PLOVER Summary

Index

AGREE CONSULT SUPPORT CONCEDE
COOPERATE AID RETREAT INVESTIGATE
DEMAND DISAPPROVE REJECT THREATEN
PROTEST CRIME SANCTION MOBILIZE
COERCE ASSAULT

Some suggestions for coding using prodigy/plodigy

  1. While the annotation files are organized by PLOVER category, make sure you have some familiarity with the entire scheme so that you will know if some alternative category is a better fit.
     
  2. It is helpful to review the definition of the category using this document before starting on a new section.
     
  3. The accuracy of the various coders will vary considerably depending on both the nature and the frequency of the event, and in cases of relatively rare events, it is likely that almost all of the cases you find will be rejects.
     
  4. Use the ignore category for any cases which you either think should not be an event—this will be the most common case—or you can't decide on the category. Don't hesitate to use : in contemporary coding, almost all events of any importance are reported in multiple sources and multiple ways, and its better just to skip texts that are ambiguous.
     
  5. Three important PLOVER context categories are “historical”, “future”, and “hypothetical”: PLOVER assumes that the coding engine will be able to resolve these and put that information in the context list, so no such distinctions occur in the definitions of the events themselves.
     
  6. In contrast to earlier event ontologies, PLOVER does not code any sort of simple commentary or appeals: verbal statements are considered event only if they indicate some policy or material change.
     
  7. PLOVER is still under development, so please make notes on places where the documentation and/or the definitions of the categories seem to be unclear.
     

AGREE

Agree to, offer, promise, or otherwise indicate willingness or commitment to cooperate. All cooperative actions reported in future tense are also taken to imply intentions.

Note: It's not entirely clear that we should maintain the distinction—which was inherited from the original human-coded WEIS ontology from the 1960s—between AGREE and SUPPORT: use your best judgment and we'll re-visit this once we've got a large set of annotations.

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CONSULT

All consultations and meetings: this includes visiting and hosting visits, as well as meeting at a neutral location, and consultation by phone or other media. Other useful keywords: “Holding talks” and “discussions”, “negotiations, bargaining, or discussions”.

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SUPPORT

Initiate, resume, improve, or expand diplomatic, non-material cooperation; express support for, commend, approve policy, action, or actor. This event form is a verbal act. Use this code only for political, diplomatic, and non-material support, including recognition of newly independent states, new governments that might have come to power through unconventional means, and initiation of diplomatic ties with an entity for the first time, as are actions which ratify, sign, or finalize an agreement or treaty. SUPPORT is distinct from the CAMEO APPEAL category, where the actor simply requested support from the target: these events, like comments generally, are not coded in PLOVER.

See comment under AGREE on the possible ambiguity of the AGREE/SUPPORT categories

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CONCEDE

This covers verbal concessions which have no immediate material consequences, including promised of future concessions, including easing of administrative or legal restrictions on persons and organizations, remove curfews, suspending protests, declarations (but not implementations) of ceasefires and withdrawals from territory.

CONCEDE, like the verbal components CAMEO/WEIS predecessor YIELD, is inherently problem since many concessions deal with promises that certain things will not happen, or will happen in the distant future (e.g. many policy changes). So, for example, the lifting of a curfew is, effectively, a promise that people will not be arrested for violating the curfew, which itself is not an event. We're treating such concessions as verbal rather than material even though sometimes they have material consequences, e.g. people coming out in the streets after a curfew is lifted. But only if they believe the government.

COOPERATE

Initiate, resume, improve, or expand mutual material cooperation or exchange, including

COOPERATE is distinguished from AID because the activity is generally understood to directly benefit both parties, whereas AID is understood to primarily benefit only the recipient.

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AID

All provisions of providing material aid whose material benefits primarily accrue to the recipient. Examples include:

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RETREAT

RETREAT covers any events—not just military “retreat” from territory—which have an immediate (not simply promised) material consequences, such as the release of prisoners and hostages, repatriation of refugees, the return of confiscated property, allowing the entry of observers, peacekeepers, or humanitarian workers, disarming, observing a ceasefire or otherwise ending active conflicts, and, of course, a military retreat from, or ceding, territory. RETREAT also covers resignations of government officials.

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INVESTIGATE

All investigations, including those of historical cases. Examples include investigations of criminal activity (theft, killing, etc) and corruption, human rights abuses, war crime, and violations of basic freedoms, military activities such as violations of ceasefire, seizures, and invasions.

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DEMAND

All demands and orders. Demands are stronger or more forceful than a request or appeal—which is not coded in PLOVER—and potentially carry more serious repercussions, although not as much as threats. Coding will need to rely primarily on the language used by reporters to make this distinction. All demands are verbal acts.

Examples from the CAMEO manual include:

Exceptions

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DISAPPROVE

Express disapprovals, objections, and complaints; condemn, decry a policy or an action; criticize, defame, denigrate responsible parties.

Examples from the CAMEO manual include:

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REJECT

All rejections and refusals.

Examples from the CAMEO manual include:

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THREATEN

All threats, coercive or forceful warnings with serious potential repercussions. Threats are typically verbal acts.

Examples from the CAMEO manual include:

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PROTEST

All civilian demonstrations and other collective actions carried out as protests against the target actor: Dissent collectively, publicly show negative feelings or opinions; rally, gather to protest a policy, action, or actor(s).

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CRIME

CRIME events are non-political actions which are considered crimes in the jurisdiction where they occur: the list below shows the common examples. This category is not intended for the coding of acts of civil disobedience, revolt and other activities which, while criminal from the perspective of the government, are primarily political in nature.

There is often a great deal of ambiguity as to whether some activities are criminal or political: for example, confiscatory activities by a weak militarized group with little local support. Usually such distinctions will not be apparent at the sentence—or even article—level and need to be resolved elsewhere in the analysis, for example by the classification of the actor.

Examples

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SANCTION

All reductions in normal, routine, or cooperative relations not otherwise specified. Note that this is not confined to formal “sanctions”—SANCTION was just the best word we could find for WEIS and CAMEO's “REDUCE RELATIONS”

Examples from the CAMEO manual include:

Exceptions

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MOBILIZE

All military or police moves that fall short of the actual use of force. This category is different from ASSAULT and FIGHT, as they refer to uses of force, while military posturing falls short of actual use of force and is typically a demonstration of military capabilities and readiness.

MOBILIZE is also distinct from THREAT in that the latter refers merely to threats, is typically verbal, and does not involve any activity that is undertaken to demonstrate military power. Source actors are not necessarily militaries affiliated with states but any organized armed groups. Targets are actors against whom the source mobilizes its military capabilities in a threatening manner if that is clear, but a group may mobilize with no specific target stated.

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COERCE

Repression, violence against civilians, or their rights or properties. This includes the following modes:

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ASSAULT

ASSAULT events are deliberate actions which can potentially result in substantial physical harm: The list below shows the common modes:

Last update: 28 December 2017