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5
Demonstrating Data Sharing:
The UNITY System
U
NITY is a data-sharing, visualization, and collaboration platform
developed jointly by DOD and USAID to make visible the scope and
scale of humanitarian development, security assistance, and peace-
building investment worldwide. By making key data visible to peacebuilders,
UNITY can maximize allocation of scarce resources and, it is hoped, improve
outcomes for the society receiving the peacebuilding intervention.
UNITY was described and demonstrated at the workshop by Mark
Hainsey, project leader at the US Army Corps of Engineers, and Steven
Wood, support lead for the Cooperative Security (CS) Joint Capabil-
ity Technology Demonstration (JCTD) program. JCTDs are intended to
exploit mature and maturing technologies to solve important military
and civilian-military problems and to concurrently develop the associated
concept of operation, a guidance document for the technology's users.
These capabilities and operational concepts are then evaluated in exercises
on a scale large enough to clearly establish operational utility and system
integrity. Emphasis is on technology assessment and integration. After the
presentation by Hainsey and Wood, workshop attendees offered comments
on the system and ideas for its enhancement.
35
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36 DATA SHARING TO IMPROVE COORDINATION IN PEACEBUILDING
THE UNITY SYSTEM
UNITY is designed to provide data visibility for the US government,
nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), international organizations, and
other entities working in fragile environments. Organizations working in
post-conflict zones tend to manage planning independently. Consequently,
project activities become siloed, and interventions can become uncoordi-
nated and inefficient. UNITY aggregates nonclassified data from partner
organizations and displays it through a Web-based browser interface as a
series of overlays, charts, graphs, and tables that are geospatially referenced
to a map of the region. As shown in Figure 5-1, each peacebuilding project
is represented by an icon that can be clicked on to see more information on
budget, partners, and other project details.
UNITY was developed under the Cooperative Security JCTD, an inter-
agency research and development initiative overseen by the Office of the
Assistant Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering. Partner agen-
cies are USAID, the US Southern Command, the US European Command,
and the US Army Corps of Engineers. The objective of this JCTD, said
Hainsey, is to develop cutting-edge capabilities to produce a better integrated
"whole of government" approach to development and defense cooperative
activities both with other US agencies and across the public-private divide.
The problem the UNITY system addresses is the absence among regional
stakeholders of integrated, interagency adaptive planning, decision support,
and assessment capabilities; information-sharing architectures; and orga-
Project Information
Project Type: Rule of Law
Title: Justice System Capacity Building
Budget: $1,600,000
Activities:
· Establish regional justice centers
· Conduct multilingual public
education campaigns
· Create community mediation centers
FIGURE 5-1 Hypothetical USG and NGO Development Projects in Guatemala and Belize
Shown on UNITY.
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DEMONSTRATING DATA SHARING 37
nizational structures needed to conduct effective cooperative security and
partner capacity-building activities. Planning is stove-piped within agencies,
resulting in overlapping solutions and wasted resources. Requirements for
the new system were that it use nonclassified information in non- and precri-
sis environments and that it engage public sector stakeholders. The system "is
not a holistic solution for all of the challenges that we've discussed through
the morning and early afternoon" but rather "an opportunity to start looking
at tools and techniques for how to share data, how we collaborate, and how
we provide mutual visibility to our partners and stakeholders," said Hainsey.
The UNITY system allows regional and multinational nonclassified
information sharing, mutually visible situation and event assessment and
planning, and collaborative implementation, monitoring, and evaluation. It
connects communities of interest through a federated, collaborative forum
called the All Partners Access Network (APAN). For the first time, users will
be able to juxtapose DOD and USAID country plans to show overlaps and
gaps in their planning processes. It takes in authoritative project data and
categorizes it by sector based on the Department of State's Foreign Assistance
Framework. And the system is scalable, with the capacity to include all fed-
eral agencies and departments that conduct foreign assistance activities as
well as nongovernmental sources of information that choose to share their
project data.
Platform tools enable users to access information in their areas of inter-
est, and an innovative RSS reader discerns what individual users may want
to see and custom-tailors the information provided by the system. A dash-
board, tailored to a user's profile, can be configured to enable faster and more
efficient visualization of information in their area of interest. Data can be
sorted, filtered, searched, and displayed according to the user's preferences.
The original format and syntax of the data are retained so that information
from the data providers is not lost. A fine-grained data access control system
allows some data to be shared only with small groups or individuals, while
other data are freely available. The system is government owned and does not
have proprietary components and consequently, said Hainsey, can be easily
updated should new capabilities be required.
DISCUSSION
Several workshop participants applauded the capabilities and scope of
the UNITY system, describing it as a valuable tool for information gathering
and planning. For example, Michael Shipler, senior program advisor, Search
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38 DATA SHARING TO IMPROVE COORDINATION IN PEACEBUILDING
for Common Ground, pointed out that the system provides a way to develop
a shared understanding of what is happening in a country and thus could
be used not just by civil society groups but by the media, local government
officials, the police, and others to assess local situations and capacities.
Participants also offered feedback on the characteristics of the system,
which Elmer Roman, oversight executive, Office of the Secretary of Defense,
US Department of Defense, Anne Ralte, senior advisor, Office of the Direc-
tor of Human Resources, US Agency for International Development, and
Hainsey and Wood, who were involved in the system's development, wel-
comed as input for future changes. Among the suggestions proposed were
software tools that could be added to the system. One useful tool would
be software that could find patterns in seemingly unrelated data. For exam-
ple, as Melanie Greenberg, president and CEO, Alliance for Peacebuilding,
noted, if everyone in a region is suddenly buying AK-47s, access to data
documenting that trend could help to prevent the outbreak of hostilities.
In response to a question about what other kinds of data can be entered
into the system, Wood said that information from authoritative sources will
be entered into the system. The system has been designed for precrisis envi-
ronments. Roman acknowledged that including conflict indicators would be
a valuable addition so that the effects of both development and peacebuild-
ing could be monitored over time.
Participants also noted potential shortcomings in the UNITY system.
As Lisa Schirch, professor, Center for Justice and Peacebuilding, Eastern
Mennonite University, pointed out, much of civil society does not want the
military to engage in development because of its negative impact on NGOs
working on the ground. The military and other organizations may have dif-
ferent perceptions about the problems that need to be solved and how to
solve them, and unless organizations are on the same page it can be difficult
to share information. "We wouldn't want to share information if we have
different goals," she said. "We do want to have conversations about those
different goals and different analyses."
Another problem cited by several participants is that the tool lacks a way
for countries included in the database to provide feedback. A system contain-
ing information only from US agencies seems to imply that the countries
being mapped need outsiders to gather and share information. It also does
not represent the full range of activities, including those of the host coun-
tries. More generally, Shipler noted, within countries different actors might
identify different sorts of data as vital to their planning processes. There does
not appear to be a way to manage these differences in UNITY.
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DEMONSTRATING DATA SHARING 39
Kevin Brownawell, interagency professional in residence, US Institute
of Peace (USIP), observed that, though Americans may be interested in
the acquisition and sharing of data, that is not necessarily the case in other
countries. As a result, several basic questions need to be answered: Does
everyone agree that data should be collected and shared? If so, what kind of
data? With whom should data be shared? Are data open or closed? How will
data be used? Brownawell suggested starting with the posting of country
statistics generated by the US government and then seeing how far the system
can expand into data provided by the NGO community and other countries.
Roman countered that many of the countries in which he has worked
have been eager for the military to engage in development activities. The
military understands its role, he said, and sharing information can allow
development and stability to progress. Also, the military wants to show, in
part through this program, that it can be a responsible partner in develop-
ment as part of the security cooperation plan. "The more you know and
understand and the more you understand what others are doing, the better
it is for the unity of effort overall," he said.
Marcia Hartwell, visiting scholar, USIP, also pointed out that, although
she is not a fan of military involvement in development projects, the situa-
tion varies from country to country. In some cases, NGOs prefer the military
to be active. For example, in Iraq, the military secured a perimeter within
which everyone working on humanitarian aid could operate safely. She also
acknowledged that the military excels in dealing with other armed groups
and military organizations. "Civilians work well with civilian groups, and the
military works well with armed groups," Hartwell said.
In response to participants' concerns about placing their data on a
platform hosted by DOD servers, Roman and Hainsey both observed that
UNITY could be hosted outside the DOD environment and that both DOD
and USAID have been looking for opportunities to do so. In particular,
Roman suggested that USIP might be an excellent place to host such a data-
sharing program.
Another potentially valuable source of data cited by workshop partici-
pants is the information available through crowdsourcing. Crowdsourcing
techniques could be used to survey the viewpoint, priorities, and perceptions
of the ultimate beneficiaries of development in a country--the people. How-
ever, this information, too, would most likely be accepted if available through
a system not involving the military.
Patrick Vinck, research scientist, Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, noted
that many platforms offering data related to peacebuilding are emerging.
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40 DATA SHARING TO IMPROVE COORDINATION IN PEACEBUILDING
Ways need to be found to enable these platforms to talk with each other,
and the UNITY system could help make such cooperation possible. Other
participants similarly pointed to other systems that provide complementary
information, including conflict indicators. Linking to these other sources
may be a better way of sharing information than having it compiled in a
system developed by the military.
Vinck also asked whether UNITY or some other collaborative software
system could be made more open and sharable. Wood explained that the
platform will support multiple server configurations, so extensibility has
already been built into it and multiple versions of the platform could be
spread across multiple user communities.
