Abstract
Perhaps one of the most surprising arguments in this book, this chapter will make the case that quantitative researchers need to adopt critical methods (and vice versa). To understand geography and war, we need empirical analysis. But we cannot do this blindly: existing research has depended on data that do not meet the needs of conflict research. Two case studies will be presented: measuring mountains to study war and measuring levels of infrastructure development to study war. There are two reasons for choosing these case studies. First, they will demonstrate how we can move from critique to empirical analysis. Second, they will highlight two prominent areas of conflict research, which have depended on two fundamentally misleading geospatial variables.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
Sometimes referred to as spatial econometrics, even when economic factors are absent.
- 2.
Writing on the Caucasus, Radvanyi and Muduyev (2007) argue that ‘[a]mong the shortcomings of conventional geographical determinist discourse is the frequent use of the adjective ‘mountainous’ to describe the entire region without qualification or nuance’ (Radvanyi and Muduyev 2007, 158). Similarly, Ó Tuathail (2001) used discourse analysis to argue that people’s notions of mountains were used to create the idea of the Balkans being a powderkeg.
- 3.
See Openshaw (1984).
- 4.
And yes, there are Marilyns: a prominence of 150 metres: see Dawson (1992).
- 5.
Consider again some of the arguments presented in Chap. 1. As well as making the case that the use of the word ‘mountain’ in conflict literature often lacks nuance, Radvanyi and Muduyev (2007) point out that ‘most authors who purportedly analyse “the Caucasus” are actually writing about the piedmonts, unaware of reality in the mountains proper’ (Radvanyi and Muduyev 2007, 174). Zürcher (2007) argues that different types of mountains have different types of effects in South Ossetia, Abkhazia, Nagorno-Karabakh, and Chechnya. Bohara et al. (2006) find that hilly terrain saw the most violence in Nepal; the high Himalayas do not provide an environment in which conflict can occur: as a rule of thumb, the probability of conflict is low when you need to carry an oxygen tank. Finally, Dupuy (1985) finds that even land that is generally regarded as flat can hamper tank manoeuvres. Yet Gerrard (2000) argues that there is little point in distinguishing high from low mountains. Using a simple binary, mountain definition will disregard all of these points.
- 6.
Mountain definitions often come with bias; this bias can be based on national factors. Gerrard’s definition here, then, is refreshingly free from such bias: by setting the lower threshold at 1000 m, he has declared England void of mountains: even its highest point, Scafell Pike, is only between 977 and 979 m (depending on source).
- 7.
This map, then, uses one of the ‘tricks of the cartographic trade’ described by Harley (1989): the use of colour. However, another trick it employs, not mentioned by Harley, is that of vertical exaggeration. The elevation of the terrain has been increased by a considerable scale in order that the reader is able to differentiate high areas from lower areas more easily. Put simply, the high points in Africa are not quite as high as this map suggests. This trick is used by NASA quite frequently in their renderings of mountains on other planets. Olympus Mons may indeed be the highest mountain in the solar system; however, rather inconveniently, its gradient is rather shallow. Viewed from a distance, Olympus is not as pleasingly pointy as its terrestrial cousin, Everest, despite being considerably higher. As such, NASA exaggerates the y axis, in relation to the x and z axes. The same principle has been employed in creating the map in Fig. 6.2.
- 8.
This research considers sea level to be the lowest point on Earth. Several states have part of their territories at elevations considerably lower than this: indeed, the lowest point in Africa is Lake Assal (155 metres below sea level) which is today part of Djibouti but would have been part of the territory of Ethiopia. Handling negative elevations would have required considerably more research time but would not yield a substantially different result. As such, the compromise of sea level as the lowest point was accepted.
- 9.
The minimum figure of 0 on this eight-bit scale will represent 0 metres in reality; the maximum figure of 255 on the eight-bit scale will represent 8850 metres (Everest). Accordingly, each of the squares represented in this diagram can be converted to metres by multiplying by 34.71: the top left square (197) is therefore 6837 metres above sea level.
- 10.
Fearon and Laitin look at a slightly different set of states to Collier and Hoeffler; as Gerrard’s data set was created for Collier and Hoeffler, this means that there are some gaps in the data used by Fearon and Laitin. As such, Fearon and Laitin use some interesting methodological shortcuts to fill in these gaps. Adding to the inconsistency, Collier, Hoeffler and Rohner go on to use Fearon and Laitin’s inconsistent data set.
- 11.
A review of research using the DCW to look at infrastructure is beyond the scope of this case study, but as a brief sample, researchers have used the DCW to model infrastructure in their analyses of biodiversity loss (Alkemade et al. 2009), conflict and malnutrition in Africa (Rowhani et al. 2011; Sherbinin 2011), desertification (Okayasu et al. 2010), distribution of HIV and AIDS in Africa (Kalipeni and Zulu 2012), mobility patterns in the Ivory Coast (Dixon et al. 2014), civil wars in Africa (Buhaug and Rød 2006), distribution of forest elephants (Yackulic et al. 2011), and the future of China’s infrastructure (Hou and Li 2011).
- 12.
Nelson et al. (2006) write in reference to the Vector Smart Map Level 0 (VMap0), which is the successor to the DCW. The differences between the DCW and VMap0 are essentially data formatting issues; in terms of actual road data content, they can be regarded as functionally equivalent. The specifications for VMap0 can be found at Defense Mapping Agency (1995b) and Defense Mapping Agency (1995c).
- 13.
To give an idea of the number of people who worked on the creation of the DCW, Langaas (1995, 10) points out that ‘around 200 ESRI staff took part in the project, although several of these were only part-time involved. During the production peak fifty personnel worked full time.’
- 14.
See National Imagery and Mapping Agency (1995).
References
Alkemade, R., Oorschot, M. van, Miles, L., Nellemann, C., Bakkenes, M., & Brink, B. ten. (2009). Globio3: A framework to investigate options for reducing global terrestrial biodiversity loss. Ecosystems, 12(3), 374–390.
Aron, R. (1966). Peace and war: A theory of International Relations. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson. (Trans. Richard Howard and Annette Baker Fox)
Bishop, M. P., & Shroder, J. F. (2004). Geographic information science and mountain geomorphology. Berlin: Springer.
Bohara, A. K., Mitchell, N. J., & Nepal, M. (2006). Opportunity, democracy, and the exchange of political violence a subnational analysis of conflict in nepal. Journal of Conflict Resolution, 50(1), 108–128.
Boulding, K. (1962). Conflict and defense: A general theory. New York: Harper Torchbooks.
Buhaug, H. (2010a). Climate not to blame for African civil wars. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 107(38), 16477–16482.
Buhaug, H. (2010b). Dude, where’s my conflict? LSG, relative strength, and the location of civil war. Conflict Management and Peace Science, 27(2), 107–128.
Buhaug, H., & Gates, S. (2002). The geography of civil war. Journal of Peace Research, 39(4), 417–433.
Buhaug, H., & Gleditsch, K. S. (2005). The origin of conflict clusters: Contagion or bad neighborhoods? In Paper prepared for the third European Consortium for Political Research general conference. Budapest.
Buhaug, H., & Gleditsch, N. P. (2006). The death of distance? globalization of armed conflict. In M. Kahler & B. F. Walter (Eds.), Territoriality and conflict in an era of globalization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Buhaug, H., & Lujala, P. (2005). Accounting for scale: Measuring geography in quantitative studies of civil war. Political Geography, 24, 399–418.
Buhaug, H., & Nordkvelle, J. (2014, 11 November). Climate and conflict: A comment on Hsiang et al.’s reply to Buhaug et al. PRIO Paper.
Buhaug, H., & Rød, J. K. (2006). Local determinants of African civil wars, 1970–2001. Political Geography, 25(3), 315–335.
Burke, M. B., Miguel, E., Satyanath, S., Dykema, J. A., & Lobell, D. B. (2009). Warming increases the risk of civil war in Africa. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 106(49), 20670–20674.
Cederman, L.-E., Rød, J. K., & Weidmann, N. (2006). Geo-referencing of ethnic groups: Creating a new dataset. In Paper prepared for the GROW workshop, Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO). Oslo.
Collier, P., & Hoeffler, A. (2000). Greed and grievance in civil war. World Bank Development Research Group Policy Research Working Paper, 2355.
Collier, P., & Hoeffler, A. (2004). Greed and grievance in civil war. Oxford Economic Papers, 56, 563–595.
Cunningham, D., Gleditsch, K. S., & Salehyan, I. (2005). Dyadic interactions and civil war duration. In Paper prepared for the 46th annual convention of the International Studies Association. Honolulu, HI.
Dawson, A. (1992). The relative hills of Britain. Milnthorpe, Cumbria: Cicerone Press Limited.
Defense Mapping Agency. (1995a). Military Specification – Operational Navigation Charts (ONC), MIL-O-89102. http://earth-info.nga.mil/publications/specs/printed/89102/89102.pdf. (Online; accessed 12 February 2015)
Defense Mapping Agency. (1995b). Military Specification – Vector Smart Map (VMap) Level 0, MIL-V-89039. http://earth-info.nga.mil/publications/specs/printed/VMAP0/vmap0_main.doc. (Online; accessed 12 February 2015)
Defense Mapping Agency. (1995c). Military Specification – Vector Smart Map (VMap) Level 0, MIL-V-89039 Appendix. http://earth-info.nga.mil/publications/specs/printed/VMAP0/vmap0_app.doc. (Online; accessed 12 February 2015)
Dixon, M. F., Aiello, S. P., Fapohunda, F., & Goldstein, W. (2014). Detecting mobility patterns in mobile phone data from the Ivory Coast. Mobile Phone Data for Development, Analysis of Mobile Phone Datasets for the Development of Ivory Coast, 9, 656–665.
Dupuy, T. (1985). Numbers, predictions & war: The use of history to evaluate and predict the outcome of armed conflict. Fairfax, VA: HERO Books.
Farer, T. J. (1979). War clouds on the Horn of Africa: The widening storn (2nd ed.). New York: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
Fearon, J. D., & Laitin, D. D. (1999). Weak states, rough terrain, and large-scale ethnic violence since 1945. In Paper prepared for the annual meeting of the American Political Science Association. Atlanta, GA.
Fearon, J. D., & Laitin, D. D. (2003). Ethnicity, insurgency, and civil war. American Political Science Review, 97(1), 75–90.
Febvre, L. (1932). A geographical introduction to history. London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co.
Gates, S. (2002). Empirically assessing the causes of civil war. In Paper prepared for the annual convention of the International Studies Association. New Orleans.
Gerrard, J. (2000). What is a mountain? World Bank, DECRG.
Gleditsch, K. S. (2007). Transnational dimensions of civil war. Journal of Peace Research, 44(3), 293–309.
Gleditsch, K. S., & Pickering, S. (2014). Wars are becoming less frequent: A response to Harrison and Wolf. The Economic History Review, 67(1), 214–230.
Gleditsch, N. P. (1967). Trends in world airline patterns. Journal of Peace Research, 4(4), 366–408.
Goudie, A. (1985). The encyclopaedic dictionary of physical geography. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.
Goulty, G. A. (1991). A dictionary of landscape. Aldershot: Avebury Technical.
Guevara, A. C. (1961). Guerrilla warfare. New York: Monthly Review Press.
Harley, J. B. (1989). Deconstructing the map. Cartographica, 26(2), 1–20.
Hell, X. Hommaire de. (1847). Travels in the steppes of the Caspian Sea, the Crimea, the Caucasus, &c. London: Chapman and Hall.
Hou, Q., & Li, S.-M. (2011). Transport infrastructure development and changing spatial accessibility in the Greater Pearl River Delta, China, 1990–2020. Journal of Transport Geography, 19(6), 1350–1360.
Hsiang, S. M., Burke, M., & Miguel, E. (2013). Quantifying the influence of climate on human conflict. Science, 341(6151), 1235367-1–1235367-14.
ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 24 Committee. (2004). ISO/IEC 15948:2004. ISO.
Kalipeni, E., & Zulu, L. C. (2012). HIV and AIDS in Africa: A geographic analysis at multiple spatial scales. GeoJournal, 77(4), 505–523.
Langaas, S. (1995). Completeness of the Digital Chart of the World (DCW) database. UNEP/GRID-Arendal.
Lichbach, J. I. (1995). The rebel’s dilemma. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press.
Morelle, R. (2013, 2 August). Rise in violence ‘linked to climate change’. BBC News.
National Imagery and Mapping Agency. (1995). Vector Map Level 0 (VMap). http://earth-info.nga.mil/publications/vmap0.html. ([Online; accessed 12 February 2015])
Nelson, A., Sherbinin, A. de, & Pozzi, F. (2006). Towards development of a high quality public domain global roads database. Data Science Journal, 5, 223–265.
NOAA. (n.d.). Version 4 DMSP-OLS Nighttime Lights Time Series. Version4DMSP-OLSNighttimeLightsTimeSeries. (Image and data processing by NOAA’s National Geophysical Data Center. DMSP data collected by US Air Force Weather Agency.)
Okayasu, T., Okuro, T., Jamsran, U., & Takeuchi, K. (2010). Desertification emerges through cross-scale interaction. Global Environmental Research, 14, 71–77.
O’Loughlin, J. (2003). Spatial analysis in political geography. In J. Agnew, K. Mitchell, & G. Ó Tuathail (Eds.), A companion to political geography. Oxford: Blackwell.
Openshaw, S. (1984). The modifiable areal unit problem. Catmog, Study Group in Quantitative Methods, 38.
Ormhaug, C. (2007). Disaggregating conflict data – coding challenges. In Paper prepared for the annual meeting of the International Studies Association.
Ó Tuathail, G. (2001). The Bosnian war and the American securing of “Europe”. In M. Antonsich, V. Kolossov, & M. P. Pagnini (Eds.), On the century of Ratzel’s Politische Geographie: Europe between political geography and geopolitics (Vol. 2, pp. 797–812). Rome: Società Geografica Italiana.
Owens, P. N., & Slaymaker, O. (2004). Mountain geomorphology. Arnold.
Pickering, S. (2012). Proximity, maps and conflict: New measures, new maps and new findings. Conflict Management and Peace Science, 29(4), 425–443.
Pickering, S. (2015). infra: An infrastructure proxy function. Retrieved from http://CRAN.R-project.org/package=infra (R package version 0.1.2)
Pickering, S. (2016). Introducing SpatialGridBuilder: A new system for creating geo-coded datasets. Conflict Management and Peace Science, 33(4), 423–447.
Potere, D., Schneider, A., Angel, S., & Civco, D. L. (2009). Mapping urban areas on a global scale: Which of the eight maps now available is more accurate? International Journal of Remote Sensing, 30(24), 6531–6558.
Radvanyi, J., & Muduyev, S. S. (2007). Challenges facing the mountain peoples of the Caucasus. Eurasian Geography and Economics, 48(2), 157–177.
Raleigh, C., & Hegre, H. (2009). Population size, concentration, and civil war. a geographically disaggregated analysis. Political Geography, 28(4), 224–238.
Robst, J., Polachek, S., & Chang, Y.-C. (2007). Geographic proximity, trade, and international conflict/cooperation. Conflict Management and Peace Science, 24(1), 1–24.
Rowhani, P., Degomme, O., Guha-Sapir, D., & Lambin, E. F. (2011). Malnutrition and conflict in east Africa: The impacts of resource variability on human security. Climatic Change, 105(1–2), 207–222.
Sambanis, N. (2002). A review of recent advances and future directions in the quantitative literature on civil war. Defence and Peace Economics, 13(3), 215–243.
Sandvik, B. (2008). World borders dataset. http://www.thematicmapping.org/downloads/world_borders.php. (Online; accessed 12 February 2015)
Semple, E. C. (1911). Influences of geographic environment on the basis of Ratzel’s system of anthropo-geography. New York: Henry Holt and Company.
Sherbinin, A. de. (2011). The biophysical and geographical correlates of child malnutrition in Africa. Population, Space and Place, 17(1), 27–46.
Siverson, R. M., & Starr, H. (1991). The diffusion of war: A study of opportunity and willingness. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press.
Smith, B. (1995). On drawing lines on a map. In A. U. Frank, W. Kuhn, & D. M. Mark (Eds.), Spatial information theory: Proceedings of COSIT ’95 (pp. 475–484). Berlin: Springer Verlag.
Smith, C. G., & Langaas, S. (1995). A survey of Digital Chart of the World (DCW) use and data quality. UNEP/GRID-Arendal.
Starr, H. (1978). “Opportunity” and “willingness” as ordering concepts in the study of war. International Interactions, 4(4), 363–387.
Starr, H., & Bain, W. (1995). The application of geographic information systems (GIS) to international studies. International Studies Notes, 20(2), 1–8.
Starr, H., & Most, B. A. (1976). The substance and study of borders in international relations research. International Studies Quarterly, 581–620.
Starr, H., & Most, B. A. (1978). A return journey: Richardson, “frontiers” and wars in the 1946–1965 era. Journal of Conflict Resolution, 22(3), 441–467.
Storeygard, A. (2013). Farther on down the road: Transport costs, trade and urban growth in sub-saharan Africa. World Bank Policy Research Working Paper(6444).
Tammen, R. L., Kugler, J., Lemke, D., Stam, A. C., Alsharabati, C., Abdollahian, M. A., et al. (2000). Power transistions: Strategies for the 21st century. New York: Chatham House Publishers.
Theisen, O. M., Gleditsch, N. P., & Buhaug, H. (2013). Is climate change a driver of armed conflict? Climatic Change, 117(3), 613–625.
Thorsell, J. W., & Harrison, J. (1992). National parks and nature reserves in mountain environments and development. GeoJournal, 27(1), 113–126.
Toft, M. D. (2003). The geography of ethnic violence: Identities, interests and the indivisibility of territory. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Uchida, H., & Nelson, A. (2010). Agglomeration index: Towards a new measure of urban concentration (Tech. Rep.). Tokyo: Working paper/World Institute for Development Economics Research.
Wesley, J. P. (1962). Frequency of wars and geographical opportunity. Journal of Conflict Resolution, 387–389.
Yackulic, C. B., Strindberg, S., Maisels, F., & Blake, S. (2011). The spatial structure of hunter access determines the local abundance of forest elephants (Loxodonta africana cyclotis). Ecological Applications, 21(4), 1296–1307.
Zürcher, C. (2007). The post-Soviet wars: Rebellion, ethnic conflict and nationhood in the Caucasus. New York: New York University Press.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Copyright information
© 2017 The Author(s)
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Pickering, S. (2017). Critical Quantitative Geo-Spatial Methods and War. In: Understanding Geography and War. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-52217-7_6
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-52217-7_6
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, New York
Print ISBN: 978-1-137-52216-0
Online ISBN: 978-1-137-52217-7
eBook Packages: Political Science and International StudiesPolitical Science and International Studies (R0)