In this episode of the NUPI podcast The World Stage, Cedric de Coning (NUPI) sits down with Dirk Bruin and Tomas Veloz of the Center Leo Apostel for Transdisciplinary Studies of the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (CLEA), to discuss the development of a computational decision-support tool, called the Adaptive Peace Simulation (APS).

The aim of the tool is to help policy makers and researchers to test the effects of different policy choices in a simulated, computational version of a conflict system before committing actual resources or exposing real populations, to the risks of stabilisation interventions. They discuss the science behind the tool, its development and results thus far in the process.

If you want to read more about the Adaptive Peace Simulation tool, note this article:

Veloz, T., De Coning, C., and Bruin, D. (2026), "Modeling and Simulating Complex Conflict Management Using Reaction Networks," Entropy 28(7), 754.

The episode is part of the NUPI led project Managing Climate, Peace and Security Risks from the Borderlands of the Lake Chad (CPS-Lake Chad). The project is funded by the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) through the Cross-border Conflict Evidence, Policy, and Trends (XCEPT) research program.