This data set contains information about public opinion towards Israel and the Palestinian Authority. It was collected on February 14, 2001. The Gallup poll asked respondents to rate their overall opinion of Israel and the Palestinian Authority. The data was collected in interval form on a scale of -5 to +5, 0 was not an option. There was also a no opinion option. The higher numbers denoted favorable opinions of Israel and Palestine and the lower numbers denoted less favorable opinions of Israel and Palestine. The data set is publicly available online. — Emily Briskman

This project monitored the 2000 election process by conducting over 100,000 interviews over 60 weeks leading up to the election. The surveys were conducted by International Communications Research of Media, PA, and used a cross-sectional design with a minimum of 1000 respondents for each of the 60 weekly surveys Their most important study was the voter involvement index, which was conducted every week. It was calculated by averaging the responses to four questions- whether people say they pay close attention to the campaign, and whether they have seen, talked about, or thought about a news story about the campaign in the past day. Secondary questions, involving reactions to the campaign, voter involvement measures, and how certain structural variations (debate formats, for example) affect voter interest, were asked on a rotating basis. Voter issue knowledge was also tested. This data is all available online at no cost from the website, and can be accessed in table or graph form. The project also posted a number of papers analyzing their data, which can also be accessed free of charge. — Josh Pantesco

The data set presented is a table showing income, in dollars, of citizens of each of the counties in Florida. It is represented in many different categories ranging from household, families, married-couple families, female householder, males and females fifteen years and older, and most importantly per capita income. Each category is also broken down into interval categories, where income is derived from and the median income pertaining to each category. The per capita income, which will be the main focus of study of the table, is a rational measure in U.S. dollars in 1989. This data was collected and compiled in the 1990 decennial census of the United States. — Robert Fuller

This data set is in the form of a contact list, and is provided by the Center for American Woman and Politics. This contact list serves as both a resource, and a tool to gage which states have political action committees or donor networks. This data shows that 46 PACs and donor networks are in operation in this country. Though the display of the organizations does not provide this conclusion visually, the web site breaks down the PAC’s numerically by state. The contact list is publicly available. — Emily Task

This data set provides useful documentation of the congressional legislation and voting roll calls for the last year. It is a compilation of abstracts of all of the bills proposed, whether on procedural o�r substantive matters. The book also outlines the major issues debated by this particular congress along with the main arguments of these debates and their major supporters and opposition. The book also has tables showing the relative support of the president by different members of congress, and the lines along which party unity held. The data set includes roll calls from both the Senate and The House of Representatives. The methodology behind the compilation of the data included in the book is on pages B-11, B-12, and B-18. This Compilation to CQ’s Voting Analyses states that the data was based upon tabulating the roll call votes on which members were asked to vote "yea" or "nay", excluding quorum calls. The scores of individual legislators were based upon those actually cast, and all overall scores were also based upon "yea" or "nay" votes. — KC Stover

This website contains disclosure of campaign contributions that is given to candidates who are running for either Congress or for president, as required by law. The data looks at the reported contributions made to individuals over the last three House and Senate campaigns (1996, 1998, 2000), as well as the last two Presidential campaigns (1996, 2000). The data is in ratio form-the number zero equates to lack of money that is raised during an election cycle. The data and variables that are collected not only reviews simply what individual candidates received over an election period, but also compares reported contributions between opponents, what the candidate received during an FEC election reporting cycle (pre-primary, post-general, etc.), the party of the individual whether the congressional seat was open or contains an incumbent, etc. The goal of the finance report is not necessarily for the government itself to make any specific analysis on the information that is given, but rather simply to make readily statistics available for public viewing. The coded variables are accessible, and is located within the government’s website. — Jonathan Parker

This data set tracks the assessment, naturalization, and apprehension of different foreign natives who tried or did enter the United States in 1999. The publication covers the movements of legal and illegal aliens, which take the form of immigrants, temporary visitors, parolees (defined as an alien, which is allowed into the country temporarily for significant humanitarian reasons, or who’s temporary entry into the U.S. is deemed to have "significant public benefit"), refugees and also asylees (an alien that is unable or unwilling to return to his home country because of persecution against him) and those who become naturalized citizens of the U.S. The Yearbook is divided into sections that are titled "Enforcement," "Temporary Admissions," "Naturalizations," "Estimates," "Immigrants," and "Refugees/Asylees." The "Enforcement" section covers the number of aliens apprehended from the fiscal years of 1892-1999. Aliens are removed from the U.S. when that alien’s presence in the U.S. is deemed to be detrimental to the welfare of the United States. This section provides tables of aliens that were deported; they’re country of origin, and their business in the United States from 1892-1999. An explanation of these tables can be found in the text portion of the "Enforcement" section. The "Temporary Admissions" section of the Yearbook details the number of visas and visitors, where they were from and the class (purpose) of the visa, admitted to the U.S. in the fiscal years 1981-1999. "Naturalizations" includes data on the number of foreign nationals given U.S. citizenship from the years 1907-1999. The data is broken down into data sets organized by such categories as home country, sex, occupation, and metropolitan statistical area (ranked by the number of persons naturalized) of the foreign nationals that were naturalized. The "Estimates" section looks to approximate the number of persons who leave the U.S. and take citizenship in other countries. These data sets show emigration from the U.S., ratios of emigration and immigration throughout the 20^th century and it projects future emigration through 2005 from 1995. Finally, "Immigration" and the "Refugees/Asylees" sections include some of the same data found in the "Temporary Admissions" data sets, but also include data about the number of refugees and asylees admitted to the U.S. in recent years. These final sets also include the number and class (purpose) of the immigrants admitted to the U.S. in recent years. This Yearbook and others for 1998, 1997, and 1996 can be either viewed publicly online at the above link, or can be purchased via the Superintendent of Documents electronically or through the mail. Previous Yearbooks dating back to 1965 can also be purchased in hard copy in the same manner. — Rusty Miller

This data set contains estimated measurements showing the average affect of the 2001 Bipartisan Patient Protection Act on insurance premiums. The data is in ratio form, measuring projected percent change in insurance premiums for the bill. The data measures ultimate estimated changes for the prospective bill by percentage. Percentages were estimated by the Congressional Budget Office, and includes percent changes for categories such as grievances and appeals, access to care, access to information, and protecting the doctor-patient relationship. Further research on the generation of the numbers was not available. — Chris Freeman

The Record of American Democracy (ROAD) is a website for election data. The ROAD website is an information center where people with the right tools (SPSS) can come and receive much information about the US electoral system. Some of the features of this site are that it includes one very large if not the largest amount of election data in one place on the web. The ROAD program collection of documents concerns the United States elections from the years 1984-1990. These pieces of information allow an individual to find out how each state in the Union voted on a particular topic during this time. The use of ROAD allows people to understand how states voted in major presidential and senatorial elections every four and six years or the off year elections. A final interesting thing about this computer program is that the ROAD site allows people to print copies of how individual counties in different states voted during different elections. — Charlie Requardt

This data set contains measures of trends in eith, tenth, and twelth graders lifetime prevalence of various drugs. Data is collected once a year, beginning in 1991 and ending in 2001. The data is in ratio form, ranging from 0% to 100%, with values closer to zero indicating little or no use of a particular drug, and vaules closer to one hundred indicate a high use of a certain drug. Some of the categories of drugs from the study are the following: 'any illicit drug,' 'any illicit drug other than marijuana,' inhalants, nitrites, and LSD. Data and codebook are available to the public and cab be accessed through the Internet at the above mentioned website. — Erin Skinner

This digest contains seven chapters on statistical reports about education for the 1999 year.  These statistics were obtained from many sources, including federal and state agencies, private research organizations, and professional associations.  The stats were gathered through different surveys given by the different organizations form the sources listed above. The chapters range from All Levels of Education to Learning Resource Technology.  There are more specific analysisís done with elementary, secondary, and postsecondary education.  Also, Federal programs are looked for there aid in education.  An overall outcome of education is measured and then compared internationally as well. The surveys themselves date from the 1975 to 1999 with projected numbers up to 2009.  These dates are used for longitudinal and cross sectional analysis.  Depending on the data set there is coded instruction included on the web page.  All of the data is available publicly, and can either be downloaded or ordered from the NCES's web site, listed above. — Kendra Heffelbower

The National Election Studies (NES) organization conducts surveys of the American electorate during presidential and midterm elections. NES does pilot studies during the odd numbered years, and they have compiled several time-series studies, which have been conducted since the 1948 election. With this number of results, a through analysis of the same question can be done effectively using the NES data. The data sets that are available from the NES cover many topics such as: expectations on election outcomes; perceptions and evaluations of the actions of the political parties; the public’s opinions on foreign affair issues; partisanship; major national issues; trust in the government; vote choice; media relations; candidate performance; civil rights; and the economy. All the data sets are collected by NES researchers and are available electronically for no cost at the web site listed above. The data and codebooks for all the studies are available by request at http://www.isr.umich.edu/nes/archive/studies.phtml. The information above was found at http://www.umich.edu/~nes/overview/overview.htm. — Ryan Bagley 

The focus of this data set is on several aspects of the presidency as an institution. They range from the parties presidential nominations to post election activities such as staff nominations and Congressional and Judiciary relationships. This data set gives statistics on each president individually, but seeks to emphasize these statistics through their effects on the institution of the presidency over time. Data on the following subject matter is given for the Presidents Washington to Clinton, where available. Ragsdale begins with data on presidential nominations starting in 1832, and then goes on to give data on presidential election outcomes. Ragsdale analyzes behavior from both the presidential and public perspectives through looking at public appearances and public opinion data. Data are then presented on the executive office staff and how these appointments have shaped the institution of the presidency over time. Finally, Ragsdale presents data sets on the interactions between the executive office and the other two branches of government. — Sarah Moorhouse

This data set, compiled by the National Election Studies (NES) organization, contains the average scores based on an index of external political efficacy from surveys of public opinion. The average index scores are presented from the years 1952-2000. The data is collected once a year from a sample of the American population, and is presented in ratio form on an index ranging from 0 to 100. Values closer to 0 denote a lower sense of political efficacy, while values closer to 100 indicate a stronger sense of political efficacy among individual American citizens. The index was constructed using data from questions measuring respondent agreement with the statements "People like me don't have any say about what the government does," and "I don't think public officials care much what people like me think." The response options were read or shown to the respondent. Scores are also broken down among different demographic groups. A description of how the index is coded is available in Sapiro, Virginia, Steven J. Rosenstone, and the National Election Studies. 1948-2000 Cumulative Data File [dataset]. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan, Center for Political Studies [producer and distributor], 2001. The codebook and data for all NES studies are available at http://www.isr.umich.edu/nes/archive/studies.phtml. — Erin Kriynovich

This data set contains American population totals by region and state separating urban from rural residents. Data is gathered from the United States Census every ten years from 1900 to 1990. Also included in this data are the percentages for each decade by state and region that are urban and rural to account for what percent of population has shifted from one census to the next. Data is measured in total persons. Another critical note is the criteria behind the classification of a person into an urban or rural categorization. Urban is defined as the territory, persons, and housing units in all places, incorporated or unincorporated with 2500 or greater persons. Those living in territory with less than 2500 persons were classified as living in rural settings. The intent of this data is to show government officials where the population of the nation resides and to show historical evidence of the changes over the past 100 years. It is incredibly useful data for those who earmark money towards rural or urban programs to know exactly how many people are classified as urban residents or rural residents. What is also captured is how greatly this nation has become urbanized over the course of the last century, and how the agrarian roots of our nation are becoming ever smaller. — John O'Neill Storey

This data set measures the amount of sprawl in urbanized areas by taking the U.S. Census data on urbanized areas and determining the amount of consumption and population growth to the outlying farmland and natural habitats surrounding the urban area and surrounding suburbs. The observations, based on Census data that is collected every ten years, starts with the 1970 census, for most cases, and is compared with every consecutive census year until 1990. The data is used to determine which cities have exhibited the most sprawl and which cities, states, and regional governments have adopted anti-sprawl policies and the effects of those policies. The data and codebook are publicly available on the internet and all the information is accessible through the Sprawl City website listed above. –Gerald Turner

Originally used in: Stimson, James A. 1991. Public Opinion in America: Moods, Cycles & Swings. Boulder, CO. Westview Press. Available at the College of Wooster Library — Call Number: HN90.P8S54 1991. The raw data for this data set was collected over many years and many different public opinion surveys. James Stimson then took the raw data, ran them through a series of complex but carefully diagrammed formulas, and came up with the data set which can be found at the above website. This data set seeks to operationalize the public opinion so it can be described and examined on a more general basis, Stimson calls this operationalization the public mood. The data was collected through gallup polls ranging back to the early fifties. Stimson devised a way to lump the results of these various polls together into his model of the public mood and graph his new data. The result: the first calibration of public opinion as it changes through time. — Matthew Englander

The above link can be accessed publicly and there are links to multiple data sets. There are Fair Market Rents data from 1999 to 2002. There is HUD Income Limits data from 1996-2002. There are qualified Census Tracts and Difficult Development Areas data. From the Hud Income Limits, one can access the Estimated Median Family Income for FY 2002. This data set contains estimates based on 1990 Census data , Bureau of Labor Statistics earnings and employment data, and Census Divisional P-60 median family income data. This data set is calculated for each metropolitan and nonmetropolitan area based on the use of the Fair Market Rent (FMR) definitions applicable to the Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher Program. The data and methodology can be acessed publicly through http://www.novoco.com/Facts_Figures/HUD_Income_Limits/section8_IL_02.pdf — Niklaus Edman

This data set is a compilation of "cross-national" and "cross-temporal" social research. National samples in all the European Union member countries are interviewed at the same time in spring and fall. The Eurobarometer is for monitoring on a regular basis the attitudes if the citizens the European Union on social and political issues. These surveys have been conducted since the 1970s every fall and spring. This data set is publicly available on the net. Examples of major studies done through this group, included in the data set are: surveys on British social attitudes, health surveys, workplace employee relations, labor force surveys, family expenditure surveys. The subjects covered within the surveys are wide-ranged: housing, home ownership, moral issues, tax and spending, religion, environmental issues, etc. — Sarah Trafford

The Eurobarometer data set of top decision makers is a collected survey of information, which measures the level of importance with regard to specific European Union (EU) issues decision makers must focus on. The data set is broken down by two major categories: (1) the issues level of importance to these decision makers compared with the general publics views, and (2) how important issues are to specific countries within the EU. The data is ranked in level of importance to the respondents of the survey, and counterbalanced by information provided from the general public. Special target groups were also surveyed, along with the public, to determine how important these issues were to special interests in the EU, but was the first survey of its kind regarding the top decision makers attitudes. The types of decision makers surveyed included elected officals, civil servants, business leaders, media members and academics or leading civilian organizers. A total of 3,778 persons were surveyed for this information. Topics ranged from European interests, single currancy issues, support for institutional versus "constitiutional" issues, and leading priorities for the next decade in the EU. The data is arranged in nominal form, from 1-11 for the first category, and 1-100 for the second - 1 representing the greatest level of issue relevancy for the decision-maker. A full explanation of the data and the results for specific issues covered in the survey can be obtained and downloaded from the website listed above. — Alec More

The Freedom House Press Survey analyses the degree of press freedom in 186 countries and has been collecting data since 1979l. The degree of allows "free flow of information" is the determining factor in classifying media as "free", "partly free", or "not free". The method of data analysis includes examining laws and regulations that affect media content, political pressure and control over media content, economic influences on media content, and repressive actions such as murder, assault, and censorship. The study separates broadcast and print media. Laws and regulations, political pressure and control, and economic influences are scored 0-15 with 0 representing the freest media. Violations against media are scored from 0-5, with 0 representing the least repressed. Finally, countries with a total score from 0-30 have free press, countries with a score from 31-60 have a partly free press, and countries with a score from 61-100 have no free press. The data was gathered from overseas correspondents, research staff abroad, international visitors, human rights groups, foreign publications, a 24-hour news service, geographic and geopolitical specialists, and government reports. — Sally Lawton

The Freedom house data set is determined by a survey, which is aimed at showing the gap that exists between freedom and democracy in Nation States, particularly Islamic States. The survey puts each country into a political rights and civil liberties category and uses 2 scores to determine the country’s ranking under each subject. The countries are then divided into categories of ‘Free’, ‘Partly Free’ and ‘Not Free’ according to the results of the previous ratings. Ratings for political rights and civil liberties are done individually in numbers on a scale of 1 to 7 where 1 is the most Free country and 7 is the least Free country. The highest score that is given to political rights is 32 and a nation achieves this by attaining 4 points each out of the 8 possible questions on the survey. 56 points can be obtained for the civil liberties category by a nation getting 4 points each on the 14 questions given. Once this data is obtained, an average of the political rights and civil liberties gives a country the status of ‘Free’, ‘Partly Free’ or ‘Not Free’. Countries who get an average between 1-2.5 points are considered ‘Free’, those with 3-5.5 points are ‘Partly Free’ and those who have 5.5-7 points are ‘Not Free’. These points may sometimes overlap each other and make it confusing to determine a partly free or Not Free country. The final Freedom status of a country is therefore attained from the overall points. This means that countries that fall between 0-30 points for both political rights and civil liberties are considered to be ‘Not Free’, those between 31-59 points ‘Partly Free’ and those from 60-68 points are ‘Free’. This survey puts all nations together in a specific criterion and by so doing stresses the importance of democracy. This data can be obtained and downloaded from the Freedom House website listed above. — Christabel E. Dadzie

The Polish General Social Survey 1992-1993 is a dataset rendered from a national survey and personal interviews of a sample of the adult population of Poland. The goal of the survey is to make available annual indicators of developments in Polish popular opinion. Containing statistical information of more than 300 variables, the data are valuable for social researchers studying social, political, and economic change along with popular reactions to political situations in a comparative perspective. The data may also be valuable for social researchers studying political culture. The data are free of charge from CIESIN sponsored servers, although they are only formatted for SPSS. — Michael Knoop

The researcher sent out questionnaires to 40 non-governmental organizations specializing in "hunger issues," and operating within the united states. 87.5% (35 out of 40) of the organizations responded with a completed survey. The researcher asked a number of questions about the organization itself, and about its uses of electronic information technologies. The goal was to determine whether (and why) certain organizations were likely to use these methods, and whether (and why) the use of these technologies increased the organizations' effectiveness in fulfilling their missions. Both the full data set and the project codebook are available at the web site listed above. — Matthew Krain

This data set contains measures of the degree to which countries are divided along ethnic lines. Data is collected four times (one observation per decade – 1948, 1958, 1968, and 1978) for each country in the international system. Data is in ratio form, ranging from 0 to 1, with values closer to 0 denoting ethnic homogeneity, and values approaching 1 denoting an ethnically heterogeneous state. To enable comparison, the author also includes rival data published in 1972 by Charles Taylor and Michael Hudson. Taylor and Hudson’s ethno-linguistic fractionalization variable was coded only once for each country. Krain claims that his data is an improvement on Taylor and Hudson’s data for two reasons: 1) the data more narrowly captures ethnic divisions, and 2) there are multiple data points for each country to enable both cross-national and longitudinal analysis. A description of how the author’s ethnic fractionalization measure is coded is available in: Krain, Matthew (1997). "State-Sponsored Mass Murder: The Onset and Severity of Genocides and Politicides," Journal of Conflict Resolution, 41, 3: 331-360. Data and codebook are publically available, and can be downloaded from the author’s web site, listed above. — Matthew Krain

This data set performs transformations and runs regressions for fifty five different nation states using variables to find a relationship between electoral institutions, socal structures and the number of political parties within a state. It shows the number of parlimentary parties, presidential candidates and other electoral and political factors and the number of several ethnic, religious and language groups within a nation-state. The scale for these variables ranges from 0 to 5 depending on the magnitude of these various factors which have been sytematically collected from the fifty five nation-states and arranged in alphabetic order.  — Cecily Raynor

The Polity IV Project is a data set that continually measures regime and authority characteristics of states that have populations greater than 500,000 people. The dataset tries to measure conventional politics such as surveying political violence. Information about the project and access to the codebook, dataset, and users^" manual are accessible on-line and through the Center for International Development and Conflict Management. Copies of the dataset are available free by registering at the Polity IV Project home page listed above. Older versions of the Polity dataset are available through hyperlinks on the home page. Regime characteristics are measured twice a year through contracts with the U.S. government, in May polity scores are updated and in November regime changes are updated. Variables in the dataset include country and case identifiers, indicators of democracy and autocracy, authority characteristic component and concept variables and political regime transitions. — Laura Fothergill

The Central and Eastern Eurobarometer (CEEB) is a survey that has been carried out in the period between the years 1990 and 1997. The research has been concluded in eight phases and its theme is to cover economic, political issues in Central and Eastern Europe and also the general attitude towards the European Union. For that purpose, a total of 20 countries have been investigated in this particular region. A sample of approximately 1000 residents per country has been used in the methodology of the survey as all the respondents are at age of 15 years and above. The essence of the methodology consists of specific questionnaires, asked in personal and at the houses of the respondents. The sampling has been done in a random manner, with the exception of Hungary where a "quota" sampling has been applied. This data set is regularly published by the European Commission. The CEEB review has been conducted in a consistent fashion throughout the years. Some of the considered variables are: income, education, politic… — Nora Vasseva

This data set contains information on country and regional strategy papers in response to the European Union’s policies of dealing with other countries. This will focus on the European Commission’s work on the European Union’s work overseas. This site contains the speeches and press released about work related to the European Union in connection with the European Commission. This site will only cover the work of external workings of the European Commission, not all countries strategy papers are currently included, but they are working on enhancing their collection to include all members of the European Commission. This data is accessible through the above link. To find the codebook for the site, you need to go to the heading of "site", and then to the sub-heading of "About this Site". Once you are there, the codebook is self-explanatory. This site does not contain direct data, like charts or graphs, but it contains the strategies for the countries in the European Commission, and that will be beneficial for case studies or creating and gathering data to compile. — Kelly Kenyhercz

This data set contains research about Russia that is unique to only the New Russia Barometer. It is focused on finding research that cannot be found anywhere else. It does this by gathering data on things that give warning in advance to what might happen in Russia. Research is conducted through surveys. A nation-wide sampling of 1600-2000 respondents is done. Field work is undertaken by VTsIOM. All together, nine surveys have been completed. The first survey was in 1992, and the tenth is scheduled to be held in spring of 2001. The nine previous survey topics are:

The New Russia Barometer data and codebook are publically available, and can be viewed from the Centre for the Study of Public Policyís web site, given above. — Amy Baker

This data set assess the various levels of democracy within 187 states. The information covers the time period from 1810 through 1998. The statistics provide a summary of the elections held by each state. Data for each election is collected concerning the system of government, what is the majority party at the time of the election, the number of votes cast, the number of votes in favor of the majority party, the size of the population, and voter turnout. Additionally, coups d’etat and dictatorships are listed in the respective states’ history. The data set provides links to specific pages for each researched state. Vanhanen also lists other resources (by state) that may be used for further research. – Fallon M. Skinner

This data set provides a historical report of the status of women in today’s society. The data was gathered from UN and its affiliated organizations statistical research. Two tables were provided with data of women involved in national legislatures worldwide, and by region. The data is presented in percentage, ranking the highest involvement of women in politics at the top and decreasing as going down. At the same time, the year when the women got the right to vote is put in the data table. This data is publicly available in the book listed above, which can be found at College of Wooster library. — Erjona Fatusha

This data was collected from a survey. In 1999 the survey was mailed to 1,600 institutions for the year 2000. The survey was mailed to each institution in three different languages English, French, and Spanish. The survey asked nine questions regarding different savings records of the clients within their institutions. The questions served to address the cost effectiveness of poverty measurements. The incoming surveys are reviewed by the Summit staff for clarification. There was a phone campaign that reached 270 of the surveyed institutions in order to ensure their response. Some of the variables include region, gender, and economic status. — Kristin Walley

This data provides 9 tables consisting of Asian Development Bank’s lending, co-financing, borrowing, technical assistance, net income, members and shareholdings, resources, staff, and disbursements. The data is being collected annually (1 January-30 September) from 43 regional members and 16 non-regional members of ADB. The data is represented in percentage ratio (100 is the total) based on number of shares and par value. This data provides the understanding of the two basic types of accounts: 1) the ordinary capital resources account; consists of the income derived from the sale of ADB bonds and the subscriptions to ADB stock by member countries 2) the special funds account; special funds are in practice attached to conditions required by their respective donors. The ultimate success of ADB depends on how the organization distributes its funds and how dynamic Asian economies become as a result of its operations. Further description of how funds are distributed can be found at the web site listed above. The data set and codebook are available through the College of Wooster library. The following are the list of documents related to Asian Development Bank.

— Mai Pongcharoenkul

The African Research Program is conducted though Harvard University’s Center for International Development. Robert Bates conducts this study. The aim of this research program is to study the political economy of Sub-Saharan Africa in terms of institutional development within African nations, important factors in economic growth and the relationship between politics, economics, and violence. This project is in addition to the African Economic Research Consortium (AERC), based in Nairobi Kenya. In order to conduct this study a survey of 36 African nations was done this survey looked at economic growth in African nations in the post-colonial period. There are six data sets to view, violence date, institution data, other political data, economic data, violence data from other sources, and controls data. For example, the violence data is measured nominally 0 indicating no domestic conflict, 1 indicating at least one non-violent domestic conflict, and 2 denoting at least one violent domestic conflict. In addition to the data this site also provides links to other sources, working papers, and samples. This site can be located at the aforementioned web-site. — Malika Gujrati

This data set was compiled to offer a new method for measuring income inequality. It contains data on Gini coefficients, on individual quintile groups? income shares, and data that explain the criteria and basis on which the Gini coefficients were selected and computed. The variables, in the data set, used to measure inequality are net or gross income, income or expenditure, and per-capita or household. Other sources of existing compilations are also included in the data set to allow comparisons between the data sets. The data set and a brief description of it are available on the Internet at the World Banks web site, listed above. Malek Abboud

The focus of this data set is to provide ready access to labor market indicators in the Euro area, that is the nations that have the Euro as their currency. The data covered contains information relative to: employment and unemployment levels, unit labor cost for the whole economy, compensation of employees in the whole economy, labor productivity in the whole economy, labor costs and their components and earnings per employee in the manufacturing sector. The data is measured in ratio form with the value in Euros. Since all the data is not available for this month, the data is formed using the area aggregate sum from the Euro nations. This aggregate sum is calculated once 80% of the Euro-zone data has been compiled to give an accurate measure of the date. The data and the explanation of the data can be downloaded in pdf format. — Karl Haddeland

Fred is an economic database employed by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. The database contains both historical and current economic figures such as the consumer price index (CPI), interest rates and gross domestic product (GDP). Specific regional economic figures are also available for seven states: Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri and Tennessee. A majority of the files are kept updated, with files containing several of the most recent figures. The data sets and codebook can easily be viewed by the public on the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis website, listed above. — Jane Smith

The GATT database contains 295 instances of dyadic conflict.  For each conflict various measurements are taken to see the effects from the conflict.  For each of the conflicts information the following information is provided: the two counties involved, the year the conflict took place, the duration of the conflict, title of the dispute, the complainant and defendant countries, how the GATT was involved with the conflict, size of economies of the two countries, and more.  There are numerous measurements that assess the size and impact the conflict had on both countries. These measurements are either in ratio measures or nominal.  — Eric Duncan

This data set contains measures of human development in 130 countries, through living standards using the criteria; life expectancy, gross national income per capita, and adult literacy, in the year 1987. There are three columns, one consist of the HDI (Human Development Index), one the GNP per capita in 1987, and the third column the Rank. HDI compares the standard of living in different countries. This also reveals not only their monetary wealth as GNP per capita does, but the government's ability to convert those resources to social benefits like literacy and health care. Subtracting the GNP rank from HDI results in a measurement that indicators how well countries' pass on their prosperity into raising the living standards of their population. If the number in the third column (Rank GNP Rank) is negative, this reveals a country is not benefiting their citizens with social benefits. Whereas the more positive the ranking, more benefit to the social welfare of the citizens. This shows that the data is interval, because there is a difference between the data, for example 2 is twice as great as 1, however zero, does not mean that the figure does not exist, therefore it is interval and not ratio. Looking at particular examples, although Sri Lanka has a low GNP per capita, their third column rank is a high positive and from this we know that Sri Lanka invests in other important criteria, such as health and education, to have such a high figure in the third column, which shows that it uses it resources to benefit its citizens. I personally know this is true, having lived there for 19 years, that Sri Lanka has free health and education. This of course is the time that the data was collected. Whereas the US has a high GNP per capita, but the Rank is negative, which shows at the time the data was collected that they were not investing as much as they could in social services and thereby not assisting their people as they possibly could. — Shanika Gunesekera

The International Labour Organization Bureau of Statistics provides a very comprehensive database (LABORSTA) of labor related information. The database allows the user to select three parameters for the desired data set. Annual time-series data is available for about 200 countries, ranging from the year 1969 through the most current available, and concerning data on 23 labor related statistics. The statistics cover measurements of various aspects and components of employment, wages, safety, hours of work, and statistics illustrating levels of union activity. The database user has the ability to submit a request data for one or more country, involving one or more of the statistics. LABORSTA then produces a table of all the available requested information. Above that table, there is an icon that links the user to an explanation of the definitions and methods utilized in the compilation of the data. The definitions used are very clearly defined and are generally adapted from various conferences of the International Labor Statisticians. LABORSTA is a good resource for any study in which labor related data is needed. The tables generated are, conveniently, formatted to be transformed for use in other programs. — Thomas Fishwick

Since 1991, the United Nations has annually published the World Investment Report. A variety of statistics have been published by the WIR investigating the connection between domestic and multinational institutions in countries around the world. This site provides information through tables and figures regarding transnational corporations, foreign direct investment flows, GDP and annual growth rate. Values of FDI inflows and outflows are listed alongside regions and countries around the world. Statistical values of FDI flows are presented from 1989 to 2000. Positive and negative ratio variables are illustrated as increased or decreased  inflows  and outflows of FDI. For an example, in 1995, foreign direct investors inflowed 4.7 billion US dollars into Africa; these funds aided the increase of globalization on the world economy. And in 1995, Africa outflowed 0.5 billion dollars; Africa was in control of distribution of 0.5 billion dollars supplied by FDI. Data by the UNCTAD can be located online at the website above. — Rian Graves

The data set is collected by the World Bank annually and is in various categories indicating the different development levels of the nations surveyed. The data on the web page begins in 1995, but data in the World Development Indicators Book goes as far back as 1960 and there are approximately 206 nations represented. There are 54 timeseries indicators each of which is specifically defined for clarity in the collection process. There are five major ways, data profiles, country at a glance tables, data query, data by topic, and maps, in which the data can be examined. Data profiles are used by selecting a country or group. The at a glance tables are two page comparisons of each nation in which you can choose from the following headings - poverty and social, key economic ratios and long term trends, structure of the economy, prices and government finance, trade, balance of payments, and external debt and resource flows. Data query offers access to a segment of the World Development Indicators (WDI) database. The data can be displayed in several ways - index, percentage change, and graphs, and can export the result in standard formats. Last the data can be accessed through topic (i.e. poverty, education level, and urban development) and maps. The World Bank also provides links to many other sources with useful international development data. The data is publicly available through access on the internet, the World Development Indicators Book, and the World Development Indicators CD ROM. — Maurizia Stock

The World Bank gives a detailed report of development in the world over a period of fifty years and uses lessons learned from these experiences to devise ways that will improve development in the 21st century. Changes in world development are due to globalization and localization. In lieu of following the usual trend of addressing development with issues such as poverty, labor and infrastructure, the report uniquely approaches development by examining how globalization and localization have changed development in the world. To enhance development, globalization and localization requires the involvement of nation states at both supra- and subnational levels. The report examines trade, capital flows, and environment under globalization as well as urbanization and decentralization under localization. An important aspect of the report is the recommendations that the report gives to both state and non-state actors to help them lessen development crises. To illustrate the merits of the two phenomena, five case studies are presented in the report. Also included are graphs which clearly illustrate the points presented. An alternative to the full written report is a link to a slide show. Other features in this data set include questions and answers, recent World Development Reports, and other useful websites. A detailed background of how the report was obtained is also available. This data is accesssible on the internet by using the World Bank website that is listed above. — Chriss Yohuno

Violent Intrastate National Conflicts (VINC) is a database that identifies intrastate conflicts around the world from 1945 - 1995. It points out the majors actors in the conflict and examines the effect of variables such as the date on which the conflict started, the date it ended, whether or not the conflict recurred, victor of the conflict, the type of agreement made (if any), implementation of the agreement and the estimate of the total deaths during the course of the conflict episode, on factors such as the number of armed troops in the area, the presence of regional or great allies and the presence of third party involvement. Overall, the data studies the effect of the nature of the internal conflict on the steps that were taken to resolve it. — Neha Sahgal

This website describes the Integrated Data for Events Analysis (IDEA) event data framework. The (IDEA) framework is used to record a broad range of occurrences in politics, economics, and other social events. The (IDEA) framework has similar codes and categories as the World Event / Interaction Survey (WEIS); however, (IDEA) records data with state, and non-state actors. Example variables include: natural disasters, coups and mutinies, and ease of sanctions. Using (IDEA) data event framework, data is extracted from Reuters Business Briefing (RBB) global news reports. Information extracted from the first sentence of the news article is used to code and organize a record of the event. This framework and codebook are available online through the web site listed above. – Elizabeth Clark

This data set contains information on civil wars [defined as internal wars of more than 1000 casualties] from the years 1960-1995. There is one entry for each "civil war" in this time period, detailing factors related to those wars. The factors taken note of in this data set are per capita income, economic growth [measured over previous 5 years], primary commodity exports [natural resources available], population, social fractionalization, ethnic dominance, geographic dispersion of the population, and length of peace since civil war last broke out in that state. Data of this sort is collected for all parts of the world, including all civil wars in the world between the dates above. A related article can be found in the Journal of Conflict Resolution 46:13-28. – Jonathan Webster

This data set takes a different approach to test the diversionary theory empirically. The authors of the study consider the military to be an important factor in decision-making when a nation-state in domestic dispute decides to go to war abroad. It is unlikely that a country will engage in an international conflict without the full military support, since it is the military itself that actually has to battle. Professors Dassel and Reinhardt take Levy’s (1989) data set, which contains 107 countries over the period of 156 years, to authenticate their argument. Thus concluding that not all domestic unrest lead to international conflict, but only the ones that interfere with the interest of and threaten the very institution of the military do. The authors call this particular type of domestic strife "contestation." — Jaewah Lee

Data in this set concerns all genocide-related activities that occurred in Rwanda between April 6, 1994 and July 30, 1994. Each entry in the database represents one violation that happened during this time period and was reported by a single source. Davenport includes many variables in the set, including the actual actions of the perpetrators (death, torture, acts of violence, etc). He also includes variables for the ethnicity, professions, sex, and all available names of the perpetrators. The data is expanded to also include the same variables for the victims of these actions. Sources used in this set include African Rights, Human Rights Watch, and economic and demographic variables derived from the 1991 Rwandan Census. The Census was used to determine the size, density, and ethnic makeup of the commune populations. The data set is very vast and very meticulous, chronicling everything from the name of the perpetrator to the type of weapon used on the victim. – Giles Mitchell

This project seeks to measure levels of political conflict and cooperation in societies by coding political event reports from international, regional, and local sources. The IPI project is groundbreaking because it attempts to focus on conflict and cooperation within nation states by concentrating on domestic actors. Similar data previously was unavailable for this area of study. The authors devised two ten point scales to reflect the severity of conflictual and cooperative situations and then use this scaled data to calculate a domestic polity’s volume and intensity of political conflict. In addition to measuring conflict’s volume and intensity, the IPI coding enables the interaction between specific societal groups to be measured and allows scholars to examine relations both among social groups and between social and state groups. The author’s definition of conflict, cooperation, coding, and definition of political events, as well as a detailed description of the project are available on the website previously listed. Data and codebook for the project are also publicly available at the aforementioned site. – Angie Zombek

The main topic of this data set is to explore the relationship and to discover factors that cause ethno-political conflict in the world. This study is first developed by Ted Gurr in 1988, and has progressed over the last decade into a project that collects and analyzes groups (275 groups total), of minorities at risk through both qualitative and quantitative information. All of these groups tested fall under the category of minorities at risk because of strict population guidelines, (a country no smaller than 500,000 people), and other political and economic regulations as well. Some of the variables in this study include group characteristics and status, group discrimination, group organization, group collective interests, and group conflict behavior. The groups studied are also pulled from six geopolitical regions that span across the world in all areas so spurious factors like location can be eliminated. This data set can be found and downloaded on the web site listed above, but is connected to its own link entitled "Project Dataset and Codebook." — Imani Wadud

This data uses a variety of categories such as economic conditions, the environment, population, regime type and/or political conditions, and armed conflicts, of countries to find explanations for environmental problems across the globe. In examining economic conditions, the author categorizes countries from one to four according to their GDP and GNP ranking and compares this data to levels of energy consumption. The degree of energy consumption is also categorized in interval form from one being low per capita oil consumption (below 1000 kilograms) and three being high (over 3000 kilograms of oil consumption per capita). The author then examines the percent of income countries of level four economic standing compare to the percent of income level one countries spend on energy. For further analysis, the author adds in a variable dealing with the percent of GDP each country puts towards military spending. The other categories of investigation use similar forms of interval ranking tools to find patterns of significance in each of the separate data sets. With the accumulation of evidence that the variables provide in each data set, each category can respectively be compared to one another. Most of the data contrived was on an annual basis from the year 1980 until 1994. The site provides a description of how the authors’ measurements are coded. Access to this codebook is available online. However, the actual availability of a completed data set is unknown. — Leslie Hankin

This codebook and data set were created because of the lack of events data for international conflict and cooperation. The codebook generates data for 6 cases from 1955 to 1991 for the following conflicts: Colombia, Lebanon, Peru, Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe. The data presented in this project fill in some gaps in previously coded research such as the lack of coded entries for events like speeches, statements and petitions. The VICDP Codebook creates new and more accurate group variables, for example creating a better distinction between political parties that have different goals than do previous studies. The main categories identified are: the types of resolutions of conflicts, political-military and diplomatic-economic hostile actions, and threatening and non-threatening verbal expressions. This data set is more useful then previous projects because the data groupings created can be used for both international and intrastate conflicts. The data is available at the website above and can be downloaded. – Karl Haddeland

Both the full data set and the project codebook are available at the web site listed above. — Matthew Krain 

This web site contains access to Peace Agreements from all over the world. The agreements are organized by world regions. The purpose of this collection is to show the "trend towards internally agreed initiatives, rather than externally imposed settlements," and to see why most peace agreements fail. There is emphasis on the failure of peace agreements to prepare for "post-conflict problems," and how the building of one agreement upon another one that is deficient adds to the likelihood of failure. This is a qualitative assessment and data set. There is no interim discussion between the agreements. — Erin King

This data set explores the conditions under which interventions in civil conflicts are an effective means of managing conflict. Data is collected on civil conflicts between 1945 and 1999 and any interventions to these conflicts. Data is recorded for every month of the conflict and includes information regarding the opposition forces and the intervention itself, including the date the intervention took place, the goal of intervention, type and amount of assistance, and who received the assistance. This data set is an improvement on the author’s former work in which he focused on the efficacy of the general policy of intervention based on intervention being an all or nothing event. This data looks at discreet intervention, which could be part of a larger policy, thus showing how a specific intervention may or may not terminate a conflict. This data set and the corresponding codebook are available to the public on the internet and are also available at: Patrick M. Regan. 2002. "Third Party Interventions and the Duration of Intrastate Conflict", Journal of Conflict Resolution. 45(1). (Call No.: WOO periodicals JX1901.J6). – Karina Colbenson

This document takes a look at international politics on ethnic conflicts. The data set specifically concerns itself with whether there is discrimination in external support granted to certain ethnic groups over others. The data is put into quantitative values in order to evaluate this relationship. The dependent variables are Level of Support and Breadth of Support of countries. These are both measured from 1990 to 1998. For the first three years, the data is grouped biennially (1990-1991, etc.) while the last three years, 1996 to 1998, are measured annually. Level of support is measured on a scale of 0 to 4 with 0 meaning ‘No support’ and 4 ‘intense support’. Breadth of support is quantified through a count of the total number of countries who have supported a particular minority at risk. There are ten independent variables found in this data and these are measured on different scales using mainly the MAR and COW data sets to code the variables. Work on this data set is in progress and will be published in The Journal on Peace Research. – Christabel E. Dadzie

This data set compiles information on over 120 cases of ethnic civil war in order to gain a clearer understanding of the effectiveness of partition as a solution to these conflicts. The data set measures and scores four primary variables in order to understand the central question of the study: whether or not the conflict resulted in partition (1 if yes, 0 if no); whether or not the conflict ended (1 if yes, 0 if no); whether or not violence continued to occur after partition (1 if yes, 0 if no); the level to which the country offers democratic individual freedoms (maximum democracy = 20, maximum autocracy = 0). The author also includes numerous other variables that he feels are relevant to the issues of ethnic conflict, and claims that these are "to enable other researchers to conduct sensitivity and robustness tests" of his findings. Sambanis has clustered his conflicts into different groupings based on the various types of civil wars that occur. – Nathan Collins

The Kansas Event Data System produces political event data. The system’s three major research focus areas include "Software development for the machine-coding of political event data", "Production of event data sets", and "Development of early warning methods". KEDS effectively converts English-language reports of political events into data, produces numerous event data sets of such active areas as the Middle East, and serves as an early warning technique. The Data is in nominal and ordinal form with codes denoting interactions between international actors. It presents political activity through a series of correlation. Specifically, the data is presented in three categories: the actor who initiated the action on the left, the actor to whom the action was directed in the middle and a code describing the type of political action involved on the right. For example, you can find numerous data on activity involving the state of Israel and the Palestinian Liberation Organization in the Levant Event Data Set. The attached codebook will unveil political events in one or two-word descriptions such as "force", "mil engagement", "riot", "demonstrate", "deny", etc. For those looking for conflict data on Middle Eastern interactions, Kansas Event Data System is an excellent source. — Stephen Belenky

The above data set is in regard to the material indicators of resources for the entire international system. The data set that correlates to the data has been broken down so that each individual country has it’s own code. From there the information on resources is even further broken down by year. This means that every country has a specific code in the data set, there is then an entry for every year with every country. The data set allows easy access to the material resources of any country for any year between 1816 and 1993. The various material resources are then broken down again. Each year is subsequently divided into seven different resources. The material resources measured in this data set are military personnel, military expenditure, iron and steel production, energy consumption, urban population, urban agglomeration, and total population. The dataset is available for download from: http://www.umich.edu/~cowproj/capabili.zip — Michael Babuder

This data sets contains military expenditure data, which provides a simple scale of measurement regarding resources used by states‚ military spending. Military expenditure is an input measure, regarding how many resources go into the actual military production itself, however it does not account for the actual military strength produced. The SIPRI data is based upon official data and a SIPRI survey that is annually sent to countries. The SIPRI contains data on the military expenditure of over 180 countries. The information is presented in time-series spanning over the fiscal period of 1991-2000 in three formats: (1) State military spending in local currency, at current prices; (2) State military spending in US dollars, at constant (1998) prices and exchange rates; (3) State military spending as a share (%) of gross domestic product (GDP). This information is available online at All data is accessible with free registration to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). — Marc Patterson

This data set includes information on worldwide refugee flows. Each country’s refugee information is listed separately. The information included is the number of refugees coming into the country, how many leave the country, and how many are currently granted asylum. For countries with more information available governmental characteristics for classifying refugees is also provided. The data was collected from governmental sources and compared to data collected by the U.S. Committee for Refugees. Statistics from 1997 to 2001 are provided. – Bill Russell

The data set contains overviews of terrorist activities on all the continents of the world. The data is collected annually by the United States Department of State. There are two years (2000 and 2001) in the data set found online at the given website but there are 51 additions dating back to 1983 available through consort and the call number is given above. The overviews include a brief history of terrorism against a country and facilitated within a country for each country as well as how each country is contributing to the fight against terrorism. There are small articles within the data set that contain case studies such as the attack on the U.S. embassy in Italy by Ben Khemais and the kidnapping of the reporter Daniel Pearl. Data and codebook are publicly available, and can be downloaded from the government web page above. – Delisa Williams

This data set examines UN peacekeeping missions, providing insight into what might occur during certain types of missions. It includes independent variables such as mission type, conflict type, severity, and superpower involvement. The dependent variables are measures up through December 31, 1997, and include items such as duration of conflict, troop deployment, and fatalities. The data set and codebook are publically located, and can be retrieved from the author's web site, listed above. — Corey Harkey

This data set aims to illustrate the degree of similarities in foreign policy positions of the United Nation's member states. Data has been collected between the years of 1946 and 1996 based upon both votes and resolutions passed during the roll-call voting procedures, which took place in the UN General Assembly. The data used in this project was collected from the 40^th through 51^st session and can be found as a link (UN General Assembly Voting) off of this original web site. Furthermore, the actual data can be downloaded using different versions provided by the authors at the web site listed above. In addition, the codebook used to assign a code in order to represent all of the member nation-states in the United Nations may be publicly viewed by downloading the file off of this web site as well. — Leslie Hahn

This collection of data includes information collected by the United Nations Department of Peacekeeping. Data is collected under the following headings: Troop Contributors, Size of Individual UN Peacekeeping Operations, Total Size of UN Peacekeeping Operations, and Tables and Charts on UN Peacekeeping Finance. Data is arranged three ways under the heading of Troop Contributors. The first set of data is the monthly list of the summary of peacekeeping troop contributors compiled by the United Nations, listed alphabetically by member state, with troops sorted as observers, police, troops, and total. The second and third sets of data measure the size of troop contributions each year, with states ranked according to the size of contribution and alphabetically by member state. Each data set is based on the end of the month sizes of forces, and data is available from 1996-2001. Under the Size of Individual Peacekeeping Operations, data is available from 1996-2001, with the data based on the end of the month, of the size of the ongoing operations. The operations are organized chronologically, and the data includes military observers, troops, and police. This data is reported monthly. Under the Size of UN Peacekeeping forces 1947-1997, the size of the overall forces in the field for the highest month in that year is reported, rounded to the nearest hundred. Finally, the Global Policy Forum has compiled data on Appropriations and Assessments 1999-2000, Payments due, Peacekeeping Arrears, UN-owed payments to member states, and peacekeeping expenditures. This data is available on the website of Global Policy Forum, and all explanatory materials are readily available. — Laura Stahr

The data set has been compiled to illustrate the movement of refugees and immigrants and gathered by a division of the United Nations, the UNHCR (United Nations High Commission on Human Rights). The site provides pdf files of statistics in the form of tables, top ten lists, and line graphs and highlights the time frame 1999-2001. Ratio variables such as the yearly, quarterly, and monthly number of asylum applications in a given country, the top-ten nationalities applying for asylum in various countries, and tables noting the yearly number of asylum applicants in case studies such as Canada, Australia, and Sweden of a total of 29 countries are displayed on this website. Negative and positive ratio percentage values indicate the increase or decrease in asylum applications in a particular country. One can utilize this data to study the trends in the number of asylum applications submitted and the countries facing the highest percentage of applicants when compared to other nations over a period of 3 years. This particular data set is publicly accessible and can be downloaded from United Nations sponsored website noted above. The UNHCR’s Population Data Unit (Population and Geographic Data Section) takes credit for maintaining the statistics found on the website. — Katharine Bayer

This data set provides empirical contributions to the measurement of the dimensionality and relative positions of states' voting behavior in the UN General Assembly during the Cold War (1946-1988) and the post-Cold War (1991-1996). For the analysis, the Cold War era is divided into three periods. The years from 1946 to 1953 signify the aftermath of World War II and the US-Soviet deadlock. Then the membership in the United Nations General Assembly nearly doubled between 1954 and 1969. The final division examines the voting behavior of the more cohesive bloc of developing countries. The study includes all adopted resolutions put to a roll-call vote during the first forty-three plenary sessions (1946-1988) and the forty-sixth through the fifty-first session (1991-1996). This range of observations allows a before and after measurement of conflict in the UN General Assembly. The interval variables that correspond with each vote and session are illustrated by the first or first two digits indicate the session number, and the last digit represents the vote. For example, v53061 is the sixty-first vote in the fifty-third session. The nominal variables that code a country's vote are as follows: 1='yes,' 6='no,' 7=Abstain,' and 9='N.A.' This coding does not distinguish between countries that are not present during a vote. Variables CNT and NAME identify countries by their names. The data set lists all countries that are current members of the UN. Data can be missing from certain countries depending on the date of the session and their date of membership. Voeten takes the data for session 1 to 40 from the ICPSR, study number 5512. Likewise, the data for sessions 46 through 49 come from Soo Yeon Kim's and Bruce Russett's article "The New Politics of Voting Alignments in the United Nations General Assembly." In their study, they argue that world politics is multidimensional because dealignment enables countries to vote according to their preferences which allows for flexibility in aligning on different issues. Through Voeten's use of NOMINATE scaling, he disagrees with Kim and Russett and demonstrates that the underlying structure of conflict in the post-Cold War UN General Assembly is one-dimensional. The position of countries along this single dimension is stable across time, issue area, and importance of issues. This one-dimensional voting behavior shows that the US and its Western allies occupy one extreme pole, while a bloc of rising powers and a group of countries with little in common except that they clash with the West form the opposite pole. — Lisa Basalla