The soundtrack of social cohesion – What music trace data reveals about social cohesion and political instability

The Centre for Global Security Challenges and the Quantitative Cluster are delighted to host Dr Karina Mross and Dr Christoph Dworschak to discuss the project, 'The soundtrack of social cohesion – What music trace data reveals about social cohesion and political instability'. 

Join us on Monday 28th October at 2pm in Michael Sadler SR (LG.16).

Abstract

The world is facing major and interrelated global challenges that threaten to accelerate social disintegration and conflict. Social cohesion is closely linked to the resilience of societies to deal with internal upheaval, external shocks and to prevent violent escalation. However, we still lack much knowledge on how social cohesion develops, especially because data collection is both difficult and costly – largely relying on representative surveys with limited geographical and temporal coverage. In a third party funding proposal, ‘The soundtrack of social cohesion – Measuring and Understanding Social Cohesion through music listening preferences (MUSiC)’, Karina Mross proposes using collective music listening preferences to create a ‘mood barometer’ that approximates a society’s state of social cohesion by focusing on the most popular songs in the largest streaming platform (Spotify). Using national and city charts that draw on large-scale user data to determine weekly top 200 songs, the project aims to create an immediate and dynamic measure of social cohesion. Moreover, this novel and dynamic approach offers the chance to gain insight into the real-time, latent emotional state of societies, which may allow us to predict imminent outbreaks of political unrest. Zooming into this project component, which is co-authored with Christoph Dworschak (University of York), the authors discuss how they plan to use music listening preferences to inform forecasts of protests and riots in their paper  ‘Rhythms to riot: Forecasting political instability with music trace data.’

About the speakers

Karina Mross is a political scientist and Senior Researcher at the German Institute of Development and Sustainability in Bonn. Her research focuses on how political institutions impact on peace and social cohesion in conflict-affected contexts and especially after civil war. Moreover, she investigates the role international engagement such as democracy promotion, peacebuilding efforts or transitional justice support can play. She combines cross-country analysis with qualitative research and has conducted field research in Burundi, Liberia, Mozambique, Nepal, Niger and Timor-Leste. She also engages in policy advice to the German government and international organizations. Karina obtained a PhD in International Affairs and Political Economy from the University of St. Gallen in 2019.

Christoph Dworschak is Lecturer of Quantitative Political Science at the University of York. His research focuses on the causes and consequences of violent and nonviolent mobilisation, security force behaviour, civil-military relations, UN peacekeeping, and social science methodology. His work has been awarded the NEPS Medal and the PSS(I) Moore Prize, and is published in leading journals such PLOS ONE, Comparative Politics, International Studies Quarterly, the Journal of Conflict Resolution, and the Journal of Peace Research. Previously he held positions at the University of Mannheim, the University of the German Federal Armed Forces, and the Norwegian University of Science and Technology. He was scientific advisor on computational crisis early warning for the German Ministry of Defence and was invited a visiting scholar to Princeton University and the Peace Research Institute Oslo. He holds a PhD in Government from the University of Essex.