Research interests
Richard’s research interests are broad touching on many areas in the Social Sciences. Early interests were on: patterns of and links between ethnicity and crime, before moving on to the field of demography of armed conflict and violence where I look at demographic consequences of violent conflict on components of population change. In the last stage of his PhD, Richard’s research interests drifted momentarily towards the Third Sector where he looks at the geography of different traditions of voluntary actions. Assessing components of population change before, during and in the aftermath of violent conflict or natural disasters remains Richard’s main research interest.
Abstract: In an effort to document and monitor the scale and scope of recent conflicts (1998–2004) in Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), the International Rescue Committee (IRC), in conjunction with some of the world’s leading epidemiologists, conducted a series of five surveys in the country over a seven years’ period (2000–2007). Estimates of conflict-related mortality generated from the IRC’s surveys range from 3.3 million between years 1998 and 2002, to 5.4 million excess deaths for the period between 1998 and 2007. Reflecting on the IRC’s work, the Richard’s research project combines four different data sources – 1984 DRC Population Census, 1995 and 2001 DRC Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS) and the 2007 DRC Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) – to derive demographic estimates and assess the extent of population loss associated with the conflict period between 1995 and 2007. Both statistical and demographic techniques are relied upon for this purpose.
Indirect techniques of estimation as developed by the United Nations are applied to derive missing demographic estimates from the latest census conducted in the DRC back in 1984. Based on the 1984 DRC population and the derived estimates, forward projections are conducted using the cohort component method to generate demographic estimates for the period between 1984 and 2007. Direct estimates from intermediate surveys, mentioned above, are used to benchmark population projections based on two scenarios: the factual and the counter-factual. The difference between the two projections is used to determine population loss for the period under study.
Findings from the Richard’s project indicate that the IRC may have overestimated the scale of excess deaths associated with the 1998 and 2007 period. Due to the fact that Richard’s study is based on many assumptions and scenarios, it is evident that a high level of uncertainty is associated with the derived estimates. For this reason, his study conducted a series of sensitivity analyses to assess the level of uncertainty associated with both the model and the demographic components in order to evaluate the range of plausible estimates of excess population loss.
Research group
Third Sector Research Centre (TSRC)
Mr R KapendSouthampton Statistical Sciences Research Institute University of Southampton Highfield Southampton SO17 1BJ UK
