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TU-SAMF-Utstyr/databaser/samlinger - Samfunnsvitenskap

Armed Conflict: An Extension of the PRIO/Uppsala Database

Awarded: NOK 0.89 mill.

The Armed Conflict database is widely used as a source of armed conflict data only two years after its initial release. The project seeks to address some shortcomings to the database that are barriers to releasing the full potential for the use of the dat abase. These improvements seek to increase the amount of information available in the database, ensuring better integration with related projects, providing better and more versatile solutions to difficult coding issues, and improving the accessibility of the database. The project will involve coding more refined information on when conflicts start and end, their precise geographical location and how this changes over time, and integrate information on opposition groups into the database. The database is widely regarded as the best source when asking questions such as how many conflicts are going on in the world. It is less ideal for studying the causes of or factors affecting when conflicts start or end. For these purposes, researchers are typically forced to make some coding choices and to restructure the data consequently. The project will formulate some of the most obvious coding decisions and provide a set of datasets that reflect these. A series of data collection efforts based on the Uppsala d ata are going on. A better integration of these efforts would be very useful, both in terms of exchange of information and of integration of the data sources themselves. The main challenge of the project will be to formulate more flexible criteria and re structure the database in order to meet the needs and wishes of individual researchers, especially regarding different definitions of when an armed conflict starts and ends. The project will improve accessibility of the dataset by providing ready-made da tasets in different formats. The project will also develop software solutions to generate such datasets interactively, or adapt the database to be integrated into such software solutions.

Funding scheme:

TU-SAMF-Utstyr/databaser/samlinger - Samfunnsvitenskap

Thematic Areas and Topics

No thematic area or topic related to the project