another.FindingsIt is worth emphasizing that higher levels of control are related to prospector strategic business units (SBUs) and that informal control was significantly more prevalent than formal control for all the strategy typologies the authors' studied.Originality/valueThis research provides empirical evidence to gain a better understanding of the role marketing decisions play on formal and informal control mechanisms.
Journal Article
