Democracy & Economic Analysis Dashboard

An interactive R Shiny web application for analyzing democratic and economic trends across countries using large-scale historical datasets. Built with shinylive for serverless deployment and advanced statistical modeling capabilities.

🌟 Features

Statistical Analysis

• Bayesian Structural Time Series (BSTS) modeling for trend analysis
• Arrow plots for visualizing directional changes in democracy metrics
• Interactive time series visualizations showing economic and political evolution
• Cross-country comparative analysis with dynamic filtering

Data Integration

• Maddison Project Dataset: Historical economic indicators spanning centuries
• V-Dem Dataset: Comprehensive democracy measures for 180+ countries

Technical Implementation

• shinylive deployment: Browser-based execution without server requirements
• Interactive dashboards: Real-time data filtering and visualization updates
• Responsive design: Optimized for various screen sizes and devices

📊 Datasets

The Maddison Project

Historical statistics on world population, GDP, and per capita GDP spanning from 1 CE to present day across major world regions.

Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem)

Comprehensive dataset measuring democratic institutions and processes with 450+ indicators across 200+ countries from 1789-2023.

🚀 Live Demo

View Live Application (It may take a while to load...)

💻 Technologies Used

• R Shiny: Interactive web application framework
• shinylive: Client-side deployment enabling serverless hosting
• ggplot2: Statistical data visualization
• dplyr: Data manipulation and analysis
• BSTS: Bayesian Structural Time Series modeling
• plotly: Interactive plotting capabilities

📈 Key Visualizations

1. Democracy Evolution Arrow Plots: Directional changes in democratic indicators over time
2. Economic Growth Trajectories: GDP per capita trends with uncertainty intervals
3. Comparative Dashboard: Side-by-side country analysis with customizable metrics
4. Correlation Analysis: Relationships between economic development and democratic progress

🔍 Analysis Insights

• Identification of democratization waves and reversals
• Economic development patterns and their correlation with political systems
• Regional trends in governance and economic growth
• Forecasting capabilities for democratic and economic indicators

📁 Project Structure

shiny.old/
├── app.R                 # Main Shiny application
├── datasets/                 # Processed datasets
│   ├── maddison_data.rds
│   └── vdem_data.rds
├── R/                    # Helper functions
│   ├── arrow_module.R
│   ├── democracy_module.R
│   ├── image_module.R
│   └── countries_module.R
└── www/                  # Static assets
    └── styles.css

🤝 Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please feel free to submit a Pull Request.

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Built with ❤️ using R Shiny and modern statistical techniques