Modelling Terrorist Attacks

Master thesis (2018)

Authors

D. Koopman Electrical Engineering, Mathematics and Computer Science

Contributors

P. Cirillo (mentor)
C.W. Oosterlee (graduation committee member)
R.J. Fokkink (graduation committee member)
Faculty
Electrical Engineering, Mathematics and Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Mathematics and Computer Science
Copyright: © 2018 Daan Koopman
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Published Date

29-06-2018

Language

English

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Faculty

Electrical Engineering, Mathematics and Computer Science

Abstract

This thesis adds to quantitative literature on terrorism by examining the relationship between various annual country statistics and the number of terrorist attacks. In addition, it assesses the potential of forecasting terrorism. Combining an extensive review of literature from social science, with data analysis of the Global Terrorism Database, results in a specific selection of attacks on country-level, along with various factors that allegedly affect terrorism. It is shown that, under certain conditions, the countries can be fit by a nonhomogeneous Poisson process model with a Weibull baseline intensity and a piecewise constant covariates component. For three out of five countries, the in-sample results are satisfactory, providing a tentative answer to the general debate whether terrorism can be explained by root causes. Out-of-sample results for Afghanistan and Somalia are promising for future research and implementation in policy making.