This page will soon be moved to a separate ICOW.org site, rather than being part of PaulHensel.org. It will also be reorganized, with a separate page for each ICOW data set (like I have started doing with MTOPS) and with icoworg.html being replaced by people.html.

Project Description

The Issue Correlates of War (ICOW) project is a research project that is attempting to collect systematic data on contentious issues in world politics. More detail on the project's goals and theoretical underpinnings may be found in the papers generated by the project.

Project Participants and Funding

The ICOW project was started by Dr. Paul R. Hensel of the Political Science department at Florida State University, who first created the project and is responsible for the ICOW territorial and river claims data sets. Dr. Sara McLaughlin Mitchell then joined the project as co-director and is responsible for the ICOW maritime claims data set.

Beyond Paul and Sara, a number of other researchers have worked on ICOW data sets. Some worked as volunteers or as part-time workers for a few summer hours, while others -- most notably Allison, Sowers, and Tures -- have spent substantial amounts of time working for the project over several years:

Funding for the territorial claims data (in the form of research assistants) has generally been provided by the FSU Political Science department. Paul Hensel received a small Summer 1999 grant from FSU'S Committee on Faculty Research Support (COFRS) to cover initial research on river claims. He and Sara Mitchell received a 2001 National Science Foundation (NSF) grant and a 2002-2004 NSF grant to cover data collection on territorial, river, and maritime claims.

Disclaimer

J. David Singer of the University of Michigan was kind enough to allow the use of the name "Correlates of War" in the ICOW project's name when the project first began in the late 1990s. It should be noted that Singer, the Correlates of War project, and the University of Michigan, Penn State University, and University of Illinois (all of which have hosted COW at some point in time) bear no responsibility for any decisions or errors that might be made by the ICOW project; such responsibility lies entirely with Paul Hensel, Sara Mitchell, and their co-authors and research assistants associated with the ICOW project.

Project Data Sets

Data Set Requirements

Because one of the ICOW project's primary goals is the generation of systematic data on a variety of different types of issues dividing nation-states, the project will eventually produce numerous data sets that are fully compatible with each other. That is, each ICOW data set will follow the same format, contain the same type of variables, and contain data on contention over comparable types of issues.

The first (and most important) requirement for each ICOW data set is explicit evidence of contention involving official representatives of two or more nation-states over some type of issue. In the case of the ICOW territorial claims data, this means evidence that official representatives of at least one state make explicit statements claiming sovereignty over a piece of territory that is claimed or administered by another state. Claims that are not made explicitly, are not made by official representatives of at least one state government, or do not involve at least one nation-state on each side of the claim are beyond the scope of the present data set.

Second, each ICOW data set must be collectable without reference to the occurrence of militarized conflict over the issue in question. Most existing social science data sets that involve disputed issues begin by identifying cases of militarized conflict (disputes, crises, or wars) and then code the issues involved in each confrontation. One of the most important contributions of the ICOW project, though, lies in the ability to test propositions on the propensity of different issue types to lead to militarized conflict, which can not be done if the data collection only includes issues that actually lead to such conflict. The ICOW territorial claims data set thus includes all identifiable cases where two or more states are involved in a claim over territory -- regardless of whether or not this claim eventually led to militarized conflict.

A third requirement for each ICOW data set is that data must be collectable on some type of measure of issue salience. That is, scholars using the data set must have some way to distinguish between claims of higher and lower salience. The ICOW territorial claims data set offers numerous variables that may be used to distinguish claims by issue salience, including the area and population of the claimed territory, the existence of resource, ethnic, or religious bases for the claim, and whether the claim involves mainland or offshore territory, homeland or colony/possession territory, and all of the target state, part of the target state, or merely the precise location of the border.

Finally, each issue covered by the ICOW project must be amenable to data collection on attempts to manage the issue(s) in question. Another important contribution of the ICOW data is the ability to test propositions on the ways that states attempt to manage or settle their disagreements over different types of issues. For the ICOW territorial claims data, this includes all attempts to settle a territorial claim through bilateral negotiations or through third party assistance (such as mediation, arbitration, or adjudication).

Current Issues Data Sets

Territorial Claims

The ICOW project is currently collecting data on territorial issues in all regions of the world since 1816, compiled into several related data files. The first file identifies territorial claims, or explicit claims by official government representatives of at least two sovereign nation-states to the same piece of territory, and includes basic claim-level information such as the overall beginning and ending of the claim and the form of claim termination. The second file is organized by claim-dyad-years and includes one data point for each year of each claimant dyad, with information on details such as the characteristics of the claimed territory. The third and final data file covers attempts to settle these territorial claims through bilateral negotiations or with third party assistance (good offices, mediation, inquiry, conciliation, arbitration, or adjudication), and includes details such as the beginning, ending, and effectiveness of each settlement attempt.

The current version of the codebook is available for the ICOW territorial claims and attempted settlements data sets, in Adobe Acrobat [PDF] format; this codebook is supplemented by the general ICOW codebook. These codebooks offer instructions to coders, lists of variables in the data set, and lists of permissible values for each variable; users may also want to download the latest version of the Correlates of War Project's list of interstate system membership and the ICOW list of non-state actors appearing in the data set. The official list of Western Hemisphere territorial claims is also available, along with the full data set used in the 2001 ISQ article.

Current Status: A complete version of the territorial claims and attempted settlements data sets has been collected for the Western Hemisphere, and was used in Paul Hensel's March 2001 International Studies Quarterly article; this data is now available in the ICOW data archive. Data for Northern and Western Europe has been completed, and will be released on this web site once the documentation can be finalized. Data collection on the Middle East is moving along, and should be done by the end of 2007 if not sooner. Preliminary data collection for many claims in the rest of the world has also been completed, although a number of other sources are still being consulted for claims in each of these regions and the material that has been collected is still being checked for accuracy. Eastern Europe will be next after that; we are currently examining about 70 potential claims. Africa, Asia, and Oceania -- which are not as far along yet -- will be completed over the next year or two; we are currently aware of at least 75 claims in Asia and Oceania, and we are examining some 110 potential claims in Africa.

River Claims

The 2001 NSF grant was intended to cover collection of new data on river claims, focusing on explicit claims involving cross-border rivers. Beginning in the summer of 1999 (supported by the COFRS grant from FSU), we have started to collect data on cross-border rivers and on explicit claims related to these rivers in several regions of the world.

The current version of the codebook is available for the ICOW river claims and attempted settlements data sets, in Adobe Acrobat [PDF] format; this codebook is supplemented by the general ICOW codebook. These codebooks offer instructions to coders, lists of variables in the data set, and lists of permissible values for each variable; users may also want to download the latest version of the Correlates of War Project's list of interstate system membership and the ICOW list of non-state actors appearing in the data set.

Current Status: We have finished data collection for three regions of the world so far: the Americas, Northern and Western Europe, and the Middle East. Data for these three regions was used in the 2006 Hensel/Mitchell/Sowers Political Geography article, and will be posted here shortly. Data collection for the rest of the world will be completed during the calendar year 2007, beginning with Eastern Europe (expected by early summer) and followed by Asia/Oceania and Africa later in the year.

Maritime Claims

The 2001 NSF grant is also intended to cover collection of new data on maritime claims, focusing on explicit claims involving fishing rights, exclusive economic zones, and similar topics. Beginning in the spring of 2001, we have started to collect general maritime data (such as each country's specific claimed economic zones) as well as data on maritime claims in several regions of the world. A recent version of the codebook (current as of July 2003) is available.

Current Status: We have finished data collection for two regions of the world so far: the Americas and all of Europe. Data for these regions will be posted here shortly. Work is underway for the rest of the world, beginning with the Middle East and then moving on to Asia/Oceania and Africa.

Regime Claims

John Tures, a Florida State Ph.D. (and former ICOW research assistant while at FSU) currently working at LaGrange College in Georgia, collected preliminary data on regime-based claims in the Western Hemisphere for his dissertation (which he successfully defended in spring 2000). This data set includes data on explicit statements by one or more states seeking to remove the specific leader or entire political system of at least one other state, as well as details of each claim such as characteristics of the claim's initiator and target and the relationship between their states. The data set is currently limited to regime claims involving Latin American regimes (although the challenger may come from outside of the region), although John eventually plans to extend this data collection to the remainder of the world. Any questions about this data set should be directed to John Tures.

A current version of the codebook is available for the ICOW regime claims data set, in Adobe Acrobat [PDF] format. The official list of Western Hemisphere regime claims is also available, with information identifying each claim such as the challenger and target state, name of the targeted leader, and the beginning and ending date of each claim; additional variables that can be used to measure claim salience will be made available at a later date.

Current Supplementary Data Sets

Beyond the issues data sets described above, the ICOW Project has also collected several supplementary data sets to help in subsequent data collection and analysis. While nor directly involving issues, these data sets are important for testing various issue-related hypotheses (involving the impact of the regional or global institutional context, for example) and for collecting data using historical reference sources that may refer to states or other entities by non-current names.

Historical State Names

The ICOW historical state names data set includes alternative names (or alternative spellings of names) for each nation-state in the COW interstate system. The primary purpose of this data set is to assist data coders (or other researchers using historical sources), who can often be confused by references to entity names that no longer exist or are no longer used (leading to a risk of ignored or miscoded data). The data set attempts to list all relatively common alternative names that have been used to refer to each state over the past two centuries, so that the researcher can determine easily that "New Granada" actually refers to Colombia rather than risking data loss or errors. This data set is now publicly available in the ICOW data archive.

Multilateral Treaties of Pacific Settlement

The ICOW multilateral treaties of pacific settlement data set includes signature and ratification status for all regional and global treaties that explicitly call for the pacific settlement of (political) disputes among their members. This data set is expected to be used primarily to test the proposition that the regional or global institutional context -- as indicated by joint membership in such an organization -- should affect states' choices of actions in attempting to settle their territorial, river, maritime, or other issues. Over thirty regional and global treaties and organizations are included in the current version of this data set; more details on each organization's charter are provided in the codebook and documentation. This data set is now publicly available in the ICOW data archive.

Colonial History

The ICOW colonial history data set attempts to identify colonial or other dependency relationships for each state over the past two centuries. This includes states that have ruled each state as a colony, dependency, League of Nations mandate, UN trust territory, or other type of possession, as well as states that have seceded from existing states and states that have merged into existing states. This should be most useful for analyses of a variety of possible propositions on the general impact of colonial rule on subsequent relations between the former colonizer and the former dependency, the impact of different countries' colonial policies on post-independence events (involving the former dependency and either internal problems or external relations with the former colonizer or with other states), and similar topics. It may also be useful in identifying cases for certain types of analysis (or perhaps "relevant dyads"), if former colonial powers are thought to have an interest in their former dependencies and their surroundings. This data set is now publicly available in the ICOW data archive.

Future Data Collection Plans

Data on the initial issue data sets will be released publicly (through this web page) once the first article using each respective data set has been published (thus, data used in the 2001 ISQ article on Western Hemisphere territorial claims is already available here). Upon completion and release of these initial data sets, the project may move on to collecting additional data sets involving different types of contentious issues between nation-states, as well as trying to keep the initial data sets updated.

The most likely direction for future work would involve the collection of data on (ethnic, linguistic, religious, or other) identity-based claims, where the subject of the claim is a disagreement over the status or treatment of the identity group. Examples of such issues include Austrian demands over Italy's treatment of ethnic Germans in South Tyrol or Russia's demands over the treatment of ethnic Russians in the post-Soviet successor states; most issues of this type do not involve demands for territorial sovereignty over the area where the identity group lives, so this would be largely distinct from the current territorial claims data set. It must be emphasized that this is only a tentative plan for possible future work, though; we make no guarantee that we will collect data on this or any other issue in the near future.

Papers from the ICOW Project

All of these papers may be downloaded in Adobe Acrobat (PDF) format.

Publications

Multiple Issue Types

Paul R. Hensel, Sara McLaughlin Mitchell, Thomas E. Sowers II, and Clayton L. Thyne, "Bones of Contention: Comparing Territorial, Maritime, and River Issues." Journal of Conflict Resolution 2008, 1 (February), forthcoming.

Sara McLaughlin Mitchell and Paul R. Hensel, "International Institutions and Compliance with Agreements." American Journal of Political Science 2007.

Territorial Claims

Paul R. Hensel, Michael Allison, and Ahmed Khanani (2009). "Territorial Integrity Treaties and Armed Conflict over Territory." Conflict Management and Peace Science, forthcoming.

Hensel, Paul R., and Sara McLaughlin Mitchell, "Issue Indivisibility and Territorial Claims." GeoJournal 64, 4 (December 2005): 275-285.

Sara McLaughlin Mitchell (2002), "A Kantian System? Democracy and Third Party Conflict Resolution." American Journal of Political Science, forthcoming.

Paul R. Hensel, "Contentious Issues and World Politics: The Management of Territorial Claims in the Americas, 1816-1992." International Studies Quarterly 45, 1 (March 2001): 81-109.

Paul R. Hensel, "Territory: Theory and Evidence on Geography and Conflict." In John A. Vasquez, ed., What Do We Know about War?. Boulder, CO: Rowman and Littlefield, 2000, pp. 57-84.

River Claims

Marit Brochmann and Paul R. Hensel (2009). "Peaceful Management of International River Claims." International Negotiation, forthcoming.

Paul R. Hensel, Sara McLaughlin Mitchell, and Thomas E. Sowers II, "Conflict Management of Riparian Disputes: A Regional Comparison of Dispute Resolution." Political Geography 25, 4 (May 2006): 383-411.

Maritime Claims

Working Papers

Multiple Issue Types

Elizabeth A. Nyman and Paul R. Hensel, "Implications of Issue Salience for Territorial, Maritime, and River Claims." Paper presented at the 2008 Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, Boston.

Territorial Claims

Paul R. Hensel, Michael Allison, and Ahmed Khanani, "Territorial Integrity Treaties and Armed Conflict over Territory." Submitted to Conflict Management and Peace Science (September 2007); an earlier version of this paper was presented at the 2006 Shambaugh Conference "Building Synergies: Institutions and Cooperation in World Politics," Iowa City, IA.

Paul R. Hensel, "Territorial Claims and Armed Conflict between Neighbors." Paper presented as a keynote speaker at Lineae Terrarum International Borders Conference, El Paso, TX, March 2006.

Paul R. Hensel, "Starting on the Wrong Foot: Political Independence and Territorial Claims." Paper presented at the 2005 Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, Washington, D.C., and the 2006 Annual Meeting of the International Studies Association, San Diego.

Paul R. Hensel, "Power Politics and Contentious Issues: Realism, Issue Salience, and Conflict Management." Paper presented at the 2005 Annual Meeting of the International Studies Association, Honolulu.

Shawn E. Rowan and Paul R. Hensel, "Declining Benefits of Conquest? Economic Development and Territorial Claims in the Americas and Europe." Paper presented at the 2004 Annual Meeting of the Peace Science Society (International), Houston, TX.

Paul R. Hensel, "Militarized Management of Territorial Claims in the Americas, 1816-2001." Paper presented at the 2003 Annual Meeting of the CEEISA and International Studies Association, Budapest, Hungary. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Annual Meeting of the International Studies Association, Portland.

Michael E. Allison and Paul R. Hensel, "Who Cares?: Domestic Politics and the Management of Territorial Claims." Presented at the Annual Meeting of the International Studies Association, March 2002.

Paul R. Hensel (1998), "Reliability and Validity Issues in the Issue Correlates of War (ICOW) Project." Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the International Studies Association, Minneapolis.

Paul R. Hensel and John Tures (1997), "International Law and the Settlement of Territorial Claims in Latin America." Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, Washington, D.C.

River Claims

Paul R. Hensel and Marit Brochmann, "Armed Conflict over International Rivers: The Onset and Militarization of River Claims." Paper presented at the 2007 Annual Meeting of the International Studies Association, Chicago.

Maritime Claims

Stephen C. Nemeth, Sara McLaughlin Mitchell, Elizabeth A. Nyman, and Paul R. Hensel, "Ruling the Sea: Institutionalization and Privatization of the Global Ocean Commons." Paper presented at the 2007 Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, Chicago.

Regime Claims

John Tures (1998), "Expanding the Issue Correlates of War (ICOW) Project: Regime-Based Claims, Disputes, and Means of Settlement, 1816-1996." Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the International Studies Association, Minneapolis.

John Tures (1999), "From Coup to Conflict: The Onset and Escalation of Regime Claims in the Western Hemisphere, 1816-1992." Poster presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, Atlanta.


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Last updated: 28 December 2008
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