Conflict and Governance
Conflict remains one of the biggest impediments to economic and democratic development, and increasing violence targeting government officials and processes poses a direct threat to democratic governance. Violence targeting government officials and election processes can have a chilling effect on the work of those public officials but also on the rule of law and democracy more broadly, given these actors’ direct role in safeguarding the democratic order. Likewise, attacks on civic activists can undermine their work to advance rights and government accountability.
The Center’s Conflict and Governance project systematically tracks political violence targeting elections, government officials, and human rights defenders. The project is a partnership between the Center and ACLED (Armed Conflict Location and Event Data). ACLED is an independent, impartial global monitor that collects, analyzes, and maps data on conflict and protest. ACLED provides detailed information to help identify, understand, and track patterns and trends in conflict and crisis situations around the world. The UT Government Department offers a nationally acclaimed program of teaching and research in political science, bringing unique expertise in comparative politics and public law to support the project.
The Center piloted the project in Spring 2024, applying new elections and national administrator tags to violent events in ACLED's data for Mexico, as a country with one of the highest conflict rates globally and pivotal elections in June 2024. The project has since expanded to include Bolivia, Ecuador, El Salvador, Honduras, India, Iraq, Pakistan, Panama, the Philippines, and the United States. In 2026, the project added additional tags tracking violence against human rights defenders, including specific tags for attacks against advocates for civil and political rights, identity-based rights (addressing gender, minorities, migrants, religious groups, indigenous groups, and other groups experiencing discrimination), and land and environmental rights.
In each country, the project is backdating ACLED coding to track violent events related to elections, government officials, and human rights defenders in all years available in the ACLED data, dating back to 2018 in some countries and 2020 in others. The election violence data are available on ACLED's website, along with analytical reports related to elections, such as these on Ecuador, Mexico, and the Philippines.
The Conflict and Governance project is directed by Ashley Moran. UT students have played an indispensible role in updating and expanding the new governance tags applied to the ACLED data. Current and former UT students working on the project include undergraduates Isra Akhtar, Cristobal Alcantara, Sarayu Bellary, Ty Burroughs, Owen Butler, Geraldyn Campos, Beau Chapman, Julissa Chavez-Bravo, Manasi Chande, Tori Coleman, Dina Elsaid, Tamon Hamlett, Hudson Harris, Abigail Holguin, Sunny Hou, Jefte Ibarra, Thea Islam, Anshumi Jhaveri, Zee Khan, Eugene Lee, Brian Montalvo, Holly Moyers, Sofi Muñoz, Kathleen Nguyen, Jasmine Panjwani, Briana Peña, Britney Ann Pope, Joanna Ramos, and Ethan Thomas.
UT students interested to intern with the project can reach out to Ashley Moran.