Collaborative Research: Contentious Issues in World Politics: Updating the ICOW Dataset

这个项目通过战争相关问题(ICow)项目提供额外的数据收集，这是一个由Paul R.Hensel(北得克萨斯大学)和Sara McLaughlin Mitchell(爱荷华州大学)共同指导的合作项目。ICow项目收集两个或多个国家之间涉及有争议边界的地缘政治冲突的信息，包括陆地边界(或岛屿)、海域和跨界河流的冲突。到目前为止，该项目已经编码和公布了自1816年以来在北美、中美、南美、西欧和东欧以及中东发生的450多个问题冲突。该项目已经研究的一些竞争激烈的地区包括福克兰群岛、丰塞卡湾、约旦河和阿尔萨斯-洛林。对这些数据的分析已经让我们了解到，各国何时可能诉诸军事化手段来解决地缘政治问题，以及何时和平冲突管理努力能够取得成功。拟议的项目涉及完成关于边界争端(1816-2001年)、海洋争端(1900-2001年)和河流争端(1900-2001年)的数据收集，这些数据涉及目前未被国际海洋观测组织项目覆盖的其余区域：非洲、亚洲和大洋洲。ICow项目记录了关于所声称的问题对每个相关国家的重要性的信息，以及为解决这一有争议的问题而进行的所有和平外交和军事化尝试。和平尝试包括争端双方之间的双边谈判，以及第三方通过调解、仲裁、裁决等方式解决争议问题的努力。迄今为止，该项目记录了2005年美洲、欧洲和中东和平和军事化试图解决问题索赔的信息。当项目完成后，我们将把案例年表上载到网站上，这将使政策制定者更容易获得关于每一次历史上和正在进行的边界争端的详细信息。从理论上讲，这个项目通过使用新的数据来研究新的有争议的问题产生的过程，问题导致长期的国家间竞争的过程，以及国际机构在管理和解决问题方面的相对成功，扩大了我们对问题的理解。首先，审查了新冲突出现的方式。一些国家对，如洪都拉斯-尼加拉瓜和法国-德国，在其历史互动过程中出现了许多不同的地缘政治问题，而其他国家对则完全避免了此类冲突。这些冲突的一个明显预测因素涉及冲突发生的基本机会，例如通过共同的陆地边界。与水有关的争端也更有可能发生在水更稀缺和由于人口和工业需求较大而需求较高的地区。这个项目还侧重于国家吗？国内机构和参与国际组织(如联合国)。民主国家和国际组织成员是否有更相似的外交政策偏好，从而避免地缘政治冲突，或者它们只是用和平工具更有效地管理出现的问题？初步分析支持后一种解释，尽管来自亚洲、非洲和大洋洲的其他数据将确保这些结果的概括性。第二，开发了一种基于地缘政治问题的新的竞争衡量标准。这包括在同一问题上有两个或两个以上持续问题冲突或两个或两个以上军事化争端的成对国家。这些措施使人们更清楚地了解冲突管理的进程，在问题竞争和问题非竞争环境方面有所不同。最后，主要调查员延长了他们以前在机构和冲突管理方面的工作。例如，海洋问题可以由专门针对问题的组织，如海洋法公约(UNCLOS)，或由更一般的组织，如欧洲联盟和联合国来管理。他们审查了哪些类型的组织最适合帮助各国达成成功和长期的协议。除了这些新的研究主题，新扩大的数据还将允许学者通过引入有关殖民历史较丰富地区的问题冲突的信息，来改进之前对殖民遗产等因素的研究。

This project provides for additional data collection by the Issue Correlates of War (ICOW) project, a collaborative project co-directed by Paul R. Hensel (University of North Texas) and Sara McLaughlin Mitchell (University of Iowa). The ICOW project collects information on geopolitical conflicts between two or more countries involving disputed boundaries, including conflicts over land boundaries (or islands), maritime areas, and cross-border rivers. To date, the project has coded and made public information on over 450 issue conflicts since 1816 in North, Central, and South America, Western and Eastern Europe, and the Middle East. Some examples of hotly contested areas already studied by the project include the Falkland Islands, the Gulf of Fonseca, the Jordan river, and Alsace-Lorraine. Analysis of this data has already taught us a great deal about when countries are likely to resort to militarized means to resolve geopolitical issues, as well as when peaceful conflict management efforts are well positioned to succeed. The proposed project involves completion of data collection on border disputes (1816-2001), maritime disputes (1900-2001), and river disputes (1900-2001) for the remaining regions not currently covered by the ICOW project: Africa, Asia, and Oceania. The ICOW project records information on the importance of the claimed issue to each state involved, as well as all peaceful diplomatic and militarized attempts to resolve the contested issue. Peaceful attempts include bilateral talks between the disputants, as well as third party efforts to resolve the contested issue using mediation, arbitration, adjudication, etc. To date, the project has recorded information on 2005 peaceful and militarized attempts to settle issue claims in the Americas, Europe, and the Middle East. When the project is complete, we will upload case chronologies to the website, which will make it easier for policy makers to access detailed information about each historical and ongoing boundary dispute. Theoretically, this project expands our understanding of issues by using the new data to study the process by which new contentious issues arise, the process by which issues lead to long-term interstate rivalries, and the relative success of international institutions for managing and settling issues. First, the manner in which new conflicts emerge is examined. Some pairs of states, such as Honduras-Nicaragua and France-Germany, have had lots of different geopolitical issues arise throughout the course of their historical interactions, while other pairs of states avoid such conflicts altogether. One obvious predictor of these conflicts involves basic opportunities for them to occur, such as through shared land borders. Water-based disputes are also more likely to occur in areas where water is more scarce and in higher demand due to larger population and industrial needs. This project also focuses on countries? domestic institutions and participation in international organizations (such as the United Nations). Do democracies and international organization members have more similar foreign policy preferences and thus avoid geopolitical conflicts, or do they simply manage issues that arise more efficiently with peaceful tools? Initial analyses support the latter explanation, although additional data from Asia, Africa, and Oceania will ensure the generalizability of these results. Second, a new measure of rivalry based on geopolitical issues is developed. This includes pairs of countries with two or more ongoing issue conflicts or two or more militarized disputes over the same issue. These measures provide a clearer picture of the process of conflict management differs in issue rivalry and issue non-rivalry environments. Finally, the principal investigators extend their previous work on institutions and conflict management. Maritime issues, for example, can be managed by issue specific organizations like the Law of the Sea Convention (UNCLOS) or by more general organizations like the European Union and United Nations. They examine which types of organizations are best suited to helping states reach successful and long-lasting agreements. Beyond these new research topics, the newly expanded data will also allow scholars to improve previous research on factors such as colonial legacies by introducing information about issue conflicts in regions with richer colonial histories.