This article presents the UCDP Georeferenced Event Dataset (UCDP GED). The UCDP GED is an event dataset that disaggregates three types of organized violence (state-based conflict, non-state conflict, and one-sided violence) both spatially and temporally. Each event -defined as an instance of organized violence with at least one fatalitycomes with date, geographical location, and identifiers that allow the dataset to be linked to and merged with other UCDP datasets. The first version of the dataset covers events of fatal violence on the African continent between 1989 and 2010. This article, firstly, introduces the rationale for the new dataset, and explains the basic coding procedures as well as the quality controls. Secondly, we discuss some of the data's potential weaknesses in representing the universe of organized violence, as well as some potential biases induced by the operationalizations. Thirdly, we provide an example of how the data can be used, by illustrating the association between cities and organized violence, taking population density into account. The UCDP GED is a useful resource for conflict analyses below the state and country-year levels, and can provide us with new insights into the geographical determinants and temporal sequencing of warfare and violence.

In this article, I examine to what extent gender equality is associated with lower levels of intrastate armed conflict. I use three measures of gender equality: (1) a dichotomous indicator of whether the highest leader of a state is a woman; (2) the percentage of women in parliament; and (3) the female-to-male higher education attainment ratio. I argue that the first two measures in particular capture the extent to which women hold positions that allow them to influence matters of war and peace within a state. I further argue that all three measures, but especially the last two, capture how women are valued relative to men in a society, that is, the relative degree of subordination of women. Whereas female state leadership has no statistically significant effect, more equal societies, measured either in terms of female representation in parliament or the ratio of female-to-male higher education attainment, are associated with lower levels of intrastate armed conflict. The pacifying impact of gender equality is not only statistically significant in the presence of a comprehensive set of controls but also is strong in substantive terms.The claim developed in feminist theory that societies based to a lesser extent on gender hierarchies are less beset by collective violence bears directly on some of the most central questions in the study of International Relations. Following a debate about the relationship between this field of research and feminist scholarship

In 2007, 34 armed conflicts were active worldwide, up by one from 2006 and by five from 2003, the year with the lowest number of active armed conflicts since the 1970s. While the number of conflicts increased, the number of wars, i.e. conflicts with over 1,000 battle-related deaths in a year, dropped by one to four. Five of the conflicts from 2006 were no longer active in 2007, but during the year, two previously recorded conflicts (in Mali and Pakistan) were restarted by new actors and two (in Angola and Peru) by previously recorded rebel groups. For the first time since 2004, two new conflicts were recorded: a conflict over governmental power in Niger and a territorial conflict in DRC. A conflict may involve one or more dyads or pairs of warring parties. In the 236 conflicts active since 1946, 487 dyads have been recorded in the new UCDP Dyadic Dataset. While most intrastate conflicts involve a single rebel group fighting the government, in 30 of the conflicts two or more dyads were active simultaneously. In 2002 and 2003, over 30% of the active conflicts involved more than one rebel group. The number of active rebel groups and changes in the set of groups are important elements of the complexity of any armed conflict, and the study of these aspects should be greatly facilitated with the new dataset. By adding the dyadic dimension to the study of conflicts, the analysis of a range of phenomena that have hardly been captured by previously available data is made possible.

The alarming upward trend since 2012 in the number of fatalities incurred by organized violence did not continue in 2015. Indeed, 2014 saw more than 130,000 people killed in organized violence while in 2015 this figure was close to 118,000. This is still an unusually high number, the third-worst year in the post-Cold War period. The number of conflicts continued to increase from 41 in 2014 to 50 in 2015. This increase was by and large driven by the expansion of the Islamic State. Most of the fatalities, over 97,000, incurred in state-based conflicts. Non-state conflicts also increased, from 61 in 2014 to 70 in 2015, the highest number recorded in the 1989-2015 period. No non-state conflict passed the threshold of 1,000 battle-related deaths, but 11 state-based conflicts did -a decrease by one from 2014. Seven of the ten most violent state-based conflicts in 2014 became less violent. Twenty-six actors were registered in one-sided violence just as in 2014, while the number of fatalities decreased from over 13,500 to 9,500.

The dramatic increase in the number of fatalities in organized violence, seen between 2011 and 2014, did not continue in 2015 and 2016. Rather, the notation of some 131,000 fatalities in 2014 was followed by a steep decline, with just below 119,000 in 2015 and a little over 102,000 fatalities in 2016. Despite the decrease, the number was the fifth highest during the entire 1989-2016 period. Most of the fatalities -over 87,000 -were incurred in statebased conflicts, the main driver behind the trend. Just as the number of fatalities, the number of state-based conflicts, albeit remaining on a high level, continued to decrease in 2016, going from 52 to 49, with 12 of them reaching the level of war, with at least 1,000 battle-related deaths. Also the non-state conflicts dropped in number in 2016, from 73 to 60. This was followed by a decrease in the number of fatalities, and only one conflict caused more than 1,000 deaths. Twenty-one actors were registered in one-sided violence, down by five from 2015. A number this low has only been recorded twice before; in both 2009 and 2010, 21 one-sided actors were listed in UCDP data. The number of fatalities also decreased, going from almost 9,800 to a little over 6,000.