Events and versions: Reconstructing event data analysis

International event datasets generally provide singular descriptions of the stream of international interactions. Each description represents one version of events. Yet, because events may be described in several ways, each reliant upon an alternative perspective or world version, these descriptions grossly underrepresent events. In its negative moment, this paper, “deconstructs,” after a fashion, the interpretations and versions that stand behind event codes, reviewing the widely‐suspected partiality of events datasets that threatens the validity of all subsequent analyses. In its positive moment, this paper outlines a reconstruction of the event‐data project as “computational hermeneutics.” This perspective takes seriously the plurality of world versions. It would construct reproducible models of textual accounts of international events and test hypotheses regarding the inferential effects of interpretive presuppositions embodied in alternative world versions. To initiate discussion, the paper proposes several principles of computational hermeneutics.