Research instrument · In development

Civic Stress Index

A structural monthly measure of societal stress in the United States — grounded in relative deprivation theory, institutional legitimacy research, and validated economic indicators.

Methodology phase Open methodology

This is an experiment. The Civic Stress Index may produce inconsistent results, counterintuitive outputs, or be fundamentally wrong. That is expected and intended. We are examining deep connections between structural conditions and civic stress — connections that are obscure both by design (institutions work to hide them) and by their very nature (they involve feedback loops, nonlinearities, and unmeasured confounds). The index will fail in ways that are instructive. When it does, we learn what we were missing.

What it measures

The Civic Stress Index is not a prediction of civil unrest. It measures the stress state of American society — the structural and operational conditions that, historically, correlate with elevated civic tension, protest activity, and institutional strain. High scores indicate conditions that research associates with increased unrest probability; they do not predict events.

It comprises two complementary instruments: the CSI (Civic Stress Index), a structural monthly measure using slow-moving economic, institutional, and social data; and the CSSI (Civic Supply Stress Index), an operational 12-hour instrument tracking real-time supply chain, fuel, food, and event signals.

Scale

0–20 Low Stable baseline. Historical anchor: US 2000–2005 avg ≈ 22.

21–40 Guarded Elevated stress; normal political cycle friction.

41–60 Elevated Sustained structural stress; institutional trust declining.

61–75 High Historically associated with significant unrest. Anchor: 2020 peak ≈ 75.

76–90 Severe Compounding crises; institutional legitimacy under acute strain.

91–100 Critical Reserved for unprecedented systemic collapse.

CSI — Structural components

The structural CSI draws on four research-grounded components, each independently validated in conflict-prediction or economic-stress literature:

EPI Economic Pressure Index ~35%

Perceived purchasing-power erosion: necessity-weighted CPI (food-at-home + energy + renters shelter, bottom-40% weights), real wage gap, fuel prices, U-6 unemployment, and consumer sentiment divergence from verified conditions. Grounded in Stantcheva (NBER w32300, 2024) and Fed FEDS Notes (April 2025).

ITI Institutional Trust Index ~25%

Composite of government, congressional, judicial, and media trust (Gallup) alongside polarization measures (Pew affective polarization, DW-NOMINATE divergence). Functions as a multiplier on EPI stress — the same economic conditions produce different civic outcomes depending on institutional legitimacy.

SSI Supply Stress Index ~25%

Structural supply conditions: NY Fed GSCPI (27-variable PCA, validated 2021–23), ISM PMI sub-indices, and ATA Truck Tonnage. The GSCPI contributed ~60% of above-trend inflation 2021–2023; a 1-SD shock adds ~0.5pp PCE with a 4–8 week pass-through to household prices.

SFI Social Fragmentation Index ~15%

Long-run structural substrate: V-Dem US democratic health indicators, EIG Distressed Communities Index, and social capital proxies. Slow-moving but load-bearing — the same economic shock produces different civic outcomes on a fragmented vs. cohesive social substrate (PITF, Goldstone et al., PLOS ONE 2021).

CSSI — Operational components

The operational CSSI runs at 12-hour cadence using fast-moving data, with the structural CSI as a contextual amplifier:

SSI Supply Shock Index 55%

EIA weekly retail gasoline + diesel prices, NY Fed GSCPI (monthly leading), BLS food-at-home CPI.

CVI Civic Volatility Index 30%

ACLED US geocoded protest/riot/violence event counts (weekly) + GDELT 2.0 media conflict-tone spike index (15-minute cadence).

GLSI Grid & Logistics Stress Index 15%

ATA Truck Tonnage Index momentum + EIA Electric Power Monthly outage indicators. Infrastructure capacity as a civic stress signal.

Research foundation

Gurr (1970) Why Men Rebel — relative deprivation theory. Perceived wage-price gap predicts unrest better than objective conditions; decremental deprivation is most destabilizing.

PITF / Goldstone et al. (2021) PLOS ONE logistic regression on political instability — regime type, state capacity, prior-episode persistence as primary predictors. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0254350

Stantcheva NBER w32300 (2024) Buying-power erosion as the primary driver of inflation aversion — supports necessity-weighted CPI over headline PCE or CPI.

NY Fed SR1017 + FRBSF (2023) GSCPI construction and validation. 1-SD shock = +0.5pp PCE; contributed ~60% of above-trend inflation 2021–2023.

PMC11764509 (2024) Census Household Pulse Survey: inflation stress at 77–79% prevalence, 2.5× anxiety odds ratio — validates subjective economic stress as a first-class signal.

Current status

The CSI is currently in methodology development. No live score is published yet — the instrument is being specified, tested for calibration against historical ground truth (ACLED + GDELT), and documented. The methodology laboratory below records the full specification process, including formulas that failed adversarial review and why.

Methodology laboratory →