Data and progress in peace and conflict research

Abstract

We highlight how efforts to collect systematic data on conflict have helped foster progress in peace and conflict research. The Journal of Peace Research has played a key role in these developments, and has become a leading outlet for the new wave of disaggregated conflict data.We survey progress in the development of conflict data and how this interacts with theory development and progress in research, drawing specifically on examples from the move towards a greater focus on disaggregation and agency in conflict research. We focus on disaggregation in three specific dimensions, namely the resolution of conflict data, agency in conflict data, as well as the specific strategies used in conflict, and we also discuss new efforts to study conflict processes beyond the use of violence. We look ahead to new challenges in conflict research and how data developments and the emergence of 'big data' push us to think harder about types of conflict, agency, as well as the 'right' level of aggregation for querying data and evaluating specific theories.3

Framed field experiment on resource scarcity & extraction: Path-dependent generosity within sequential water appropriation

“…For these types of natural experiments on collective action see, e.g., a review de Rooij et al (2009). 4 Environmental conflicts can also be triggered by asymmetries in power relations, divergent attitudes toward the resources (Bob and Bronkhorst, 2010), institutional factors (Timura, 2001;Hagmann, 2005;Gleditsch et al, 2013;Bernauer et al, 2012), and control of valued market (mainly non-renewable) resources such as mineral, metals, oil and others (Schwartz et al, 2000).…”

Communication Technology and Reports on Political Violence

“…The ability to collect and analyze event data provide contemporary scholars' with opportunities to explore micro-level mechanisms of repression, mobilization, and strategies of violence (Gleditsch, Metternich and Ruggeri 2014). (Galtung and Ruge 1965;Snyder and Kelly 1977;Franzosi 1987;Woolley 2000;Fleeson 2003;Earl et al 2004), there have been few efforts to explore the quality of "Big Data" in the internet age (notable exceptions include Price and Ball (2014), Weidmann (2015) and Weidmann (2016)).…”

A Dynamic Embedding Model of the Media Landscape

“…These works have monitored the media response to events such as protests, [33] natural disasters [23] or conflicts. [14,21,47] This data-source was also used to get a world-wide view on coverage of global issues like climate change. [29] Research Questions: Given the work above, several research questions are of our interest and have remained unanswered:…”