Following revelations earlier this week around the caste-orientated work for political parties conducted by SCL India, documents made public by Christopher Wylie, the Cambridge Analytica whistleblower, on Thursday provided a glimpse of other work conducted by the group, including in tackling honour killings.
Between 2009 and 2010 SCL carried out a project for an unnamed client on honour killings in Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan, to better understand the “often convoluted and secretive culture surrounding honour killing” and the “socio-cultural understandings of honour…that drove the murders.”
The work was carried out by SCL Social, and was among documents published by the House of Commons Department of Culture, Media and Sports select committee, based on material provided by Mr. Wylie following his explosive testimony earlier this week.
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The company used “space mapping” and proposed a number of interventions that could help stop the practice.
Other work carried out by SCL Social ranged from work to tackle criminality on the island of St. Lucia and jihadist recruitment in Pakistan, based on surveys including in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, and which recommended a strategy focused around the empowerment of older women, education and local investment.
The bundle of documents cover SCL Group’s work across the world, including in elections. Other work included psychological operations for Britain’s Ministry of Defence and Britain’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office, for which it carried out a behavioural study in Pakistan relating to counter-jihadist strategies.
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“SCL Social were a joy to work with,” writes an FCO figure in a reference statement. Another U.S. government agency commissioned SCL Social to carry out work relating to violent extremism in unnamed South and Southeast Asian countries.
Mr. Wylie’s testimony on Tuesday, provided a startling picture of the influence wielded by the Group and its division Cambridge Analytica, both in the build-up to the U.S. presidential election.
Mr. Wylie challenged claims that Aggregate IQ, which worked for one of the main U.K. pro-Brexit groups was not linked to SCL, and suggested their work raised questions about the legitimacy of the UK 2016 referendum.
“This is not about Leave/Remain — it’s about protecting our democracy,” wrote Mr. Wylie, who described himself as a rare breed of “progressive” Eurosceptic, and took to Twitter to urge people to attend a rally on Thursday called by the group Fair Vote, pushing for a second referendum.