Last Tuesday, the Rei Jaume I Awards jury, made up of a significant number of Nobel Prize winners, awarded Marta Reynal-Querol, Professor of Economics at Pompeu Fabra University, with the economics prize “for her contributions to armed conflict and political economy.” and economic development with methodologies based on historical experience and big data». Complete happiness at home. Valencian José García Montalvo, whom she married in 2019, also received the same award.
Can big data predict the outcome of a war like the one in Ukraine, or is every war unpredictable?
What we do with big data is use very detailed data, and that means having a lot of information and therefore being able to very well measure risk factors and how they change over time, such as wealth distribution. population…etc. This means we can more precisely define and better measure the outcomes of wars. At the global level, for example, we were able to calculate measures of economic inequality and inequality between ethnic groups for very small areas. But as close as we are getting, we are still far from predicting when a conflict will begin. If we compare it to medicine, we might think that what we have are pretty tight profiles where people (regions, regions, areas…) are most likely to get cancer (conflict), but we don’t know when they happen. will develop and in which body (on what day and in which city the war begins). With big data, I am convinced that what seems impossible to us now will finally come true.
And you’re afraid of what will happen if the war continues?
It may spread to other areas or increase in intensity, causing an accident with disastrous consequences.
Are you seeing another recession?
It could be, I’m not excluding it. A significant part of the problems of inflation and dislocation of production chains stem from the war in Ukraine.
One of his research lies in the polarization of social groups to find out how close a society is to engaging in a social conflict. Is Spain so polarized that it fears a conflict?
The potential for conflict depends on many factors. Having an ethnically, religiously or ideologically polarized society is a very important factor, especially where groups are concentrated regionally and the values that each group accepts above all are not shared. The ideological polarization in Spain is not geographically separate. There are people with different ideologies in every field, even among groups of friends. Also, in general, we all value our jobs, keeping our families healthy, and an education for our children, even though it may not seem like it at times. It would be very difficult to risk all these problems. The values shared during this period among ideologically polarized groups in Spain are more deeply rooted than the values that differentiate us. The day these three pillars fail for a very high proportion of society, then the extent to which we will be polarized will change and it will certainly be far more divisive than ideological.
One of their methodology consists of measuring inequality through satellite images. What do those images show?
Measures created with satellite information such as the light captured at night try to catch up with the development level of the regions. It has many advantages for calculating measures of poverty and inequality. First, they don’t lie. Second, they may have precise definitions. Thirdly, these are the same measures for all countries and we do not have a comparison problem. For example, in countries with more authoritarian political systems, data on poverty has already been shown to have nothing to do with what we observe with satellite data.
Unstoppable inequality is one of the greatest dangers to social peace. Will its effects like war and inflation in Ukraine accelerate it?
Undoubtedly, the war in Ukraine can have significant effects on inequality. Above all, inflation more affects the most disadvantaged social classes, who spend most of their income on basic consumption and energy. The implementation of the government’s measures to reduce fuel prices, for example, regardless of income level, does not balance this effect. In addition, wages do not maintain their purchasing power, which reduces purchasing power. But the most important thing is that experience tells us that the biggest danger to social peace is the rapid increase in energy and food prices, and that is exactly the biggest impact we are experiencing right now.