A Global Forecasting Model of Political Instability

Prior studies of civil conflict using panel studies or econometric models have provided inconsistent results. This paper presents the results of a new study, using case-control methods, to identify risk factors for political instability two years prior to event onset. The models we derive are surprisingly simple, and yet are able to identify states that will or will not experience political instability two years hence with over 80% accuracy in the historical data across several random samples. Using global data from 1955 to 2003, we examine a wide range of political upheavals and demonstrate that regime type is overwhelmingly the dominant factor behind revolutions, ethnic wars, and adverse regime changes. However, the effect of regime type is not a simple function of the degree of democracy or autocracy. Rather, certain kinds of autocracies and democracies are much more vulnerable than others, depending on the patterns of executive recruitment and political participation under those regimes.