Analyzing Spatial Drivers in Quantitative Conflict Studies: The Potential and Challenges of Geographic Information Systems

Commission The objective of this literature review is to understand where Graphical Information Systems (GIS) can be useful to address security issues and how it has been used until now. While the geographic drivers of territo-rial conflicts have been extensively described by a number of political studies, the quantitative analysis of these drivers is quite new. This study traces an evolution from conceptual research to quantitative develop-ment. It then discusses the advantages and challenges of applying new geographic techniques to analyze spatial drivers of conflict. We identify the main spatial components in conflict and security, the existing types of information ⁄data and the quantitative methods used. We describe the spatial component of security by looking at: (i) the main sociopoliti-cal concepts linked to territory, (ii) the kind of geographic concepts linked to territory, (iii) measures used to describe such geographic con-cepts; and (iv) the issues raised in any attempt to integrate geographic