Schrodt: Event Data in Foreign Policy Analysis

Schrodt, PA. 1994. Event data in foreign policy analysis. Foreign Policy Analysis: Continuity and Change. Prentice-Hall: 145-166.

"Event data are a formal method of measuring the phenomena that contribute to foreign policy perceptions. Event data are generated by examining thousands of newspaper reports on the day to day interactions of nation-states and assigning each reported interaction a numerical score or categorical code. For example, if two countries sign a trade agreement, that interaction might be assigned a numerical score of +5, whereas if the two countries broke off diplomatic relations, that would be assigned a numerical score of -8. When these reports are averaged over time, they provide a rough indication of the level of cooperation and conflict between the two states" (2).

Creating event data involves three distinct steps: 1. identify sources; 2. develop a coding system; 3. train human coders.

"Event data was originally developed by Charles McClelland in the early 1960s as a bridge between the traditional approach of diplomatic history and the new quantitative analysis of international politics advocated in the behavioral approach. McClelland reasoned that history could be decomposed into a sequence of discrete events such as consultations, threats, promises, acts of violence and so forth. Event data formed the link between the then-prevalent general systems theories of international behavior and the textual histories which provided an empirical basis for understanding that behavior" (7).