Climate—Conflict—Vulnerability Index
Mapping the overlap between climate and conflict risks
Where in the world do climate and conflict risks overlap in harmful ways? Which role do local vulnerabilities play in exacerbating risks? How can we allow analysts and policymaker to make better decisions — based on heterogenous, multi-faceted information sources?
Premise
There is significant overlap between countries most affected by climate change and those most at risk of violent conflict. Climate change in the context of conflict is considered a potential “threat multiplier” and the interplay between climate and conflict has received increasing attention from researchers and policy-makers over the last two decades.
In order to provide a bird's eye perspective on the climate-conflict nexus, the Climate—Conflict—Vulnerability Index (CCVI) maps current global risks by integrating climate and conflict hazards with local vulnerabilities.
The index comprises a harmonized set of data layers and a transparent scoring methodology to make regions globally comparable. The data is updated quarterly and gridded to 0.5 degrees (ca. 55km by 55km at the equator).
Both methodology and data are available for download and reuse under a permissive Creative Commons license. A code release is planned for 2025.
Research project
The index is the product of a joint research collaboration between the scientific partners at the Center for Crisis Early Warning (CCEW) at the University of the Bundeswehr Munich and the FutureLab - Security, Ethnic Conflicts and Migration at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research.
My team and I are guiding the development of the index from a design perspective, and help the project with science communications and data visualization.
Public launch
The CCVI was launched publicly by the German Federal Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock at the Berlic Climate Security Conference 2024.
See a recording of the keynote in English translation below or the original in German language. The CCVI part start at around 08:30.
CCVI Tool
In addition to the public facing part of the project, we also work on advanced internal tooling to make the index relevant for decision-making at the German Federal Foreign Office and its partners.
The CCVI Tool provides analysts with detailed perspectives on the global CCVI data layers and powerful features for country-level analysis.
Based on the detailed, publically available data layers from the index, the CCVI Tool adds another level of analysis on a country level: The country profile pages feature detailed maps, trend analysis and comparison features.
All data views can be downloaded for use in reports or presentations. The CCVI Tool is currently available to selected institutions for beta testing.
Data Design Language
At the same time, we are considering more fundamentally how our contacts at the German Foreign Office can communicate data more effectively.
To this end, we are developing a Data Design Language, which provides an expressive repertoire of design elements, guidelines and components for effective data communication.
All fundamental design decisions are stored as design tokens, defining a single source of truth, and allowing consistent reuse across projects, applications, and media channels.
The Data Design Language is documented in the form of a living styleguide, and currently implemented for internal products.
By supplying a toolkit and design repertoire, rather than just one-off projects, we enable the PREVIEW team to take real ownership and put design to use in the organization. Our design-token-centric approach makes it easy to adapt to the needs of different stakeholders and supply themes and templates for a variety of tools and platforms.
Contact us, in case you want to learn more about this approach and its benefits.
