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Barbara Harff

Political scientist — risk modeling · United States (US Naval Academy, emerita)

Affiliated with Political Instability Task Force (PITF)

Government-funded research

Pioneered quantitative models for forecasting genocide and politicide risk; built the genocide/politicide component of the PITF dataset.

Financing

person
Money source

Her risk-modeling work was conducted for the CIA-funded Political Instability Task Force.

Institutional alignment

Long association with the US-government-sponsored PITF.

Financing is shown to help readers weigh incentives and constraints. It is not a finding that the source is truthful or false.

Disclosures & conflicts

Core genocide/politicide risk modeling was produced under CIA-funded Political Instability Task Force sponsorship — an important transparency consideration when weighing model outputs as neutral science.

Credibility & caveats

A foundational figure in atrocity early-warning modeling, widely cited. Her core data work was produced under US-intelligence-community sponsorship.

How this source is used

This profile is used to weigh publishers, investigators, officials, or source material cited inside case evidence. It may not itself issue a genocide determination for a case. See the methodology for the source-weighting rules.

Sources & disclosures