It seemed fitting, on the day that Oswald was killed, and a few days after Assassin's Creed II became commercial to address political assassinations. However, this paper was an unexpected finding.
What is interesting about the article is not only that it draws a final conclusion that would make Dr. House's day, but also the fact that it was produced from data by a reputable institution as opposed to a basement-dwelling, tinfoil hat-sporting, youtube conspiracy theorists.Quote:
Assassinations are a persistent feature of the political landscape. Using a
new data set of assassination attempts on all world leaders from 1875 to
2004, we exploit inherent randomness in the success or failure of
assassination attempts to identify assassination’s effects. We find that, on
average, successful assassinations of autocrats produce sustained moves
toward democracy. We also find that assassinations affect the intensity of
small-scale conflicts. The results document a contemporary source of
institutional change, inform theories of conflict, and show that small
sources of randomness can have a pronounced effect on history.
I for one, personally agree with the report, but what are the orgah's thoughts?
It's an interesting (and 51 pages long) read.
