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Pillars of Our Work

The Mass Atrocity Research Initiative’s work centers around four pillars to advance research and knowledge related to mass atrocities and genocide including Accountability, Memorialization, Narratives, and Prevention.

Accountability

Lack of accountability for atrocities committed or facilitated by the United States and other countries is promoted through media, domestic and international politics, unequal treatment under the law, and, more broadly, a culture of impunity. Disrupting this impunity is a key objective of the first pillar.

USAAP’s mission is to contribute to existing, and create new, efforts to hold the United States accountable for the atrocities it has committed and has facilitated. Because the United States has erected numerous barriers, in this context, accountability is not limited to legal accountability. Accountability includes, first, documentation of atrocities committed by the United States and its client states. Such documentation includes the collection of media reporting and nongovernmental and intergovernmental organization reports, and statements by government officials. Second, in the case of atrocities facilitated by the United States, documentation includes tracking U.S.-provided political and material support to client states directly responsible for the commission of atrocities. Third, accountability includes efforts to promote public awareness of, and scholarly and advocacy engagement with, U.S. atrocities. This includes writing op-eds, publishing original research, and holding a regular conference, which may include People’s tribunals. Together, these accountability efforts will contribute to forms of justice beyond retributive, such as restorative and reparative justice, by seeking public accountability and, therefore, a more accurate historical memory.

While USAAP is committed to the longer history of U.S. atrocities, the first two USAAP projects include the U.S. role in Yemen and Gaza. Working with students, we will develop and build a spreadsheet database that documents, among other things: 1) atrocities committed in Yemen, from 2001 to present, and Gaza, from October 2023 to present, using media reports, NGO reports, and UN reports; 2) U.S. weapons sold and provided as aid to Saudi-led coalition members, from 2015 to present, and Israel, from October 2023 to present; (3) confirmed atrocities committed using U.S. weapons; and (4) U.S. political support through statements delivered by administration officials (president, State Department, etc.) and participation in United Nations discussions/votes. Additionally, we will analyze the ways U.S. officials have attempted to explain and justify the United States’ direct actions and its provision of weapons and support despite reporting on atrocities committed by the United States and its client states.

  1. Jeffrey S. Bachman (2024) “Bench Stacking and Biases: The ICJ’s Impartial Decision in Yugoslavia v. NATO Members in Comparative Perspective.” Genocide Studies and Prevention 18 (2).
  2. Jeffrey S. Bachman and Esther Brito Ruiz (2024) “The Geopolitics of Human Suffering: A Case Study of Media Coverage of the Conflicts in Yemen and Ukraine.” Third World Quarterly 45 (1): 24-42.
  3. Jeffrey S. Bachman (2022) The Politics of Genocide: From the Genocide Convention to the Responsibility to Protect. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.
  4. Jeffrey S. Bachman (2022) “US Congress and Partisanship on Yemen Among Democrats from Obama to Trump.” International Journal of Human Rights 26 (8): 1353-1373.
  5. Jeffrey S. Bachman (2019) “A ‘Synchronized Attack’ on Life: the Saudi-Led Coalition’s ‘Hidden and Holistic’ Genocide in Yemen and the Shared Responsibility of the US and UK.” Third World Quarterly 40 (2): 298-316.
  6. Jeffrey S. Bachman and Jack Holland (2019) “Lethal Sterility: Innovative Dehumanization in Legal Justifications of Obama’s Drone Policy.” International Journal of Human Rights 23 (6): 1028-1047.
  7. Jeffrey S. Bachman (2017) The United States and Genocide: (Re)Defining the Relationship. London: Routledge.
  8. Jeffrey S. Bachman (2017) “The New York Times and Washington Post: Misleading the Public about U.S. Drone Strikes by Ignoring Civilian Casualties and Associated International Law.” Journalism Studies 18 (4): 470-494.
  9. Jeffrey S. Bachman (2016) “Libya: A UN Resolution and NATO’s Failure to Protect.” In Land of Blue Helmets: The UN in the Arab World, edited by Karim Makdisi and Vijay Prashad, 212-230. University of California Press, 2016.
  10. Jeffrey S. Bachman (2015) “The Lawfulness of U.S. Targeted Killing Operations Outside Afghanistan.” Studies in Conflict and Terrorism 38 (11): 899-918.
  1. Esther Brito Ruiz and Jeffrey S. Bachman (2023) “Headlines and Front Lines: How US News Coverage of Wars in Yemen and Ukraine Reveals a Bias in Recording Civilian Harm.” The Conversation.
  2. Jeffrey S. Bachman (2019) “Senate Vote Could End US Complicity in the Saudi-Led Genocide in Yemen.” The Conversation.
  3. Jeffrey S. Bachman (2018) “US Complicity in the Suadi-Led Genocide in Yemen Spans Obama, Trump Administrations.” The Conversation.
  4. Jeffrey S. Bachman (2015) “The New York Times and Washington Post are Ignoring Civilians Killed by US Drone Strikes.” The Conversation
  5. Jeffrey S. Bachman (2014) “Drone Strikes: Are They Obama’s Enhanced Interrogation Techniques?” The Conversation.
  6. Jeffrey S. Bachman and Matar Ebrahim Matar (2013) “The US Must Not Bear Silent Witness to Another Crackdown in Bahrain.” The Guardian.
  7. Jeffrey S. Bachman (2013) “The Obama Administration may be Guilty of War Crimes.” The Guardian.
Associated Scholars

Narratives

There is power in stories. Through stories, we can galvanize people for the common good or convince them to commit mass atrocities. From the use of the Radio des Mille Collines in Rwanda to the dehumanization of marginalized communities in across the globe, narratives as webs of stories have demonstrated how governments can shape people’s perceptions of others, and desensitization to violence.  The second pillar explores the creation and weaponization of narratives to generate and amplify hatred as well as justify violence. The aim is to understand how and why people engage in otherness and take part in violent behaviors. 

  1. Claudine Kuradusenge-McLeod (2023) “The Burden of the Rwandan Diasporic Identity: From Social Categorisation to Silencing.” In Migrations and Diasporas: Struggling Between Inclusion and Exclusion, edited by William Arrocha and Elena Xeni, 273-289. Leeds: Emerald.
  2. Claudine Kuradusenge-McLeod (2021) Narratives of Victimhood and Perpetration: The Struggle of Bosnian and Rwandan Diaspora Communities in the United States. New York: Peter Lang.
  3. Claudine Kuradusenge-McLeod (2018) “Belgian Hutu Diaspora Narratives of Victimhood and Trauma.” The International Journal of Transitional Justice 12 (3): 427-443.
  4. Claudine Kuradusenge-McLeod (2016) “Denied Victimhood and Contested Narratives: The Case of Hutu Diaspora.” Genocide Studies and Prevention 10 (2): 59-75.
Associated Scholars

Memorialization

Mass atrocities have long-lasting effects on collective consciousness. From shaping policies to generational trauma, the acts committed and the policies resulting from them influence the nation’s political standing and perspectives toward other atrocities and interventions methods. This pillar unpacks and studies the impacts and ramifications of mass atrocities on how they are remembered, and consequently used to promote or prevent prevention methods.

  1. Claudine Kuradusenge-McLeod (2021) Narratives of Victimhood and Perpetration: The Struggle of Bosnian and Rwandan Diaspora Communities in the United States. New York: Peter Lang.
  2. Claudine Kuradusenge-McLeod (2025), “Private Commemoration: How Rwandans in the Diaspora Remember the 1994 Atrocities,” in Handbook on Rwanda, Purdekova, A., Jessee, E., and Mwambari D. (eds). Routledge.
Associated Scholars

Prevention

Pillar 4 centers on interrogating the fields of genocide studies and critical genocide studies to create a tool kit to assist advocates and activists identify early warnings and find ways to preventing tensions and conflicts from escalating.

In Progress