Examining civilian lives across borders

Confronting the disparities and inequalities in implicit value that arise when some civilian lives are seemingly worth more than others in the narrative of war.

Human Exchange Rate: Palestinian to Israeli (PAL/ISR)
  • 2023 was a 12.5 year where one Israeli life was worth 12.5 Palestinian lives based on data of 1,200 Israeli deaths to 15,000 (rounded) over the course of the year.
  • While the human death rate broadly has been immense, from a disparity point of view Israeli lives had significantly more value in 2021 (205 Palestinian lives to 9 Israeli lives), 2018 (241 Palestinian lives to 7 Israeli lives).
  • 2014 was perhaps the high point in the value of Israeli civilian lives, where 1,760 Palestinians were killed against 19 Israeli civilian deaths leading to a high point exchange rate of 92.6.
  • Ongoing market factors in asymetric and guerilla warfare tactics putting civilians at risk, global military trade and weapons aid funding, displacement and occupation, dehumanising language and extremism, lack of diplomatic action from global economic powers, and increasingly sophisticated weaponry make this trend line likely to remain volatile while swinging towards Israelis (see market factors in Appendix).

References:

  • UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
  • B’Tselem: Jerusalem-based non-profit organisation
Human Exchange Rate: Ukrainian to Russian (UKR/RUS)
  • The market sprang into life in 2014 during the Russian offensive into Crimea on the back of increased tensions and ineffective dialogue.
  • With Russian civilian lives largely untouched during the course of the war, 2014 was the first high point in disparity with 2,084 Ukrainian civilians dying due to war activity.
  • 2022 saw a significant increase in value of Russian lives, with disparity widening as Ukrainians lost 8,204 civilians during the course of activity.

References:

  • UN Human Rights Office (UNCHR) and UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine (HRMMU).
  • For calculation purposes, base rate of 10 civilian deaths applied to countries that suffer no civilian casualties.
Human Exchange Rate: Iraqi to United States (IRQ / USA)
  • Tracking this since inception of the exchange rate in 2000, we see 2001 a high point for the United States of America (U.S.) due to the September 11 attacks with close to 3,000 civilian deaths. At the same point in time there is relative peace in Iraq under an authoritarian regime.  
  • 12,152 Iraqi civilians died 2003 following a swift and effective invasion by a US-led coalition force, pointing to a significant spike in the value of US civilian lives. 
  • As the US-led coalition disbands the national Iraqi army, and popular resentment for the foreign occupation mounts, the trend moves upward to a high point in 2006 where 29,526 Iraqi civilians die. 
  • The low point of 2011 means that 4,162 Iraqi civilians die as the US concludes their occupation. 
  • From 2013 to 2019, the remnants of Iraqi militant and extremist groups break through major national cities aiming to establish an extremist caliphate. A U.S bombing campaign, special operations, and Shiite militias allied with Iran turn back the tide. 
  • 2014 is the next high point with 20,218 Iraqi civilians dying. 

References:

  • Watson Institute at Brown University 
  • Iraq Body Count 
  • Council of Foreign Relations / Associated Press / Fortune.com
  • For calculation purposes, base rate of 10 civilian deaths applied to countries that suffer no civilian casualties.
Methodology - Bilateral Human Exchange Rate
  • Direct civilian deaths between country X and country Y, year on year.  Bilateral human exchange rates not standardised by population. 
  • Base rate of 10 civilian deaths applied to countries with no harm to their civilians.  
  • Civilian deaths are accounted based on opposing force perpetrator violence, civil warfare, militia warfare, air launched explosives, artillery fire, IEDs, suicide attacks, fires, live munitions, and mass execution. 
  • These figures are largely conservative, and typically undercounting of civilian deaths is expected.  
  • These numbers do not account for deaths indirectly caused by war including famine, epidemics, travel deaths from escaping warzones, nor does it cover disability, injury, sexual violence, PTSD, intergenerational mental health illness, and other miscellaneous. They also do not reflect forced conscripts sent to front lines. 

Global US-Weighted Human Exchange Rate Tracker

A new methodology for illuminating disparities in civilian casualties across nations. 

By standardising death rates per 100,000 and juxtaposing them against a U.S. benchmark, this weighted global tracker offers a revealing glance at the varied value placed on human life in times of conflict.  

Countries selected have been tracked for their significant contribution and/or suffering from conflict, while the U.S. serves as a benchmark due to its relatively stable civilian death rate and leading free world and economic power status. 

Join Our Mission: This list is only a start and there is significant potential to enhance accuracy. The Global US-Weighted Human Exchange Rate Tracker scratches the surface of war complexities, reducing the trendlines to one major factor – unnecessary human death. We invite your critical scrutiny, data contributions, and innovative ideas in the exploration of the wealth and death economy to make this a more accurate and comprehensive tool. Share your insights and be a part of this significant endeavor to shed light on the true human cost of global conflicts, beyond the news headline or soundbites, and before the next generation of weapons take prominence.

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Notes & Highlights

U.S. Civilian Death Stability: Excluding the 2001 spike from 9/11, the U.S. maintained a low civilian death ratio from 2002 to 2023, showing minimal impact from global conflicts.
 
Israel Civilian Casualties: While Israel experienced periodic increases in civilian deaths during the Second Intifada and Gaza conflicts, rates remain relatively low and comparable to U.S. figures.

Libya’s Surge in 2014: Libya’s civilian casualty rate spiked in 2014, highlighting the intense conflict impact compared to the U.S civilian death rate. Reported deaths from NATO bombings add to the discrepancy.

Autocratic Nations’ Civilian Safety: Russia, Iran, and China reported low civilian casualties, despite having varying involvement in a host of conflicts either directly or through proxy engagements.

Syria’s Conflict: Syria faced a rise in civilian deaths starting 2011, aggravated by Russia’s involvement and external powers proxy warfare.

Ukraine’s Civilian Casualty Spikes: Ukraine saw civilian deaths surge in 2014 with Crimea’s annexation and in 2021 due to escalated Donbass tensions.

Iraq and Afghanistan’s High Impact: Civilian deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan surged due to invasions led by the U.S. and ongoing conflicts, contrasting sharply with U.S. civilian death figures.

Data Accuracy Challenges:

  • Pakistan: Around 24,000 civilian deaths linked to the Afghanistan conflict and drone strikes, though timeline distribution is complex.
  • Yemen: Significant civilian casualties from the conflict and external bombing from UAE and militia forces, but precise data is hampered by reporting limitations.

As at June 2024

By tracking year-on-year civilian deaths and standardising them into rates based on deaths per 100,000 we account for differences in population size, similar to epidmiological or public health studies. This allows for easier comparisons across different regions, years, or demographics. For example, 2 deaths in a very small community could be more devastating than 100 deaths in a much larger community.   

We pair these rates to a core baseline death ratio of a relatively stable leading economic power, such as the United States, which suffers minimal civilian deaths. This establishes a nominal rate as an assumed benchmark, e.g. the Palestinian death rate, divided by the US benchmark death rate. 

Pegging to a core rate provides stability and reliability, establishing a benchmark to measure fluctuations.

The index is expected to extrapolate initially year to year data from a range of sources leveraged world leaders across the political aisle, including:

  • Brown University’s Watson Institute International of International & Public Affairs
  • Council of Foreign Relations (CER)
  • B’Tselem: Jerusalem-based non-profit organisation
  • UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
  • United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA)
  • United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA)
  • UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine
  • University of New Hampshire: Dossier on Civilian Victims of United States’ Aerial Bombing of Afghanistan
  • Disputes in calculations of civilian deaths will be resolved using a crowd-sourced basis of reliability. 
  • The index will focus exclusively on verified civilian deaths from conflict and deaths from foreign perpetrators, aiming to exclude deaths resulting from famine, epidemics, and other miscellaneous factors, which typically have an x8 multiplier.
  • Future potential to factor in condolence payments, future civilian earning potential, GDP per capital, aid dollars, defense spending, value of media coverage, etc.
  • The wide range of estimates reflects the difficulties in tracking civilian casualties in conflict zones, particularly in the early 2000s when systematic and independent verification methods were less prevalent than they are today. These figures typically only account for direct deaths from military actions and do not include indirect deaths caused by displacement, destruction of infrastructure, or other war-related factors.
  • With the best of intentions our researchers allow open-source critique and suggestion of the numbers, and also emphasise the need to ensure the billions of dollars spent on war are also committed to tracking the relative impact on civilians.
Recomendations
– Governments should ensure that civilian deaths and injuries are included in public reporting of war deaths and should include a tally of children killed. 
-An advanced public reporting framework should be developed to track fairness and disparity, while encouraging efforts to move towards zero civilian deaths.
Appendix

Impact Factors we expect to influence the index:

  • Proximity to Resources: civilian populations closer to strategic minerals, other energy resources, trade routes, and military vantage points are subject to volatile swings in their human exchange rates.
  • Collective Will of Civilian Populations: when local populations are perceived to influence their leaders through democratic institutions, cultural convictions, or complacency, then often they are more likely to be subject to reduced rates of value for their humans. On the other hand, volatile swings in the index are likely to trend with diminished faith in existing global democratic status quo whether. 
  • Historical Trends: patterns of conflict, humanitarian crisis, and intergenerational trauma and humiliation, can each, or in totality, result in reduced rates of value of civilian populations, and vice versa. Nonetheless past performance is not a reliable indicator of future performance.
  • Trends in underlying Civilian Casualty Ratio: the rate of civilian casualties to combatant casualties.
  • Relaxed Rules of Engagement: this may often occur for airstrikes resulting in volatile swings of human exchange rates.
  • Asymetric Warfare & Proxy Battle: when there exists significant disparity between the economic power of opposing armed forces, or the involvement of non-local state actors, civilians may be more likely to suffer impact as a result of human shielding, or disproportionate fire power.  
  • Technological Advancements: Typically given advanced in warfare systems, we often see an acceleration in the depreciation of human value. Air-launched explosive weapons still account for the majority of fatalities.
  • Average Media Value of Death and other Language Networks: diplomatic statements, government policy, corporate media press releases, humanising or dehumanising language, news media, and user generated content, can influence social movements and viral moments, leading to swings in the value of human lives. Each death often correlates with a certain amount of online impressions and engagement, reflecting the perceived value of that nation’s civilians. 
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