IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/deveco/v127y2017icp297-305.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The economics of early warfare over land

Author

Listed:
  • Dow, Gregory K.
  • Mitchell, Leanna
  • Reed, Clyde G.

Abstract

We investigate the incidence of early warfare among foragers and farmers in prehistory. Our focus is specifically on conflict over land. Food is produced using inputs of labor and land, and the probability of victory in a conflict depends on relative group sizes. The group sizes are determined by individual migration and Malthusian population dynamics. Both factors result in larger populations at better sites, which deters attack. There are two necessary conditions for warfare: high enough individual mobility costs and large enough shocks to the relative productivities of the sites. Together, these conditions are sufficient. In particular, technological or environmental shocks that alter the productivities of sites can trigger warfare, but only if individual agents do not change sites in response. These results are consistent with evidence from archaeology and anthropology.

Suggested Citation

  • Dow, Gregory K. & Mitchell, Leanna & Reed, Clyde G., 2017. "The economics of early warfare over land," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 127(C), pages 297-305.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:deveco:v:127:y:2017:i:c:p:297-305
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jdeveco.2017.04.002
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0304387817300330
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jdeveco.2017.04.002?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Quamrul Ashraf & Oded Galor, 2011. "Dynamics and Stagnation in the Malthusian Epoch," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(5), pages 2003-2041, August.
    2. Gregory K. Dow & Clyde G. Reed, 2013. "The Origins of Inequality: Insiders, Outsiders, Elites, and Commoners," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 121(3), pages 609-641.
    3. Fearon, James D., 1995. "Rationalist explanations for war," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 49(3), pages 379-414, July.
    4. Matthew J. Baker, 2003. "An Equilibrium Conflict Model of Land Tenure in Hunter-Gatherer Societies," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 111(1), pages 124-173, February.
    5. Daron Acemoglu & Mikhail Golosov & Aleh Tsyvinski & Pierre Yared, 2012. "A Dynamic Theory of Resource Wars," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 127(1), pages 283-331.
    6. Rowthorn, Robert & Seabright, Paul, 2010. "Property Rights, Warfare and the Neolithic Transition," TSE Working Papers 10-207, Toulouse School of Economics (TSE).
    7. Marshall Burke & Solomon M. Hsiang & Edward Miguel, 2015. "Climate and Conflict," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 7(1), pages 577-617, August.
    8. Sourav Bhattacharya & Joyee Deb & Tapas Kundu, 2015. "Mobility and Conflict," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 7(1), pages 281-319, February.
    9. Powell, Robert, 2006. "War as a Commitment Problem," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 60(1), pages 169-203, January.
    10. Chassang, Sylvain & Miquel, Gerard Padró i, 2009. "Economic Shocks and Civil War," Quarterly Journal of Political Science, now publishers, vol. 4(3), pages 211-228, October.
    11. Carol R. Ember & Melvin Ember, 1992. "Resource Unpredictability, Mistrust, and War," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 36(2), pages 242-262, June.
    12. Gregory K. Dow & Clyde G. Reed & Simon Woodcock, 2016. "The Economics Of Exogamous Marriage In Small-Scale Societies," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 54(4), pages 1805-1823, October.
    13. Dow, Gregory K. & Reed, Clyde G., 2015. "The origins of sedentism: Climate, population, and technology," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 119(C), pages 56-71.
    14. Ying Bai & James Kai-sing Kung, 2011. "Climate Shocks and Sino-nomadic Conflict," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 93(3), pages 970-981, August.
    15. Gregory Dow & Clyde Reed & Nancy Olewiler, 2009. "Climate reversals and the transition to agriculture," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 14(1), pages 27-53, March.
    16. Garfinkel, Michelle R. & Skaperdas, Stergios, 2007. "Economics of Conflict: An Overview," Handbook of Defense Economics, in: Keith Hartley & Todd Sandler (ed.), Handbook of Defense Economics, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 22, pages 649-709, Elsevier.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Jordan Adamson & Erik O Kimbrough, 2023. "The supply side determinants of territory," Journal of Peace Research, Peace Research Institute Oslo, vol. 60(2), pages 209-225, March.
    2. Jordan Adamson & Erik O. Kimbrough, 2018. "The Supply Side Determinants of Territory and Conflict," Working Papers 18-10, Chapman University, Economic Science Institute.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Gregory K. Dow & Clyde G. Reed & Simon Woodcock, 2016. "The Economics Of Exogamous Marriage In Small-Scale Societies," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 54(4), pages 1805-1823, October.
    2. Christopher Blattman & Edward Miguel, 2010. "Civil War," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 48(1), pages 3-57, March.
    3. Eoin F. McGuirk & Nathaniel Hilger & Nicholas Miller, 2023. "No Kin in the Game: Moral Hazard and War in the US Congress," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 131(9), pages 2370-2401.
    4. Christopher Blattman, 2009. "Civil War: A Review of Fifty Years of Research," Working Papers id:2231, eSocialSciences.
    5. Chan, Kenneth S. & Laffargue, Jean-Pierre, 2016. "Plunder and tribute in a Malthusian world," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 84(C), pages 138-150.
    6. Garfinkel, Michelle R. & Syropoulos, Constantinos, 2021. "Self-enforcing peace agreements that preserve the status quo," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 130(C), pages 148-178.
    7. Cattaneo, Cristina & Foreman, Timothy, 2023. "Climate change, international migration, and interstate conflicts," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 211(C).
    8. Blouin, Max & Pallage, Stéphane, 2016. "Warlords, famine and food aid: Who fights, who starves?," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 18-38.
    9. Eoin McGuirk & Marshall Burke, 2020. "The Economic Origins of Conflict in Africa," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 128(10), pages 3940-3997.
    10. Charles H. Anderton & John R. Carter, 2011. "A Bargaining Theory Perspective on War," Chapters, in: Derek L. Braddon & Keith Hartley (ed.), Handbook on the Economics of Conflict, chapter 3, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    11. Sandeep Baliga & David O. Lucca & Tomas Sjöström, 2011. "Domestic Political Survival and International Conflict: Is Democracy Good for Peace?," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 78(2), pages 458-486.
    12. Michelle R. Garfinkel, 2010. "Political Institutions and War Initiation: The Democratic Peace Hypothesis Revisited," Working Papers 101107, University of California-Irvine, Department of Economics.
    13. Akos Lada, 2013. "Clash of Brothers in a Contagious World: Wars to Avoid Diffusion," CERS-IE WORKING PAPERS 1333, Institute of Economics, Centre for Economic and Regional Studies.
    14. Francesco Caselli & Massimo Morelli & Dominic Rohner, 2015. "The Geography of Interstate Resource Wars," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 130(1), pages 267-315.
    15. Michael McBride & Gary Milante & Stergios Skaperdas, 2011. "Peace and War With Endogenous State Capacity," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 55(3), pages 446-468, June.
    16. Nathan Fiala & Stergios Skaperdas, 2011. "Economic Perspectives on Civil Wars," Chapters, in: Christopher J. Coyne & Rachel L. Mathers (ed.), The Handbook on the Political Economy of War, chapter 10, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    17. Remi Jedwab & Noel D. Johnson & Mark Koyama, 2019. "Negative shocks and mass persecutions: evidence from the Black Death," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 24(4), pages 345-395, December.
    18. Kevin Siqueira & Petros G. Sekeris, 2012. "Politics and Insurgencies," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 24(2), pages 157-181, July.
    19. Morelli, Massimo & Rohner, Dominic, 2015. "Resource concentration and civil wars," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 32-47.
    20. Mehrdad Vahabi, 2012. "Avant-Propos," Revue d'économie politique, Dalloz, vol. 122(2), pages 135-151.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    N40; O10; P48; Q54; War; Peace; Economic prehistory; Migration; Malthus; Population; Climate change; Foraging; Hunting and gathering; Agriculture; Sedentism; Archaeology; Anthropology;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • N40 - Economic History - - Government, War, Law, International Relations, and Regulation - - - General, International, or Comparative
    • O10 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - General
    • P48 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Other Economic Systems - - - Legal Institutions; Property Rights; Natural Resources; Energy; Environment; Regional Studies
    • Q54 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Climate; Natural Disasters and their Management; Global Warming

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:deveco:v:127:y:2017:i:c:p:297-305. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/devec .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.