Event Data Research on Political Behavior

These papers have employed Penn State Event Data Project (Formerly KEDS) data to study various types of political behavior. If you have any works you would like to include on this site, please contact us.

Event Type, Sub-state Actor and Temporal Dimensions of the Dissent-Repression Relationship: Evidence from the Middle East

Philip A. Schrodt and Ömür Yilmaz

This article explores the temporal relationship between state repression and collective dissent in six Middle Eastern states—Egypt, Israel, Palestine, Jordan, Kuwait and Turkey—for the period May 1991 to April 2007. The method of analysis is cross-correlation at ±40 weeks of event data coded from Agence France Presse (AFP) newswire reports. We disaggregate to the weekly level, and in the Israel-Palestine case, distinguish between secular Palestinian groups and the Islamist opposition as dissident actors. Using the CAMEO event coding system, we also differentiate between violent and nonviolent protest and repression. AFP provided inadequate coverage to do meaningful analysis of Jordan and Kuwait. In the remaining cases—as well as in some of the Israel and Palestine sub-state actor cases—the cross-correlation strongly supports the hypothesis of repression following dissent. The only cases with clear evidence for protest correlating with prior repression are those involving Palestinian Islamist groups.

Currently under review. An earlier version was presented at the 2007 Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, Chicago.

Link to Adobe .pdf file of the paper

Link to web site containing supplementary material for the paper

Political Persecution or Economic Deprivation? A Time-Series Analysis of Haitian Exodus, 1990-2004

Stephen M. Shellman and Brandon Stewart

This study addresses the factors that lead individuals to flee their homes in search of refuge. Many argue that individuals abandon their homes in favor of an uncertain life elsewhere because of economic hardship, while others argue that threats to their lives, physical person, and liberty cause them to flee. This study engages the debate by analyzing flight patterns over time from Haiti to the United States as a function of economic and security factors. Which factors have the largest influence on Haitian-U.S. migratory patterns? Our results show that both economics and security play a role, however, our analyses are able to distinguish between the effects of different individual economic and security indicators on Haitian-U.S. migration. In particular, the time-series analyses assess the impacts of important events in Haitian history on flight patterns such as the 1991 and 2004 coups d'état.

Link to Adobe .pdf file of the paper

Patterns, Rules and Learning: Computational Models of International Behavior

Philip A. Schrodt

This book-length manuscript discusses a general approach to the computational modeling of political behavior using patterns, rules, and learning. Techniques discussed include rule-based models, machine learning methods, and event sequence analysis. The original manuscript was completed 1994; this version includes an epilogue written in 2004.

Link to Adobe .pdf file of the book (287 pp, 2.6 Mb)

LAST UPDATED: 16 AUGUST 2005