Research Data_2022.11.25

Since 1996, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has been caught in a cycle of violence. Many observers consider the Congolese conflict as the most barbaric conflict since World War II. Violence against civilians, the use of child soldiers, repeated destruction of personal property and public infrastructure are frequent in the DRC. The ongoing conflict has the potential to weaken the institutions of this country. The DRC with weak institutions is a threat to the security of the world because of the possibility of illegal uranium mining. Little was known about the factors that have contributed to the emergence of these terrorist acts. A multiple linear regression analysis was used to investigate the relationship between the criterion, terrorist incidents, and two predictors: political stability and economic growth. Additionally, one-way Analysis of Variance was used to determine whether a difference existed in terrorist acts incidence between the DRC and the neighboring countries. The first discovery indicated that political stability significantly predicted terrorist incidents in the DRC. The second discovery suggested that economic growth did not significantly predict terrorist acts in the DRC. The results revealed no significant difference between the DRC and some neighboring countries in terms of terrorist acts incidence. Data source: All secondary data on the DRC and its neighboring countries were collected or compiled by the World Bank (https://databank.worldbank.org/) and the the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START) (www.start.umd.edu/gtd), headquartered at the University of Maryland. START “is a university-based research and education center comprised of an international network of scholars committed to the scientific study of the causes and human consequences of terrorism in the United States and around the world” (START, 2022). The Global Terrorism Database (GTD) contains data on over 140,000 terrorist incidents across the globe (START, 2022). The data used in this study are available on these two organizations’ websites. The original files collected from the two websites contained 162 cases. The publication of WGI started in 1996. WGI were first published once every two years. From 2002, WGI have been published yearly. WGI about the years 1997, 1999, and 2001 were thus missing in the files obtained from the website. As multiple linear analysis used in the study required observed response, terrorist incidents, and contemporaneous values of the predictors, I resolved to use valid cases. I therefore removed cases that had missing data from the file. Hence, valid cases I used in this study spanned 17 years, for the period starting in 2002 through 2019. Longitudinal data file used in the study contained 153 discrete cases.自1996年以来，刚果民主共和国（Democratic Republic of the Congo, DRC）一直深陷暴力循环之中。诸多观察人士将刚果冲突视为第二次世界大战以来最为残酷的武装冲突。在刚果民主共和国，针对平民的暴力行为、童兵征召、个人财物与公共基础设施屡遭破坏的现象频发。持续不断的冲突可能削弱该国的国家治理机构。由于存在非法铀矿开采的风险，治理机构孱弱的刚果民主共和国对全球安全构成威胁。此前，学界对催生此类恐怖行径的诱因知之甚少。 本研究采用多元线性回归分析，探究被预测变量（因变量）恐怖袭击事件与两个自变量——政治稳定性和经济增长之间的关联。此外，本研究还运用单因素方差分析（one-way Analysis of Variance, ANOVA），以检验刚果民主共和国与其邻国在恐怖袭击发生率方面是否存在显著差异。 研究的第一项发现表明，政治稳定性对刚果民主共和国的恐怖袭击事件具有显著的预测作用。第二项发现则显示，经济增长并未对刚果民主共和国的恐怖行径产生显著的预测效果。研究结果还显示，刚果民主共和国与部分邻国在恐怖袭击发生率方面并无显著差异。 数据来源： 本研究中所有关于刚果民主共和国及其邻国的二手数据，均由世界银行（World Bank，https://databank.worldbank.org/）以及总部设于马里兰大学的恐怖主义研究与应对国家联盟（National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism, START，www.start.umd.edu/gtd）收集整理。START是“以大学为依托的研究与教育中心，由国际学者网络组成，致力于从科学视角研究美国及全球范围内恐怖主义的成因与人类后果”（START, 2022）。全球恐怖主义数据库（Global Terrorism Database, GTD）收录了全球范围内超过14万起恐怖袭击事件的数据（START, 2022）。本研究使用的数据可在上述两家机构的官方网站获取。 本研究从上述两家网站采集的原始文件共包含162条样本。世界治理指标（World Governance Indicators, WGI）于1996年首次发布，最初每两年更新一次；自2002年起改为每年发布一次。因此，从网站获取的文件中缺失了1997年、1999年及2001年的WGI数据。由于本研究使用的多元线性分析要求观测被预测变量（因变量）恐怖袭击事件与自变量的同期数值，本研究对缺失数据的样本进行了剔除，仅保留有效样本。最终本研究使用的有效样本覆盖2002年至2019年共17年的时间跨度，纵向数据集共包含153条离散样本。