lisianealves/borderland-spillover-risk-framework

Geospatial risk-screening framework to identify frontier zones at risk of armed group spillover, applied to West Africa and the Colombia-Venezuela border. # Border Spillover Risk in Armed Conflict This project develops a geospatial risk-screening framework for identifying frontier zones exposed to armed spillover. It uses the Global Terrorism Index 2026 border-proximity trend as a starting point, and it's built on ACLED event data. The main case is jihadist violence in West Africa, with a focus on Sahel-to-coastal spillover. A comparative case applies the same logic to hybrid armed violence on the Colombia-Venezuela border. ## Research Question How do armed groups use borderlands to expand operational reach, and which indicators can help identify frontier zones at risk of spillover? ## Project Outputs See notebook on nbviwer | Output | Description | |:--|:--| | Border Militancy Exposure Index | Identifies border dyads where militant violence is already concentrated, contributing to Coastal Spillover Risk Index v2 | | Coastal Spillover Risk Index v2 | Ranks Sahel-to-coastal border segments by observed spillover indicators | | Hybrid Border Violence Exposure Index | Comparative Colombia-Venezuela stress test by frontier zone | | Static maps | Border bands, risk-ranked border segments, operational geography, and comparative border exposure | | Methodology | Reproducible actor filters, border-distance logic, index formulas, and limitations | ## Main Finding The West Africa results suggest that borderland risk is not evenly distributed across coastal exposure areas. The strongest spillover signal appears along the Benin-Niger frontier, followed by Burkina Faso-Togo and Benin-Burkina Faso. These segments combine recent violence, border proximity, coastal-side activity, and operational-geography indicators such as proximity to protected areas. The Colombia-Venezuela comparison shows that a similar borderland framework can be useful outside jihadist violence, but the interpretation changes. There, the relevant phenomenon is hybrid armed governance: insurgency, criminal economies, armed groups, and state fragmentatio …