About the Institute
Thesis
Approach
Foundation
Commitments
Director
Aequitas is an independent research institute diagnosing why institutional accountability fails in high-stakes institutional environments. The institute's analytical commitment is structural rather than procedural: the work addresses the architecture inside which institutional behavior happens, not the conduct of actors within it. Findings identify structural conditions; recommendations follow from the diagnosis.
Mixed methods structural-institutional analysis grounded in documented institutional behavior, named events, and public-record material. The methodology is comparative: structural mechanisms identified in one institutional domain are tested for portability to others where the structural conditions are equivalent. Current empirical domains include U.S. defense AI governance and post-conflict policing accountability. The institute’s analytical structure is defined in the Framework.
The analytical foundation builds on sustained prior research in post-conflict policing accountability conducted at the Committee on the Administration of Justice in Belfast. That research, including reports on the independence of the Office of the Police Ombudsman for Northern Ireland (Beyers, 2011) and on the MI5/PSNI national security policing arrangements (Beyers and Holder, 2012), informed the Criminal Justice Inspection Northern Ireland's September 2011 inspection into OPONI independence, which contributed to a package of reforms presented to the Northern Ireland Assembly's Committee for Justice in June 2013. The research on the post-St Andrews national security policing architecture continues to be referenced in ongoing public accountability discussions.
Five analytical commitments shape every output the institute produces:
Structural rather than procedural
Analysis of the architecture inside which institutional behavior happens, not the conduct of actors within it.
Empirical rather than abstract
Analysis grounded in documented institutional behavior, named events, and public record material.
Cross-sector
Structural diagnosis across sectors when similar structural conditions are present. The framework was developed in one institutional domain and applied to others where the conditions hold.
Diagnostic rather than prescriptive
Identifies the accountability gaps that structural conditions produce. Recommendations follow from the diagnosis.
Independent
The institute is not affiliated with the institutions it analyzes. Independence is the source of the analytical standing.
The institute is directed by Dr. Michelle Beyers, Associate Teaching Professor at Arizona State University. Her research examines structural accountability in defense AI governance and post-conflict policing. Prior empirical work at the Committee on the Administration of Justice in Belfast informed institutional reforms to the Office of the Police Ombudsman for Northern Ireland and contributed to the public record on the post-St Andrews national security policing architecture. She holds a PhD from the University of Washington and is the author of the 3+1 Structural Accountability Framework that anchors the institute's analytical work.
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