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miniAtlas on Trends in Global Security Released

09 Oct 2008

NEW YORK—The miniAtlas of Human Security, produced by the Human Security Report Project at Simon Fraser University, Canada, provides an at-a-glance illustrated guide to global and regional trends in human insecurity––focusing on wars, genocides, battle deaths, refugee flows, and human rights abuses. The miniAtlas is available in English, French and Spanish, and is co-published with the World Bank.

The miniAtlas updates the findings of previous publications by the Human Security Report Project which, to the surprise of many, revealed that there had been a dramatic decline in asspolitical violence around the world in the wake of the Cold War.

After nearly five decades of inexorable increase, the number of violent conflicts dropped by 40 percent. The deadliest conflicts, and genocides, dropped even more dramatically–– by more than 70 percent.

Wars are not only far less frequent; they are also much less deadly. In 1950, the average armed conflict killed 38,000 people; by 2005, the figure was just 700.

With a compact and accessible format, the miniAtlas reveals that despite ongoing wars that make headlines in Iraq, Afghanistan and Darfur, the downward trend in political violence has been sustained.

None of these trends is tracked by the UN or any other agency. Nor has the UN created any Millennium Security Goals comparable to its Millennium Development Goals. The miniAtlas helps fill these knowledge gaps.

Using "state-of-the art yet reader-friendly maps and graphs,” the miniAtlas of Human Security is “an invaluable resource guide and instant reference tool on trends in global security since the end of the Cold War," Ramesh Thakur, Foundation Director, Balsillie School of International Affairs, Waterloo, Ontario and former Assistant Secretary-General, United Nations.

Intended for researchers, policymakers, students of international development and security issues, as well as the media and the interested public, the miniAtlas details global and regional trends in:

  • Armed conflicts, genocides and other forms of deadly violence against civilians.
  • Fatalities from political violence.
  • Numbers of refugees and other displaced peoples.
  • Respect for human rights.

“The miniAtlas brings dull statistics to life to reveal changing worldwide security trends,” Nick Grono, Deputy President, International Crisis Group.

Association Between Armed Conflict and Political and Economic Factors

The miniAtlas shows that conflicts are far less prevalent in high-and middle-income countries––supporting the UN’s contention that economic development may be an important form of long-term conflict prevention.

The miniAtlas also points to the association between the increase in peacekeeping operations in post-conflict countries from the early 1990s, and the decline in the number of wars being fought around the world.

In addition to peacekeeping, the miniAtlas tracks a number of other indicators of the extraordinary post-Cold War increase in international activism directed at stopping wars and preventing them from starting again.

While the trends that the miniAtlas describes are certainly encouraging, there is no guarantee that they will continue––and certainly no room for complacency.

However, the evidence suggests that a sustained commitment to what the UN calls “peacemaking” (initiatives to stop wars) and “peacebuilding” (policies to prevent them from starting again), can play a critical role in furthering the international community’s efforts to achieve the primary goal of the United Nations Charter––to save future generations from the “scourge of war.”

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miniAtlas of Human Security
May 2008, 64 pages, US$9.95
English | ISBN 978-0-8213-7221-0
French | ISBN 978-0-8213-7489-4
Spanish | ISBN 978-9-5883-0740-4

Access the miniAtlas
or purchase from the World Bank
(up to 50% discount available for customers in developing countries)

The miniAtlas of Human Security was funded by the International Development Research Centre, Canada and the Department for International Development, United Kingdom. Its findings should not be taken to represent the views of these or any other government, or of the Executive Directors of the International Development Bank for Reconstruction and the Development/World Bank or the governments they represent.

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The Human Security Report Project (HSRP) conducts research on global and regional trends in political violence, their causes and consequences and makes this research accessible to the policy and research communities, the media, educators and the interested public.

The HSRP’s flagship publication, the Human Security Report, is complemented by the Human Security Brief series, the Human Security Gateway (an online database of human security resources), the Afghanistan Conflict Monitor (a website highlighting new research and analysis on the conflict in Afghanistan), and three online bulletins, Human Security News, Afghanistan Security News and Human Security Research.

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