What determines whether a particular event is classified as part of an existing conflict or a random act of violence?

Niraj Kushwaha joins the podcast to talk about modeling instances of armed conflict using fine grained datasets to better understand the emergence of conflicts and how they might be related.

We discuss how conflicts can be categorized into three main types, and the primary variables that allow for their categorization. This takes us to the broader applications of this work, from modeling epidemics to climate change, and how statistical physics can be used to form hypotheses about the likelihood of future events of particular types.

Guest: Niraj Kushwaha

Niraj's latest paper on Data-driven conflict classification

The database Niraj mentioned: Armed Conflict & Event Data Project