Today, conflict is the reason for nearly all of the 68 million displaced people worldwide. Last year alone saw a record 15 million refugees flee their homes and nearly 8,000 lives lost to terrorist attacks. And the United States is no exception: in the first half of 2018, more Americans were killed by gun violence in schools than while serving in the military. Low estimates put the cost of violence at more than $14 trillion per year, a number that is expected to increase significantly as displacement from climate change and resource scarcity worsen.
But when we put the right tools in the right hands, it changes everything. But when we leverage low-cost, easy-to-use tech and local partnerships to put the right tools in the hands of the people best positioned to make a difference: activists, peacebuilders, and NGOs in some of the most violent places on earth. Our work takes many forms. From our headquarters in Washington D.C., we run a PeaceTech Accelerator for startups using technological innovation to do everything from connecting at-risk youth across Africa with jobs to warning civilians in Syria of incoming missile attacks. In places like India, Kenya, Iraq, Myanmar, Costa Rica, and Nigeria, our PeaceTech Exchanges offer training and affordable tech tools to peacebuilders in communities around the world. And on the data front, our research around issues like social media and hate speech serve to inform policymakers, data scientists, activists, and business leaders while also providing a foundation for predictive analytics and a proprietary platform for early warning of violence. We partnered with Drexel University to launch the U.S.’s first Master’s Degree in Peace Engineering to educate generation after generation on the power of peacetech.
Keywords: Protecting Safety and Security, Startup incubator for human rights, Peacetech Lab, Peacetech Accelerator, Africa, India, Kenya, Iraq, Myanmar, Costa Rica, and Nigeria, Drexel University