The Varieties of Political Regimes (VaPoReg) dataset

vaporeg contains the March 2026 VaPoReg release in its current country-year schema. To follow package conventions, democracyData renames the upstream country_name and cowcode columns to vaporeg_country and vaporeg_cowcode, adds standardized state-system identifiers, and derives packaged democracy indicators from the current VaPoReg classifications. Use vaporeg_2024 for the archived legacy schema.

Usage

vaporeg

Format

An object of class tbl_df (inherits from tbl, data.frame) with 30574 rows and 46 columns.

Source

S. Kailitz. Varieties of Political Regimes (va-PoReg). Dataset. Version 3.2. Hannah Arendt Institute for Totalitarianism Studies. Dresden, 2026. Dataset download at https://www.va-poreg.de/download/Kailitz,%20Varieties%20of%20Political%20Regimes%20March%202026.rds.

S. Kailitz. Varieties of Political Regimes (va-PoReg). Codebook. Version 3.2. Tech. rep. Dresden: Hannah Arendt Institute for Totalitarianism Studies, 2026. Codebook PDF at https://www.va-poreg.de/download/Kailitz%2C%20Varieties%20of%20Political%20Regimes%2C%20Codebook%203.2.pdf.

Introduction

VaPoReg classifies political regimes from 1900 to 2025 using multiple classification schemes, including detailed, compact, quadruple, triple, binary-democracy, and binary-autocracy versions. It also codes dominant political authorities in dependent entities, monarchy status, regime spell timing, and population. The documentation below is based on the VaPoReg Codebook, Version 3.2 (March 2026), especially the variable list on pages 163-167.

Variables

vaporeg_country: Political unit name. This is the packaged name of the upstream country_name column.
year: Calendar year. Annual codings use July 1 as the reference date.
vaporeg_regtype_detailed: Detailed regime classification. Codes: 10 Liberal Democracy; 20 Electoral Democracy; 30 Electoral Oligarchy; 40 Democratizing Regime; 50 Electoral Hybrid Regime; 60 Electoral Autocracy; 70 Electoral Oligarchical Autocracy; 80 Non-Electoral Transitional Regime; 90 Constitutional Monarchy; 100 Autocratic Monarchy; 110 One-Party Autocracy; 120 Right-Wing Autocracy; 130 Communist Ideocracy; 140 Islamist Ideocracy; 150 Military Autocracy; 160 Personalist Autocracy; 170 Direct Rule Colonial Regime; 180 Indirect Rule Colonial Regime; 190 Direct Rule Occupation Regime; 200 Indirect Rule Occupation Regime; 210 No Central Authority; 220 Part of Other Country.
vaporeg_regtype_reports: Country reports regime classification. Uses the same 22-category coding as vaporeg_regtype_detailed.
vaporeg_regtype_compact: Compact regime classification. Codes: 10 Democracy; 20 Electoral and Liberal Hybrid Regime; 30 Provisional Regime; 40 Electoral Autocracy; 50 Ruling Monarchy; 60 One-Party Autocracy; 70 Right-Wing Autocracy; 80 Communist Ideocracy; 90 Islamist Ideocracy; 100 Military Autocracy; 110 Personalist Autocracy; 120 Colonial Regime; 130 Occupation Regime; 140 No Central Authority.
vaporeg_regtype_quadruple: Four-category regime classification: 1 Democracy; 2 Hybrid Regime; 3 Electoral Autocracy; 4 Closed Autocracy.
vaporeg_regtype_triple: Three-category regime classification: 1 Democracy; 2 Hybrid Regime; 3 Autocracy.
vaporeg_regtype_bindem: Binary democracy classification: 0 Non-Democracy; 1 Democracy.
vaporeg_regtype_binaut: Binary autocracy classification: 0 Non-Autocracy; 1 Autocracy.
vaporeg_identifier: VaPoReg unit identifier. The codebook describes this as an identifier based on the Correlates of War dataset.
vaporeg_cowcode: Correlates of War country code, where available. This is the packaged name of the upstream cowcode column.
vaporeg_dpa_country: Dominant political authority in cases of dependence.
vaporeg_dpa_regdetailed: Detailed regime classification of the dominant political authority. It uses the same coding structure as the detailed regime scale, but the current codebook labels category 20 as Defective Democracy and category 80 as Non-Electoral Autocratic Transitional Regime.
vaporeg_dpa_regcompact: Compact regime classification of the dominant political authority.
vaporeg_binary_strict: A dichotomous democracy indicator coded 1 only for the most demanding VaPoReg democracy category.
vaporeg_binary_non_strict: A dichotomous democracy indicator coded 1 for both full and defective democracies.
vaporeg_trichotomous: A trichotomous democracy indicator coded 2 for full democracy, 1 for defective democracy, and 0 otherwise.
vaporeg_monarchy: Monarchy status. Codes: 10 Autocratic Monarchy; 20 Governed by Autocratic Monarchy; 30 Constitutional Monarchy; 40 Governed by Constitutional Monarchy; 50 Ceremonial Monarchy; 60 Governed by Ceremonial Monarchy; 70 Republic; 80 Governed by Republic.
vaporeg_regtype_rwasubtype: Right-wing autocracy subtype. Codes: 0 Not applicable; 1 Fascist; 2 Corporatist.
vaporeg_continent: Continent code. Codes: 0 missing or not assigned; 1 Africa; 2 Americas; 3 Asia; 4 Europe; 5 Oceania.
vaporeg_region: UN-style region code. Codes: 0 missing or not assigned; 1 Australia and New Zealand; 2 Caribbean; 3 Central America; 4 Central Asia; 5 Eastern Africa; 6 Eastern Asia; 7 Eastern Europe; 8 Melanesia, Micronesia, Polynesia; 9 Middle Africa; 10 Northern Africa; 11 Northern America; 12 Northern Europe; 13 South America; 14 South-Eastern Asia; 15 Southern Africa; 16 Southern Asia; 17 Southern Europe; 18 Western Africa; 19 Western Asia; 20 Western Europe.
vaporeg_regstart_reports, vaporeg_regend_reports, vaporeg_regduration_reports, vaporeg_regchange_reports: Spell start date, end date, duration in years, and annual change indicator for the country reports classification. Change equals 1 if the July 1 regime differs from the previous July 1.
vaporeg_regstart_detailed, vaporeg_regend_detailed, vaporeg_regduration_detailed, vaporeg_regchange_detailed: Spell start date, end date, duration in years, and annual change indicator for the detailed classification.
vaporeg_regstart_compact, vaporeg_regend_compact, vaporeg_regduration_compact, vaporeg_regchange_compact: Spell start date, end date, duration in years, and annual change indicator for the compact classification.
vaporeg_regduration_quadruple, vaporeg_regchange_quadruple: Spell duration in years and annual change indicator for the quadruple classification.
vaporeg_regduration_triple, vaporeg_regchange_triple: Spell duration in years and annual change indicator for the triple classification.
vaporeg_regduration_binaut, vaporeg_regchange_binaut: Spell duration in years and annual change indicator for the binary autocracy classification.
vaporeg_regduration_bindem, vaporeg_regchange_bindem: Spell duration in years and annual change indicator for the binary democracy classification.
vaporeg_population: Population series based on Gapminder and UN data. The codebook notes that units coded as "Part of Other Country" are excluded from this series.
vaporeg_population_sources: Source flag for vaporeg_population. Codes: 1 Modified based on Gapminder; 2 Modified based on UN; 3 UN Data; 4 Gapminder Data.

Standard descriptive variables (generated by this package)

extended_country_name: The name of the country in the Gleditsch-Ward system of states, or the official name of the entity (for non-sovereign entities and states not in the Gleditsch and Ward system of states) or else a common name for disputed cases that do not have an official name (e.g., Western Sahara, Hyderabad). The Gleditsch and Ward scheme sometimes indicates the common name of the country and (in parentheses) the name of an earlier incarnation of the state: thus, they have Germany (Prussia), Russia (Soviet Union), Madagascar (Malagasy), etc. For details, see Gleditsch, Kristian S. & Michael D. Ward. 1999. "Interstate System Membership: A Revised List of the Independent States since 1816." International Interactions 25: 393-413. The list can be found via the Wayback Machine at https://web.archive.org/web/20130627160240/http://privatewww.essex.ac.uk/~ksg/statelist.html.
GWn: Gleditsch and Ward's numeric country code, from the Gleditsch and Ward list of independent states.
cown: The Correlates of War numeric country code, 2016 version. This differs from Gleditsch and Ward's numeric country code in a few cases. See https://correlatesofwar.org/data-sets/state-system-membership/ for the full list.
in_GW_system: Whether the state is "in system" (that is, is independent and sovereign), according to Gleditsch and Ward, for this particular date. Matches at the end of the year; so, for example South Vietnam 1975 is FALSE because, according to Gleditsch and Ward, the country ended on April 1975 (being absorbed by North Vietnam). It is also TRUE for dates beyond 2012 for countries that did not end by then, depsite the fact that the Gleditsch and Ward list has not been updated since.