The paper
In February 2026 Irma Alonso-Alvarez, Ekaterina Bukina, Marina Diakonova, Nino Khitarishvili, Javier J. Pérez, and Pedro Piqueras, all from BANCO DE ESPAÑA, in their paper “Geopolitical risk: a database of general and bilateral indices” constructed a comprehensive database of geopolitical risk (GPR) indices for 34 countries, representing approximately 80% of global GDP.
Key methodological features:
- Data Source: Dictionary-based textual analysis of national press articles accessed via the Dow Jones Factiva platform
- Multilingual Coverage: GPR queries translated into 15 languages to ensure linguistic and cultural relevance (including English, Chinese, Japanese, German, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, Polish, Arabic, Korean, Indonesian, Dutch, and Bahasa Melayu)
- Source Selection Algorithm: Standardized procedure to select 2-7 major news sources per country based on popularity (Reuters Institute data, Google Trends), trustworthiness, and geographical spread
- Index Construction: Monthly frequency indices calculated as the ratio of geopolitical risk-related articles to total articles, normalized to a mean of 100 for the 1980-2024 period
- Bilateral Indices: In addition to general GPR indices, the database includes bilateral indices for four key focal regions—Russia, China, the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), and the Western Bloc—capturing how each country perceives external geopolitical threats
- Validation: Two-stage validation including statistical robustness checks (comparing aggregate vs. source-level indices) and narrative validation (identifying and labeling index peaks against known geopolitical events)
Key Findings
The database reveals several important patterns in geopolitical risk perceptions:
- Temporal Coverage: Indices span from 1977 (United States) to 2025, with over 20 years of coverage for major economies including the US, UK, France, Germany, Spain, China, India, Japan, Australia, and Canada
- Global vs. Local Events: Indices capture both major global shocks (e.g., 9/11 attacks, Ukraine invasion) and country-specific events (e.g., Japan’s response to North Korea’s 2006 nuclear test, Spain’s Madrid train bombings in 2004)
- Regional Clustering: European countries show high correlation (close to 80%) in their GPR indices, suggesting shared regional narratives, while countries like Iran, China, Pakistan, and Algeria exhibit distinct perspectives with limited overlap with Western counterparts
- Bilateral Risk Sources: For Europe, the Middle East has consistently accounted for 20-30% of perceived geopolitical risk, while Russia’s importance has surged following the Crimea annexation and Ukraine invasion; China’s relevance has increased slightly but remains lower than Middle Eastern and Russian risks
- Divergent Perceptions: Bilateral indices effectively trace country-specific conflicts, such as India’s heightened concern over China following the 1998 India-Pakistan nuclear tests, or the Philippines’ spike in China-related risk after the 2010 Manila hostage crisis
Database Usefulness
The database offers several advantages for researchers and policymakers:
- Localized Perspective: Unlike the Caldara-Iacoviello GPR index (based on Anglo-Saxon newspapers), this database captures country-specific narratives and perceptions, providing more granular and culturally relevant measures
- Directionality: Bilateral indices identify the geographical sources of geopolitical tensions, enabling analysis of asymmetric impacts across countries and understanding transmission channels
- High Frequency: Monthly data allows for timely tracking of geopolitical developments and rapid empirical applications
- Broad Coverage: 34 countries across all continents, with particularly strong representation in North America, Europe, and Asia-Pacific
- Scalable Methodology: The standardized, dictionary-based approach is transparent, replicable, and adaptable to additional countries and regions
- Complementary to Existing Measures: The European GPR index captures regionally significant episodes absent from US-centric indices, such as the end of the Cold War, the Bosnian War, and the Kosovo conflict
- Empirical Applications: The database is particularly valuable for macroeconomic modeling, financial market analysis, international relations research, and policy scenario analysis in an increasingly fragmented geopolitical landscape
Data Access: The database provides both general and bilateral GPR indices at monthly and quarterly frequencies, with historical coverage extending back several decades for most countries.
