Statistics

Disraeli is reputed to have said 'There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies and statistics.' And Andrew Lang wrote 'He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lamp-posts-for support rather than illumination.'

I like these quotes, probably because I am instinctively sceptical of the sort of social scientists who claim special significance for their research on the basis of it being quantitative. I am a qualitative analysis man. It takes good technique and skill to measure something but the real genius is picking what's worth measuring and figuring out what it means. Still, it's good to be conversant with stats and very handy to be able to generate rough comparative measures with the click of a mouse.

Looking for a rough indicator measure of militarization? Try generating a table of armed forces personnel per capita using NationMaster, 'a massive central data source and a handy way to graphically compare nations.'

For more specific searches and comparisons try the Facts on International Relations and Security Trends database which is provided free on the phenomenally useful website of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.

Update:
Strange, the first thing I looked at after writing this post was this New York Times article 'Military Charts Movement of Conflict in Iraq Toward Chaos'. I've no quarrel with the veracity of the claim that Iraq is moving towards chaos. I just wonder how one quantifies 'hostile rhetoric' or 'problems with ineffective police'. And does assigning these things a number make the analysis more scientific?