Defense has purchased a marketing method to influence the behavior of civilians in conflict areas, a Defense spokesperson confirms after reporting NRC. The method was purchased from a controversial British company. According to the newspaper, the Netherlands is at the forefront of this new way of warfare among Western countries.
The Defense spokesman was unable to provide further explanation on Saturday morning.
It is a marketing method of the British SCL Group, the parent company of data firm Cambridge Analytica. Both were discredited in recent years due to questionable political campaigns.
The Netherlands is at the forefront of this method among Western countries, along with the United Kingdom and Canada NRC.
In places like Iraq, the armed forces hope to get a better picture of how the local population works. The method should make missions more effective and reduce the number of civilian casualties. Behavioral research and influencing goes beyond the traditional way of winning hearts and minds, the newspaper writes. It must actively change the attitude of citizens in conflict areas.
In recent years, the Dutch armed forces have, according to NRC 139 soldiers trained in behavioral research and influencing behavior according to a method of SCL Group who Behavioural Dynamics Methodology (BDM) hot.
SCL Group is controversial
BDM training courses were purchased from SCL Group, a party that has proved dubious in the past. The firm conducted political campaigns in vulnerable democracies. Among other things, SCL conducted a political political campaign in Trinidad and Tobago, where black citizens were discouraged from voting.
Subsidiary Cambridge Analytica was exposed worldwide when it widely violated the privacy of US citizens for a political campaign during the 2016 elections.
Newspaper interviews with employees of the armed forces show that the method is popular because of its effectiveness. But the method is also controversial. No rules have yet been drawn up for this new way of warfare.
Landlord boss Martin Wijnen acknowledges that legal and ethical standards must be set for the method. That is only possible “after a discussion about what we think of it as the Netherlands,” he says.
‘Ethics are in the user’
After the Cambridge Analytica scandal went around the world in 2018, Defense decided that the collaboration with SCL Group should not stop. The conclusion was that the method would be good, but the ethics are in the user, the newspaper writes.
After SCL went bankrupt, the company still worked with a former Dutch employee of the group.
A meeting with defense lawyers about rules on influencing behavior was postponed this spring due to corona, but should take place shortly.
Deployed in Northern Iraq and Curaçao
Defense has used BDM to learn how the people of Curaçao would react in case of a sudden large influx of Venezuelan refugees.
In Northern Iraq, under the guise of that method, in-depth research was conducted into the motives of the local population, in a refugee camp on the outskirts of IS territory. That would have led to more cooperation between them and the armed forces.
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