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Page added on September 23, 2015
We Should Have Seen This Refugee Crisis Coming
There are some things we can never know: The grief of a Syrian father as he finds his three-year-old son lifeless on the beach; how it feels to leave your home and community behind in the dark of night, knowing you may never return, with nothing but the need to keep your family safe from harm.
But we should be able to know when and where the next migration will occur. We should be able to predict how many people it will affect and the impact on surrounding areas. We have the technology—right here, right now—to create a new, agile, insightful model that will predict mass migrations and help us better serve displaced families even before they are displaced. We can do all this now. And we must.
Over the past few weeks I have watched along with the rest of the world as the refugee crisis reached a fever pitch in Europe, fueled primarily by the war in Syria, with thousands of desperate refugees breaking the levees established by an international community determined to keep them confined. I watched as they ran across the Hungarian border and resolved to walk 155 miles to Austria where they might have the opportunity to be treated with the compassion and respect they deserve as innocent civilians fleeing years of violence and persecution. As a first-generation Syrian American and advocate for refugees and civilians in conflict, I understand some of the obstacles involved in trying to escape a war. The heartbreak of witnessing my family become refugees and being helpless to stop it is indescribable. The international community must increase accessible, secure pathways to safety for those that seek it—but let’s put aside the fact that of course policy changes could alleviate many of the challenges refugees face. If Policy and Technology were two mischievous children, Technology is who I would be shaking my head at with a disappointed look saying ‘From you, I expected more.’ That’s the thing about innovation—there is no precedent for creativity.
We are in the midst of the largest refugee crisis on record, one that is still growing. The UNHCR estimates that there are approximately 60 million people displaced worldwide with 42,500 newly displaced each day. A migration of comparable magnitude has not been witnessed in 70 years, since the end of World War II. Many things have changed since then—innovation has been infused into nearly every aspect of modern life—with the exception of our response to mass migrations and refugee situations.
Here’s the current model: a conflict erupts, civilians flee, cross a border and become refugees living as transients indefinitely in pop-up tent communities, or become absorbed into cities and towns living as urban refugees. The resulting population influx strains the economic and physical infrastructures of neighboring host countries and tensions rise. Children miss out on years of education. Aid organizations become overwhelmed with even just registering people as refugees, let alone providing them with services and resources.
This is a reactive process devoid of innovation. In no way do I mean to disparage the remarkable work of the aid organizations on the ground. I am suggesting we make their jobs easier. Catastrophes such as these don’t come out of nowhere; they arise from specific sets of circumstances documented over decades. Those circumstances can be analyzed and the predictive models can be built to transform the way we respond to humanitarian disasters. The IT community needs to step up – big time. We have the tools to develop a proactive approach and operate with insight in a world where we have access to incredible amounts of data, yet when a refugee crisis develops and millions flee for their lives, we act as if we had no way of knowing. We watch in horror as innocent children die. And we spend billions of dollars on humanitarian assistance that addresses urgent needs but does nothing to prevent future suffering. We could have seen this coming.
Predictive analytics provides the ability to extract meaningful information from vast amounts of data allowing us to identify patterns and trends, make connections between seemingly unrelated data sets, and predict future outcomes. There are a myriad of predictive analytics tools on the market, both open source and proprietary, and even more applications. Businesses have been able to gain a better understanding of customer behavior and have made tangible, impactful decisions based on that insight: Best Buy changed the layout of their stores in response to customer intelligence data, and Netflix tailors millions of individual viewing profiles and has even made major programming decisions relying on data derived from advanced analytics. In the healthcare industry, Carolinas HealthCare System has implemented analytics solutions to help customize patient care and predict trends in public health. And in emergency management, The Weather Company is using advanced analytics to predict weather patterns and natural disasters with greater accuracy, and furthermore, the potential infrastructure damage resulting from any number of scenarios. For instance, if a weather event were to occur in a particular area, where are the weak points in infrastructure that would be most affected, and how can we best mitigate the damage?
We should be applying those same principles of disaster response and recovery to conflict. Taking into account political and social stability factors, we could conceivably determine the likelihood that there will be a migration to a particular region. What if we had predicted the confluence of events leading to this humanitarian crisis? How might our response have been different?
With the ability to predict trends in migration patterns and understand the behavior of people escaping conflict, we can improve the efficiency of organizations working to support displaced populations and drive strategic policy decisions that impact millions of people. It’s not about substituting decision making, it’s about enabling the most informed, real-time decision making possible. Headlights into this crisis would have allowed aid organizations to prepare for early deployment of life saving resources and a scale up of support to manage an onslaught of registrants. We could have implemented supply chain management strategies to provide them with process and logistics transparency and maximize the efficiency of their operations.
If the governments around the world had a better understanding of the potential of a refugee crisis of this magnitude, predictive modeling would have allowed them to assess and reinforce their infrastructures to support a massive population influx. World leaders could have engaged in informed discussions earlier and developed a contingency plan for resettlement. Perhaps we could have eased the bureaucracy of migration by streamlining processes and ramping up support with personnel and advanced case management tools. Asylum and immigration application and adjudication time frames can range from several months to years. It’s an administratively intensive process that takes time – a luxury civilians in conflict don’t have.
And how about mobile solutions? Refugees are by definition mobile, and their devices have already been proven as life-saving whether they are calling the coast guard from a raft in the Mediterranean or facilitating a reunion with lost family members. Mobile apps have the potential to revolutionize aid resource allocation and relocation support in the humanitarian sector. The possibilities are endless.
The distribution of the global population is shifting and our response to migration crises must shift as well. The IT community must work hand in hand with government agencies and aid organizations around the world to help manage the existing refugee crisis and make sure that next time – and there will be a next time – we are prepared to do things better. Let’s use the tools we have, make the data available, and allow innovation to influence policy. We have the capabilities and an urgent need for a solution. More importantly, we have an obligation to use technology in a globally responsible manner and to do so in such a way that, if possible, lessens the suffering of others and saves a single child from dying on the beach.
21 Comments on "We Should Have Seen This Refugee Crisis Coming"
Plantagenet on Wed, 23rd Sep 2015 2:50 pm
The “next time” is next year and the year after that and the year after that. There is now a continuous influx of immigrants and refugees to the EU from Syria, Libya, Somalia, Egypt, Iraq, Afghanistan etc. The EU estimates that only 10-50% of the 800,000 migrants to the EU this year are from Syria—the rest are mostly economic migrants from poor countries in Africa and Asia.
apneaman on Wed, 23rd Sep 2015 3:22 pm
Woe. If only there was some way we could have known. Some system of obtaining knowledge about the world that could have been useful as a predictor and helped us prevent and/or prepare for such things. Oh and there was also no way of knowing that decades of military interventions and regime changes to secure oil could ever contribute either. Just like the crash of 2008, I guess we just have to throw up out hand and say “Who could have seen it coming”?
80s Climate Scientists Predict Drought and Political Tension in the Mideast
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2iKF-hWUOHk
Davy on Wed, 23rd Sep 2015 3:30 pm
All of us doomers have been warning of this for years all the while the corns have been crowing growth and development will solve our population and wealth inequality issues. Doomers said the situation will go from bad to worse and it did.
There is nothing that can be done about limits and overshoot except adapt and mitigate. This is nature taking care of a problem the cornucopian establishment claimed could be solved if we just had enough growth.
When does one admit failure. Abrubt climate change has started and soon we will have climate refugees. California will be a wake up call right here at home. Millions will have to migrate out of the southwest in the next decade. Tell me how that will affect growth. Talk about a good dose of demand destruction think about that.
Cloud9 on Wed, 23rd Sep 2015 3:34 pm
Just as the 19th century Europeans pushed into the Middle East for resources, the 21st Middle Easterners are now pushing into Europe. This is a push for survival and will end in ethnic cleansing and genocide.
BC on Wed, 23rd Sep 2015 3:48 pm
“This is a push for survival and will end in ethnic cleansing and genocide.”
That’s the historical pattern.
Hello on Wed, 23rd Sep 2015 4:03 pm
To think that some low flying planes with cluster bombs or poison gas could solve the problem is mind boggling.
Yet the stupid west rather commits self-genocide instead of using the available technology at its disposal.
Stupid, stupid west.
apneaman on Wed, 23rd Sep 2015 4:15 pm
Relentless Wildfires, Water Scarcity and Marine Die-Offs: Living With Climate Disruption
http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/32890-relentless-wildfires-water-scarcity-and-marine-die-offs-living-with-climate-disruption
penury on Wed, 23rd Sep 2015 4:30 pm
You hear about the numbers of (migrants,refugees) people who are entering the EU for new lives. I wonder how many enter the U.S. every day?South and Central America are also caught in drought, food shortages, war, and extreme deprivation. With the open borders that we have it is particularly easy for these people to come here. But with the rate of change in the world soon U.S. citizens will become migrants and where will they go? 7.5 billion people will not fit in Canada and the E.U. I think it is past time to admit that the sixth extinction will include homo sapiens.
Rodster on Wed, 23rd Sep 2015 5:03 pm
This is what happens when the West purposely destabilizes the MENA. You create war, chaos, violence, death and destruction. No one wants to live under those conditions. So they pack up and leave and head to the shores of those responsible.
joe on Wed, 23rd Sep 2015 5:34 pm
Western thinkers like Zebrinsky have talked about this issue years before now. Young, educated, English speaking, aware of wealth in the west, and angry that they can’t get these things at home. The first phase was the traditional conservatives rejection of these people at home (usually called the ‘modernity’ debate, almost forgotten now), so now they are leaving and looking west. But what they will find in the west is an already entrenched conservative islam, somewhat at odds with their ambitions. The West has an opportunity here, if they are wise, but western politicians are not wise.
onlooker on Wed, 23rd Sep 2015 5:46 pm
It is really pathetic how apologist and deniers even though they are running of any coherent arguments or flavors of the month to bolster their “do not worry things will right themselves” case still keep trying. As has been said countless times on this whole website things are proceeding as people way back like Limits to Growth, Malthus, Ehrlich and others have warned. What do cornies want to be convinced biblical four horseman, famine, plague war and death. Well looking suspiciously like some riders are coming.
apneaman on Wed, 23rd Sep 2015 5:58 pm
onlooker
Climate Change Deniers Present Graphic Description Of What Earth Must Look Like For Them To Believe
WASHINGTON—Evoking cataclysmic scenes of extreme weather and widespread drought and famine, the nation’s climate change deniers held a press conference Wednesday to describe exactly what the Earth must look like before they will begin to believe in human-induced global warming.
The group of skeptics, who said that the consensus among 97 percent of the scientific community and the documented environmental transformations already underway are simply not proof enough, laid out the precise sequence and magnitude of horrific events—including natural disasters, proliferation of infectious diseases, and resource wars—they would have to witness firsthand before they are swayed.
“For us to accept that the average surface temperature of the Earth has risen to critical levels due to mankind’s production of greenhouse gases, we’ll need to see some actual, visible evidence, including a global death toll of no less than 500 million people within a single calendar year,” said spokesperson William Davis, 46, of Jackson, NJ, who added that at least 70 percent of all islands on the planet would also have to become submerged under rising seas before he and his cohort would reconsider their beliefs. “To start, we’re going to have to see supercell tornadoes of category F4 or higher ripping through Oklahoma at least three times a day, leveling entire communities and causing hundreds of fatalities—and just to be perfectly clear, we’re talking year-round, not just during the spring tornado season.”
more
http://www.theonion.com/article/climate-change-deniers-present-graphic-description-51129
Eileen Liddy on Wed, 23rd Sep 2015 6:16 pm
The Onion long has been known for it’s great satire. The Onion piece is a good example of this.
apneaman on Wed, 23rd Sep 2015 7:21 pm
26,000 homeless people in L.A. Add it up in each city and town and it looks like a homegrown refugee crisis.
L.A. to declare ‘state of emergency’ on homelessness, commit $100 million
http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-homeless-funding-proposals-los-angeles-20150921-story.html
JuanP on Wed, 23rd Sep 2015 8:02 pm
Who could have seen this coming? I did, decades ago, it was obvious. This is only the beginning, billions will have to move in the coming decades, and there is nowhere left to go for most of them. I don’t expect this problem to get any better in my life. It is all downhill from here.
makati1 on Wed, 23rd Sep 2015 8:31 pm
Hmmm. Immigration is still over 1,000,000 per year to the Us and all legal. Who knows how many illegal there were.
2013:
Asia = ~400,500
Americas = ~396,500
Africa = ~98,000
Europe = ~90,000
Misc. = ~15,000
Source: US Department of Homeland Security, Office of Immigration Statistics
BTW: Only 20% of the world’s migrants come to the US, not most.
http://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/frequently-requested-statistics-immigrants-and-immigration-united-states#Current%20and%20Historical
But the Us is taking in more and more from the ME and North Africa with plans to settle them all over the US. Do you speak Arabic?
onlooker on Wed, 23rd Sep 2015 8:51 pm
This refugee issue was decades in the making with the unequal and unjust matrix that the world is. 20% control 80% of the world’s wealth and vice-versa. Plus unleashing the dogs of war under the false premise of War on Terror. How could anyone expect anything different to have occurred.
apneaman on Wed, 23rd Sep 2015 9:00 pm
Earth’s 6th mass extinction has begun, and there are no signs that humans will be spared
“The physical events causing mass extinctions, whether asteroids, mass volcanism or other physical factors, are so disruptive and have such global consequences that even the most widespread and numerous species can be wiped out.
It is, therefore, difficult to make generalizations and predictions, but we do know that nothing is ever really safe. As we face the prospect of the sixth mass extinction, albeit caused by human activity this time, it is good to remember that extinctions can quickly escalate in unpredictable ways.”
http://www.businessinsider.com/who-will-survive-earths-sixth-extinction-2015-9
BC on Wed, 23rd Sep 2015 9:57 pm
“To think that some low flying planes with cluster bombs or poison gas could solve the problem is mind boggling.”
https://youtu.be/Fm_1GH-I_1U
It’s not meant to “solve the problem”, unless one is referring to the problem of not enough revenues and profits for the imperial war-profiteering machine and global imperial military superstructure.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AOOXpnJg-Ao
http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/flash/bomb
https://youtu.be/IyNJigMgahE
https://youtu.be/nYgEGL4ie9U
https://youtu.be/viYDVKtFeEY
I don’t know about you gents, but I feel snugly and secure. 😀
makati1 on Thu, 24th Sep 2015 3:11 am
Ap, interesting article. Informative but the hopey/feely comment at the end blew his credibility.
“We must hope that such an ecosystem collapse is far enough down the road for us to forestall it.”
Too bad we are already past that point of no return. All of your references in the past, and my reading, support that the 6th extinction event is about 99.99% certain, and not too far away in the human time scale.
simonr on Thu, 24th Sep 2015 8:25 am
The entire premise of the article is that ‘we’ did not see this coming
Is there not a chance that some of us did ?
After all the whole of MENA is in overshoot and will implode sooner or later
wouldn’t it be better to engineer this crisis while we have the resources
to Mitigate/Direct/Kill these migrants