The Hague Centre for Strategic Studies

Despite major advances in environmental security research, non-experimental observations typically rely on methods that retrieve or validate specific linkages, rather than uncovering broader causal mechanisms underlying environmentally driven armed conflict. This article demonstrates how recent advances in causal methodology can be applied to more comprehensively retrieve and validate a network of such linkages. By retrieving a more integrated causal structure of pathways from environmental variables to conflict activity, we offer a novel methodological perspective on how causal relationships among environmental, demographic, agricultural and armed conflict variables can be identified, and how associated causal hypotheses can be tested. To uncover these pathways and infer causal effects of natural conditions on conflict activity, we apply this methodology to non-experimental observations of armed conflict across Iraqi subdistricts. Our findings support the hypotheses that latent energy and soil moisture indirectly cause conflict activity. While confirming that armed conflict is positively mediated by population density, the results do not support the hypothesis that wheat production negatively mediates conflict. Finally, we discuss our methodological approach, clarify its limitations, propose future research directions, and consider the implications for evidence-based policy interventions.

In a landscape of ever-changing geopolitics and geoeconomics, Asia has stably positioned itself at the centre of global affairs, both in terms of economic relevance and up-and-coming military powers (Girardi et al. in Getting Them on Board: Partners and Avenues for European Engagement in Indo-Pacific Maritime Security, 2024). Geographically far removed from the centre of action, European states have been observing the developments of Asian powers and are now eager to play a role in the dynamics of this intriguing region. Despite the distance, Europe’s connections to Asia are stronger than ever. Europeans are top investors in the region and in 2022, over one-third of European imports came from the Asia. Together, the EU and the Indo-Pacific hold over 70% of the global trade in goods and services (Krentz, 2023). Additionally, European states have steadily increased their presence in the region through freedom of navigation operations, capacity building and infrastructure projects, and diplomatic missions (Girardi et al. in Getting Them on Board: Partners and Avenues for European Engagement in Indo-Pacific Maritime Security, 2024; Van Hooft et al. in Guarding the Maritime Commons | What role for Europe in the Indo-Pacific, 2022). This chapter proposes and in-depth exploration of Europe’s view on the region, giving particular attention to the position of South and Southeast Asian nations. Several European states, such as Germany, the Netherlands, and France, as well as the EU itself, have published Indo-Pacific strategies in which guidelines to European engagement are provided. However, there is little in-depth public policy that establishes a clear European perspective on active cooperation venues; and the little policy available has so far focused on countries such as Australia, Japan, and South Korea. Therefore, this chapter aims at taking a closer look not only at the European view on the region, but also at the role of South and Southeast Asian nations in it.

Western governments have adopted an assortment of counter-hybrid threat measures to defend against hostile actions below the conventional military threshold. The impact of these measures is unclear because of the ambiguity of hybrid threats, their cross-domain nature, and uncertainty about how countermeasures shape adversarial behavior. This paper offers a novel approach to clarifying this impact by unifying previously bifurcating hybrid threat modeling methods through a (multi-agent) influence diagram framework. The model balances the costs of countermeasures, their ability to dissuade the adversary from executing hybrid threats, and their potential to mitigate the impact of hybrid threats. We run 1000 semi-synthetic variants of a real-world-inspired scenario simulating the strategic interaction between attacking agent A and defending agent B over a cyberattack on critical infrastructure to explore the effectiveness of a set of five different counter-hybrid threat measures. Counter-hybrid measures range from strengthening resilience and denial of the adversary’s ability to execute a hybrid threat to dissuasion through the threat of punishment. Our analysis primarily evaluates the overarching characteristics of counter-hybrid threat measures. This approach allows us to generalize the effectiveness of these measures and examine parameter impact sensitivity. In addition, we discuss policy relevance and outline future research avenues.

This article examines the substance and mechanisms of Chinese nationalism. It does so by probing the boundaries of the permissible in online discourse, and explaining how the uncompromising emotions expressed online interrelate with the patriotic messages that the government espouses. The party's obsession with maintaining social stability stems from a profound fear of the people demanding freedoms it cannot give. With a stagnating economy, China under Xi Jinping (习近平) has doubled down on the repression and propaganda levers. This means that constructing external enemies and keeping down projected traitors is deemed key. Yet a scenario where government censors, digital cheerleaders, or the covert police state are no longer able to “cool popular emotions” is no inconceivable possibility, and would mean a challenge to the Chinese Communist Party's rule that is entirely of its own making.

The Netherlands is highly reliant on international investment and trade and is one of the most attractive destinations for foreign direct investment (FDI) worldwide. Until the beginning of the twentieth century, Dutch policymakers approached the economic and national security spheres as largely separate realms. But over the past two decades, FDI in critical infrastructure has become a national security issue. By the early 2020s, the Dutch government had created the legal and institutional framework and the necessary policy instruments to assess and address the potential risks associated with FDI. This chapter examines the evolution of Dutch perceptions and policies towards FDI in critical infrastructure and critical economic sectors. The first section surveys the size and scope of FDI in the Dutch economy. The second section reviews key developments that have affected Dutch government policies vis-à-vis FDI and assesses contemporary risk perceptions. The third section describes the existing policy framework for FDI screening in the Netherlands. The conclusion identifies the main takeaways and reflects on what these imply for the future.

This study proposes a generalized nth-order perturbation method based on (isogeometric) boundary element methods for uncertainty analysis in 3D acoustic scattering problems. In this paper, for the first time, we derive nth-order Taylor expansions of 3D acoustic boundary integral equations, taking incident wave frequency as a random input variable. In addition, subdivision surface basis functions used in geometric modeling are employed to discretize the generalized nth-order derivative boundary integral equations, in order to avoid cumbersome meshing procedure and retain geometric accuracy. Moreover, the fast multipole method is introduced to accelerate the stochastic perturbation analysis with boundary element methods. Numerical examples are given to demonstrate the accuracy and efficiency of the proposed uncertainty quantification algorithm.

Causality is increasingly integrated into decision-making processes. Often, the goal is to optimize over causal interventions to achieve specific policy objectives. However, research into causal optimization has bifurcated into either the online optimization of interventions in causal models or the offline optimization of decision rules in causal influence diagrams. This paper introduces an approximate method for offline optimizing interventions in arbitrary hybrid Bayesian networks using observational data. The optimization problem is approached by compiling discretized Bayesian networks as binary decision diagrams, whereafter running interventional queries is very efficient. This efficiency is exploited by running heuristic optimization algorithms to optimize over the interventional queries. By running experiments on a variety of large hybrid Bayesian networks, we demonstrate the practical utility of our method and discuss policy relevance.

“Ethical auditing” is regarded as a new device for monitoring the behaviour of firms and governments. the best known example is the EU-guideline for eco-auditing which aims a monitoring compliance with “voluntary” environmental protection standards. Unlike eco-auditing which covers firms, “women's auditing” focuses on national budgets and the behaviour of governments. It is assumed that checking revenue and expenditure item-by-item gives a clearer picture about discrimination than merely looking at tax legislation or sectoral budgets. the first country where women's auditing became institutionalised was South Africa, quickly followed by Australia, Canada, and the labour government in the UK. The paper will give a descriptive analysis of women's budgets. It attempts to clarify in how far item-by-item monitoring does indeed help to overcome the specific asymmetric information problem at stake: Asymmetric information here, takes on the form of governments claiming that budgets are gender-neutral. the high individual search costs for getting access to budget proposals before they pass parliament in combination with the generally low representation of women in parliaments defines a formidable threshold for women. A further question to be addressed is whether or not an institution such as women's auditing can be an effective device in situations in which consumer/voters’ interest are hard to organise.

Building on the advances that have been made in data analytics and machine learning, there is a push to achieve data centricity; that is, to move away from the application centric (stove piped) mind-set that has dominated our thinking and solutions for decades, to a situation where we put data at the centre of our Consultation, Command and Control (C3). This offers the possibility for users to embrace data driven decision making, with the aim of facilitating more accurate and more timely decisions. On top of this, at least in the commercial world, we are seeing a shift to a more distributed approach where data exploitation is carried out 'in the business' rather than by dedicated specialist central teams, thus empowering those closest to the problem to mine data to build situational awareness, courses of actions and reach decisions relevant to their part of the business. This current paper examines how some of the advances in the commercial world, particularly in the area of composable, self-service application delivery, can be applied to the situation of military command and control applications, providing a first answer to the questions of how might Data-Centric C3 (DCC3) differ from today's norms across the people, organisation, technology, data and funding dimensions. It argues that the data layer is the 'special sauce' that provides seamless integration and enabled Multi-Domain Operations. The paper acknowledges that this will represent a radical shift in how we do things, what skills we will require, etc. While it may be possible to evolve our current systems to the new paradigm, procurement process, funding mechanisms and such will require revolutionary approaches. This paper was originally presented at the NATO Science and Technology Organization Symposium (ICMCIS) organized by the Information Systems Technology (IST) Panel, IST-200RSY-the ICMCIS, held in Skopje, North Macedonia, 16-17 May 2023.

Contrary to detailed work on deterrence by punishment, Western strategic thought about denial and its effects is conceptually muddled at the expense of effective strategy-making. This article seeks to reconceptualize denial and rethink its emotional effects. It defines denial as a strategy aimed at frustrating the adversary’s military power and proposes four different denial logics: capability elimination, operational paralysis, tactical degradation, and strategic effect reduction. It then turns to the effects through which these denial logics generate favorable consequences, and singles out the emotions of despondency, resignation, fear, and disappointment as the key factors that mediate their impact. The article offers a framework that can help guide further theoretical reflection and empirical research, as well as inform the development of policies and strategies in today’s world.

Causality has been a burgeoning field of research leading to the point where the literature abounds with different components addressing distinct parts of causality. For researchers, it has been increasingly difficult to discern the assumptions they have to abide by in order to glean sound conclusions from causal concepts or methods. This paper aims to disambiguate the different causal concepts that have emerged in causal inference and causal discovery from observational data by attributing them to different levels of Pearl’s Causal Hierarchy. We will provide the reader with a comprehensive arrangement of assumptions necessary to engage in causal reasoning at the desired level of the hierarchy. Therefore, the assumptions underlying each of these causal concepts will be emphasized and their concomitant graphical components will be examined. We show which assumptions are necessary to bridge the gaps between causal discovery, causal identification and causal inference from a parametric and a non-parametric perspective. Finally, this paper points to further research areas related to the strong assumptions that researchers have glibly adopted to take part in causal discovery, causal identification and causal inference.

Causality has been a burgeoning field of research leading to the point where the literature abounds with different components addressing distinct parts of causality. For researchers, it has been increasingly difficult to discern the assumptions they have to abide by in order to glean sound conclusions from causal concepts or methods. This paper aims to disambiguate the different causal concepts that have emerged in causal inference and causal discovery from observational data by attributing them to different levels of Pearl's Causal Hierarchy. We will provide the reader with a comprehensive arrangement of assumptions necessary to engage in causal reasoning at the desired level of the hierarchy. Therefore, the assumptions underlying each of these causal concepts will be emphasized and their concomitant graphical components will be examined. We show which assumptions are necessary to bridge the gaps between causal discovery, causal identification and causal inference from a parametric and a non-parametric perspective. Finally, this paper points to further research areas related to the strong assumptions that researchers have glibly adopted to take part in causal discovery, causal identification and causal inference.

In a significant survey article published in the American Economic Review ten years ago, Leopoldo Solís could regret, not without justification, the lack of a serious tradition of empirical economics research in Mexico. There was no lack of well-trained and creative applied economists; but they were often engaged, then as now, in political action or public administration. Meanwhile, academic economists were engaged in the transmission of received theory (usually foreign) without reference to the realidad nacional or else in vague generalizations. However, the recent bibliographical survey by the Colegio de México, as well as the publications discussed in this review, indicate that the 1970s saw a flourishing of empirical and quantitative work among the two main groups identified by Solís: the neoclassical and monetarist economists on the one hand and the structuralists and radicals on the other. Moreover, there has emerged an increasing differentiation within these groups, spreading the scope of the debate outwards from the center, reflecting the polarization of political attitudes in Mexican society as a whole. Further, as the economists gained positions of power previously reserved for professional politicians, both structuralists such as Tello and neoclassicals such as Solís himself were in a position to translate at least some of their ideas into practice. However, although Solís had suggested that the intellectual advance would be made by economists of the neoclassical persuasion, in the event it was the monetarists and radical writers who appear to have been most fertile in the 1970s.

Great progress has been made in construction of economic policy system in recent years. Nevertheless, there are also difficulties in accurate inquiry, efficient use and comparative analysis. In a bid to address critical problems of the existed system, this paper builds an intelligent policy system platform. By adopting the big data and artificial intelligence technologies, a number of functions such as accurate matching, system classification, and the analyses of relevance, life cycle, response level, time-effectiveness, self-consistency, maneuverability and so on are made available, so as to put in place a policy evaluation management system which is systematic, multi-dimensional and intelligent.

The delivery of humanitarian aid remains one of the main challenges in contemporary armed conflict. The legal, political and physical construction of a sustained and respected humanitarian space, in which such aid delivery can occur, is a fragile operation. Humanitarian spaces increasingly appear fragmented and localised. They are re-negotiated continuously, either as part of subnational and local truces and peace or cooperation agreements or through ad hoc bargaining between humanitarians and armed actors. Based on a comparison of how relief efforts are negotiated in Syria, this article argues that humanitarian space is not shrinking, as is commonly assumed, but rather is being reconfigured into humanitarian micro-spaces. Such micro-spaces are fluid, dynamic and overlapping arenas of relief, constantly challenged, and morphed by different actors. Working in humanitarian micro-spaces requires continuous political involvement and decision-making, which presents a substantial challenge for humanitarian organisations.

Both deterrence theory and deterrence practice are evolving to address contemporary strategic challenges. In the military domain, states progressively integrate and synchronise military operations. Outside of it, they exploit grey zone strategies that combine different instruments of influence across multiple domains. These developments are now giving birth to a new wave of thinking about cross domain deterrence (CDD), what it precisely entails, and what favouring conditions are necessary for it to be effective. This chapter situates CDD in the context of today’s challenges, and identifies the prerequisites for these favouring conditions based on a review of a rather diverse body of literature. It finds that one strand of that literature predominantly focuses on practical and technical prerequisites in order for CDD to be effective, leaving the framework of traditional deterrence theory intact. It also finds a second strand that holds that the nature of today’s challenges requires more than mere innovation in application. The ideas about deterrence proposed by this second strand are expanding on common understandings of deterrence to the extent that deterrence is no longer only about fear nor about convincing opponents to refrain from certain behaviour. The conclusion summarises the findings and elaborates their implications for theory and practice.

The U.S. provides extended nuclear deterrence to allies in Europe, Asia, and elsewhere. The 2018 NPR signals several potentially destabilizing policies, including lowering the threshold for use and adding low-yield capabilities, and it emphasizes the need for nuclear superiority. This chapter argues that the U.S. is changing its nuclear posture to address the growing challenge to U.S. conventional superiority. Extended nuclear deterrence is inherently dubious and the asymmetry between the U.S. on the one hand, and its allies and adversaries on the other, makes it doubly so. In the coming decades, this will continue to generate problems for the U.S. as long as it maintains its alliance commitments.

Studies have shown that users experience regret in online electronic auctions. Our study adds to the research on the antecedents of regret by examining the effects of the major types of auction design on users’ experience of regret. Towards this goal, we analyzed bidders’ experience of regret in English and Dutch auctions. Given that English and Dutch auctions are known to produce different types of bidding behavior and outcomes, we expect that the two types of auction design will also have a differential impact on experiencing regret. We report results from a lab experiment that was implemented as a self-developed mobile application for hotel room reservations. We examined the effects of the two open-bid auction types on the experience of regret, and found that users are more likely to experience regret in Dutch auctions. We point out the theoretical relevance and practical implications of our findings.