ViEWS – a political Violence Early Warning System

ViEWS – a political Violence Early Warning System

This application presents a plan to explore the societal potential and financial viability of ViEWS – a political Violence Early Warning System, which has been developed as part of the ERC-AdG project no. 694640 at the Department of Peace and Conflict Research, Uppsala University, and Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO). It is a rigorous and transparent prediction system of unprecedented scope and performance that is positioned at the forefront of research on theoretical and methodological foundations for high-quality forecasts of political violence. The proposal describes how the research from the AdG project, as well as research conducted as extensions to the AdG project in collaboration with the UNHCR, UN ESCWA, and UK FCDO, can be applied to maximise the usefulness of the forecasting system for individuals and organisations that are dedicated to conflict prevention and mitigation, while simultaneously strengthening the system’s focus on transparency and open-access publication strategies. Planned activities include measures to solidify ViEWS’ reputation as a high-quality open-source early-warning system, and strategies to transform ViEWS into a financially viable and self-sustaining entity. The proposal also details concerted efforts to clarify our IPR position and strategy, incorporate recent user-specified developments into the early-warning system built under the AdG project, apply a user-centric approach to evaluate the predictive performance of the forecasting system (as a complement to current evaluation metrics), and a number of activities aimed at assessing, validating, and maximising the usefulness of the project's outcomes to the full target audience.