Review of “Channeling Cassandra”

Dennis King’s new monograph, Channeling Cassandra, draws on his over 35 years of experience managing information about international humanitarian disasters, including his creation of ReliefWeb.com and overseeing USAID and US Department of State humanitarian information systems.

Published by the National Intelligence University, the monograph makes the important insight that while there have been endless gigabytes of humanitarian data and publications about information management, there has been relatively little on analysis, or interpreting data, particularly how evidence is used to make decisions.

This book refers to food aid as part of the response to crises of varying severity, and in response to food insecurity driven by climate change.

King asserts that “a keystone for improving humanitarian response is understanding complexity.”  He gives examples of how analysis of humanitarian needs and options require a multi-disciplinary lens.  He writes, “The problem is rarely a lack of information; it is the inability of decision-makers to process complexity and the tendency to prioritize political expediency over humanitarian early warning.”

“Humanitarian crises are non-linear systems where small changes in one variable (like a grain price or a local skirmish) can lead to catastrophic system-wide failures.”

King cautions against causation bias and linear-logic fallacies.  He distinguishes between descriptive analysis of humanitarian emergencies, explanatory analysis, evaluation, comparisons, predictive esimation and anticipatory analysis.

He encourages analysts to consider black swan events that are rare and unanticipated (such as pandemics), gray rhinos that are probable, yet neglected threats; “boiling frogs” that are slow-simmering crises that build in scale and harm; and “Dragon Kings” that are first-time events such as nuclear weapons, transational cyber-shutdown, sea level rise or a solar storm.

He views complexity as a growing problem in part because of accelerating climate change.  “Climate disasters are occuring in unexpected locations.  2023 alone saw tropical storm-induced flooding in Libya; wildfires in Hawaii, Canada and Greece, floods in Niger, drought in the horse latitudes of South America and heat waves in Europe.  Most unresolved armed conflicts have been ongoing for more than 10 years” and have displaced generations of refugees and internally displaced persons.

King utilizes several historical and contemporary disasters to illustrate the “Intelligence-Policy Gap.”

One section reviews applications of technology including information and communication (ICT), Geospatial analysis from remote sensing, and newer applications of artificial intelligence.

He recounts the 2004 Indian Ocean tsnumi, the 2010 Haiti Earthquake, and civil wars in South Sudan and Syria.

He examines how the Ebola outbreak in west Africa that became a priority in 2014 had siloed intelligence and interpretation (medical vs. security) that inhibited a more unified response.

King fears that “the humanitarian ecosystem has not adapted to these threats, challenges and actors…  this has led many to proclaim the international humanitarian system is both broke and broken.”

His recommendations are to adapt to complexity (monitor and adapt), facilitate decision-making, enhance alternative analyses and understand that technology can often introduce more noise than signal.

– Hunger Notes board member Steven Hansch