An agent-based model of urban insurgence: Effect of gathering sites and Koopman mode analysis

Authored by Maria Fonoberova, Igor Mezic, Jadranka Mezic, Ryan Mohr

Date Published: 2018

DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0205259

Sponsors: AFOSR

Platforms: No platforms listed

Model Documentation: Other Narrative

Model Code URLs: Model code not found

Abstract

The paper investigates the effect of preferential gathering sites on urban insurgency in an agent-based model (ABM). The ABM model was proposed in earlier work and has been validated using FBI data. There is a nonlinear tradeoff between the local density of citizens due to the number of preferential gathering sites and the ability of law enforcement officers (LEOs) to adequately patrol that leads to a non-monotonic behavior in the number of large scale outburst of insurgency with respect to the number of gathering sites. The inclusion of a moderate number of sites decreases the number of large-scale outbursts. Having no gathering sites or a large number of gathering sites has a dilutive effect on the number of large-scale outbursts. Thus, this non-monotonicity indicates that a small number of organized units produces a larger insurgency effect than a larger number of distributed units. It is also shown, using Koopman mode analysis, that the spatial morphology of agents due to the gathering sites gives rise to temporal organization of the model dynamics; there is a prominent quasi-periodic component in the number of active and intimidated citizens and in the spatial distribution of the LEOs.

Tags

behavior Violence systems Sociology