The PA-X Peace Agreement Database (www.peaceagreements.org) is a database and repository of peace agreements from 1990 to date, current up until January 2003. PA-X provides a comprehensive dataset of peace agreements, capable of underpinning both quantitative and qualitative research.
PA-X has been designed to provide easy access to peace agreement texts and to allow users to explore patterns of agreements over time, both within processes and across processes. PA-X is primarily produced by a team of researchers at the University of Edinburgh, with additional collaborators - see more about the team in Acknowledgements.
It aims to be accessible to:
• mediators and parties in conflict seeking to understand how compromise can be crafted
• civic actors seeking to influence on-going peace talks and proposals
• social science researchers interested in understanding peace agreements quantitatively and qualitatively.
For peace agreement definitions see here. Download PA-X Codebook here.
PA-X contains:
It enables search permutations which can disaggregate the data by country, entity, region, conflict type, and stage of agreement; and allows examination of different combinations of issues addressed. See more here.
PA-X is accompanied by PA-X Gender, which contains more detailed analysis of the over all agreements in the main PA-X collection that mention women, girls, or gender. This database breaks down the relevant provisions into 53 categories, again with detailed search mechanisms and quantitative data fully available.
The search mechanisms and pages on PA-X Gender work the same way as PAX, although they involve different sub-coding of gender provisions. PA-X Gender was launched in 2015 and has been central to research by institutions including UN Women and the Council of Foreign Relations.
Agreements were sourced using: existing collections; country-specific websites and literature; websites of other civic groups; official documentation of international organisations; and writing to or meeting with and requesting documentation from governments and actors who have signed peace agreements, or mediators involved in conflicts.
See video demonstrating PA-X search capabilities here.
Version 7:
Bell, Christine, Sanja Badanjak, Juline Beaujouan Robert Forster, Tim Epple, Astrid Jamar, Kevin McNicholl, Sean Molloy, Kathryn Nash, Jan Pospisil, Robert Wilson, Laura Wise (2023). PA-X Codebook, Version 7. Peace and Conflict Resolution Evidence Platform (PeaceRep), University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh.
Bell, C., & Badanjak, S. (2019). Introducing PA-X: A new peace agreement database and dataset. Journal of Peace Research, 56(3), 452-466. Available at https://www.peaceagreements.org/
Version 6:
Bell, Christine, Sanja Badanjak, Juline Beaujouan, Robert Forster, Tim Epple, Astrid Jamar, Kevin McNicholl, Sean Molloy, Kathryn Nash, Jan Pospisil, Robert Wilson, Laura Wise (2022). PA-X Codebook, Version 6. Political Settlements Research Programme, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh. www.peaceagreements.org
Bell, C. and Badanjak, S. (2019) ‘Introducing PA-X: A new peace agreement database and dataset’, Journal of Peace Research, 56 (3).
Version 5:
Bell, Christine, Sanja Badanjak, Juline Beaujouan, Robert Forster, Tim Epple, Astrid Jamar, Kevin McNicholl, Sean Molloy, Kathryn Nash, Jan Pospisil, Robert Wilson, Laura Wise (2021). PA-X Codebook, Version 5. Political Settlements Research Programme, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh. www.peaceagreements.org
Bell, C. and Badanjak, S. (2019) ‘Introducing PA-X: A new peace agreement database and dataset’, Journal of Peace Research, 56 (3).
Version 4:
Bell, Christine, Sanja Badanjak, Juline Beaujouan, Robert Forster, Tim Epple, Astrid Jamar, Kevin McNicholl, Sean Molloy, Kathryn Nash, Jan Pospisil, Robert Wilson, Laura Wise (2020). PA-X Codebook, Version 4. Political Settlements Research Programme, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh. www.peaceagreements.org
Bell, C. and Badanjak, S. (2019) ‘Introducing PA-X: A new peace agreement database and dataset’, Journal of Peace Research, 56 (3).
Version 3:
Bell, Christine, Sanja Badanjak, Juline Beaujouan Robert Forster, Tim Epple, Astrid Jamar, Kevin McNicholl, Sean Molloy, Kathryn Nash, Jan Pospisil, Robert Wilson, Laura Wise (2020). PA-X Codebook, Version 3. Political Settlements Research Programme, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh. www.peaceagreements.org
Bell, C. and Badanjak, S. (2019) ‘Introducing PA-X: A new peace agreement database and dataset’, Journal of Peace Research, 56 (3).
Version 2:
Bell, Christine, Sanja Badanjak, Robert Forster, Astrid Jamar, Kevin McNicholl, Sean Molloy, Kathryn Nash, Jan Pospisil, Laura Wise (2019). PA-X Codebook, Version 3. Political Settlements Research Programme, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh. www.peaceagreements.org
Bell, C. and Badanjak, S. (2019) ‘Introducing PA-X: A new peace agreement database and dataset’, Journal of Peace Research, 56 (3).
Version 1
PA-X (2017). Peace Agreements Database and Access Tool, Version 1. Political Settlements Research Programme, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh. www.peaceagreements.org
Bell, Christine, Sanja Badanjak, Robert Forster, Astrid Jamar, Jan Pospisil, Laura Wise (2017). PA-X Codebook, Version 1. Political Settlements Research Programme, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh. www.peaceagreements.org
Bell, C. and Badanjak, S. (2019) ‘Introducing PA-X: A new peace agreement database and dataset’, Journal of Peace Research, 56 (3).
If you are using a PA-X copyrighted translation please acknowledge the translation as Agreement name and date, (Unofficial translation, PA-X Peace Agreement Database www.peaceagreements.org). You may attach translated pdfs of translations but only in the original PA-X format with the copyright header.
We invite feedback, comments, suggestions, and ideas that would help us make new data releases even better. We are particularly interested to hear if there are any documents that you think should be part of PA-X, or if you find that there is scope for cooperation. We would also like to know if the PA-X data are being used in other research projects, or if they have inspired similar endeavours. Get in touch at PeaceRep@ed.ac.uk.
For full printable version of instructions and background information see here.