Uncertainty persists over how and why some countries become democratic and others do not or why some remain democratic and others ‘backslide’ toward autocracy. Furthermore, while scholars generally agree on the nature of ‘democracy’ and ‘autocracy’, the nature of regimes in between—and changes between them—are much less clear.

A clearer understanding of these processes is not purely academic. Several studies suggest that regimes in the middle range — between full autocracies and full democracies — are most prone to war, so there is an inverted U relationship between democratic proximity and conflict risk. The empirical support of such studies is relatively mixed or disputed, presenting an area of research to which an interdisciplinary approach combining statistical physics and political science may help clarify.

The workshop will explore the use of statistical physics for modeling civil conflict in its political and environmental context by bringing together several key researchers in relevant areas. Lars-Erik Cedermann and his group at ETH explore the link between inequality and political violence, focusing on ethno-political and ethno-economic inequalities and civil war, as well as on ethnic inclusion and power sharing. Their work indicates that democratisation is likely to trigger civil war and that such conflicts are especially likely after competitive elections. The research by Kristian Skrede Gleditsch from the University of Essex includes conflict and cooperation, democratization, and spatial dimensions of social and political processes. The work of Matthew Wilson from the University of South Carolina is concerned with institution-building and political trajectories. In joint work, he and CSH external faculty Karoline Wiesner analysed the relationship between autocratisation and democratisation processes on the likelihood of civil conflict using statistical physics. CSH external faculty Karoline Wiesner explores the dynamics of political regime change using tools from the physics of diffusion. CSH postdoc Eddie Lee develops multi-scale models of conflict spread borrowing on techniques from statistical mechanics and information theory.

You can find the schedule in the ‘Download’ dropdown below.