Ted Robert Gurr
 | This article includes a list of general references, but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations. (February 2012) |
Ted Robert Gurr | |
|---|---|
| Born | February 21, 1936 |
| Doctoral advisor | Harry H. Eckstein |
Ted Robert Gurr (February 21, 1936 – November 25, 2017) was an American author and professor of political science who most notably wrote about political conflict and instability. His widely translated book Why Men Rebel (1970)[1] emphasized the importance of social psychological factors (relative deprivation) and ideology as root sources of political violence. He was Distinguished University Professor emeritus at the University of Maryland and consulted on projects he established there. He died in November 2017.[2]
Career
Before joining the University of Maryland faculty in 1989 Gurr held academic positions at
In 1968 Gurr was asked to join the staff of the
The Polity study, begun by Gurr in the late 1960s, profiles the democratic and autocratic traits of all regimes worldwide from 1800 to the present. The project is now directed by Dr. Monty G. Marshall of the Center for Systemic Peace, one of the two dozen Ph.D.'s whose doctoral work he has supervised. The Polity data is widely used by researchers and government agencies to track democratization and to assess the stability of contemporary regimes.
The Minorities at Risk project, which he began in 1985, assesses the political status and activities of more than 300 ethnic and religious minorities world-wide. The MAR project, which is continued by a research team at the University of Maryland's Center for International Development and Conflict Management (CIDCM),[3] provides data for his and others’ analyses of the causes and management of ethnopolitical protest and rebellion, most recently in Peoples versus States: Minorities at Risk in the New Century[5] and Ethnic Conflict in World Politics, coauthored with Barbara Harff.[6]
In 1994-95 Gurr helped establish the State Failure Task Force (now the Political Instability Task Force) at the request of Vice President Gore's office, to provide global risk assessments of impending intrastate conflicts. He continued to serve as senior consultant to the task force under the George W. Bush administration and the Obama administration.
Gurr was a member of a network of scholars concerned with risks and prevention of
His recent projects included periodic assessments of risks of genocide and
In 2012 Gurr accepted an offer to be a lecturer and Visiting Scholar at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
Work
Gurr has written or edited more than twenty books and monographs. Most recent was Peace and Conflict 2012, with University of Maryland co-authors J. Joseph Hewitt and Jonathan Wilkenfeld.[7] He and Monty G. Marshall established this biennial report series in 2001 to provide scholars, analysts and journalists with current information on global conflict trends and risks of future instability. Earlier editions documented the global decline in internal wars during the 1990s and the ascendancy of negotiated agreements for managing ethnic and other internal conflicts.
His latest academic book, coauthored with Lyubov Mincheva, is Crime-Terror Alliances and the State (2013)[8] He also coauthored two books in genealogy and social history, Coming of Age in the West 1883-1906[9] and A Gurr Family Odyssey, with Paul Magel.[10]
Gurr held a
Books
- Why Men Rebel (Princeton, 1970)
- Violence In America (with historian Hugh Davis Graham, U.S. Government Printing Office, Bantam Books, and Praeger, 1969; Sage Publications, 1979)
- Handbook of political conflict: Theory and research (The free press, New York, 1980)
- The State and the City, coauthored with Desmond King (University of Chicago Press, 1987)
- Ethnic Conflict in World Politics, coauthored with Barbara Harff (Westview Press, 1994, revised edition, 2003).
- Early Warning of Communal Conflict and Genocide: Linking Empirical Research and International Responses (United Nations University Press, 1996)
- Preventive Measures: Building Risk Assessment and Crisis Early Warning Systems, coedited by Gurr and John L. Davies (Rowman & Littlefield, 1998).
- Peoples Versus States: Minorities at Risk in the New Century (U.S. Institute of Peace Press, 2000)
- Peace and Conflict 2010, coauthored with Joseph Hewitt, Jonathan Wilkenfeld (Paradigm Publishers, 2009)
See also
References
- ^ Why Men Rebel, Princeton University Press, 1970; revised edition Paradigm Publishers, 2010
- ^ "In Memoriam: Ted Robert Gurr | START.umd.edu".
- ^ a b "Collection: Ted R. Gurr papers | Archival Collections". archives.lib.umd.edu. Retrieved 2020-08-18.
- ^ Violence in America: Vol 1, The History of Crime and Vol. 2, Protest, Rebellion, Reform, Sage, 1989
- ^ Peoples versus States: Minorities at Risk in the New Century (US Institute of Peace Press, 2000)
- ^ Ethnic Conflict in World Politics, with Barbara Harff (2003)
- ^ J. Joseph Hewitt, Jonathan Wilkenfeld, and T. R. Gurr, Peace and Conflict 2012 (Paradigm Publishers and Center for International Development and Conflict Management, University of Maryland)
- ^ Crime-Terror Alliances and the State: Ethnonationalist and Islamist Challenges to Regional Security, with Lyubov Grigorova Mincheva (Routledge 2013)
- ^ Will E. Gurr and T. R. Gurr, Coming of Age in the West 1883-1906, From the Mississippi to California and Gold Rush Alaska with my Minister Father, A Memoir by Will E. Gurr, Edited and Annotated by T. R. Gurr (Amazon/Create Space, 2011)
- ^ Paul Magel and T. R. Gurr, A Gurr Family Odyssey: From England to the American West, A Social History Covering Six Generations (Winnipeg: McNally Robinson, 2014)
