IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/compsc/v32y2015i4p370-394.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The timing of conflict violence: Hydraulic behavior in the Ugandan civil war

Author

Listed:
  • Timothy Allen Carter

    (Gustavus Adolphus College and Center for Peace and Conflict Studies, Wayne State University, USA)

  • Daniel Jay Veale

    (Wayne State University, USA)

Abstract

Researchers generally examine how variables directly affect events in war. Some variables, however, may not simply increase or decrease conflict events but may instead displace them. In wartime, this dynamic may result from the conditional decision-making made by militaries constrained, at least partially, by time. When there is a necessary regularity to military operations, decision-making may be complicated by factors such as inclement weather, and this regularized pressure to act may produce a hydraulic relationship between inclement weather and events. In this dynamic, today’s inclement weather, such as rain, may displace today’s events. Conversely, yesterday’s rain may increase today’s, with planned events postponed. Similarly, tomorrow’s rain may also increase today’s events, with planned activities moved forward. We test this hydraulic argument with geo-referenced data from the recent Ugandan civil war and find significant evidence that conflict events are fluid in time. Inclement weather constrains and also displaces events.

Suggested Citation

  • Timothy Allen Carter & Daniel Jay Veale, 2015. "The timing of conflict violence: Hydraulic behavior in the Ugandan civil war," Conflict Management and Peace Science, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 32(4), pages 370-394, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:compsc:v:32:y:2015:i:4:p:370-394
    DOI: 10.1177/0738894214559674
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0738894214559674
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/0738894214559674?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
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Barreca, Alan I., 2012. "Climate change, humidity, and mortality in the United States," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 63(1), pages 19-34.
    2. King, Gary & Zeng, Langche, 2001. "Logistic Regression in Rare Events Data," Political Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 9(2), pages 137-163, January.
    3. Laia Balcells, 2011. "Continuation of Politics by Two Means: Direct and Indirect Violence in Civil War," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 55(3), pages 397-422, June.
    4. Conor Devitt & Richard SJ Tol, 2012. "Civil war, climate change, and development: A scenario study for sub-Saharan Africa," Journal of Peace Research, Peace Research Institute Oslo, vol. 49(1), pages 129-145, January.
    5. Carter, David B. & Signorino, Curtis S., 2010. "Back to the Future: Modeling Time Dependence in Binary Data," Political Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 18(3), pages 271-292, July.
    6. Maximilian Auffhammer & Ryan Kellogg, 2011. "Clearing the Air? The Effects of Gasoline Content Regulation on Air Quality," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(6), pages 2687-2722, October.
    7. Clionadh Raleigh, 2012. "Violence Against Civilians: A Disaggregated Analysis," International Interactions, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 38(4), pages 462-481, September.
    8. Luke N. Condra & Joseph H. Felter & Radha K. Iyengar & Jacob N. Shapiro, 2010. "The Effect of Civilian Casualties in Afghanistan and Iraq," NBER Working Papers 16152, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Christopher Blattman & Jeannie Annan, 2010. "The Consequences of Child Soldiering," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 92(4), pages 882-898, November.
    10. -, 2009. "The economics of climate change," Sede Subregional de la CEPAL para el Caribe (Estudios e Investigaciones) 38679, Naciones Unidas Comisión Económica para América Latina y el Caribe (CEPAL).
    11. Luke N. Condra & Jacob N. Shapiro, 2012. "Who Takes the Blame? The Strategic Effects of Collateral Damage," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 56(1), pages 167-187, January.
    12. Solomon M. Hsiang & Kyle C. Meng & Mark A. Cane, 2011. "Civil conflicts are associated with the global climate," Nature, Nature, vol. 476(7361), pages 438-441, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Melissa Dell & Benjamin F. Jones & Benjamin A. Olken, 2014. "What Do We Learn from the Weather? The New Climate-Economy Literature," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 52(3), pages 740-798, September.
    2. Timothy Allen Carter & Daniel Jay Veale, 2013. "Weather, terrain and warfare: Coalition fatalities in Afghanistan," Conflict Management and Peace Science, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 30(3), pages 220-239, July.
    3. Hjort, Ingrid, 2016. "Potential Climate Risks in Financial Markets: A Literature Overview," Memorandum 01/2016, Oslo University, Department of Economics.
    4. Daniel Krcmaric, 2018. "Varieties of civil war and mass killing," Journal of Peace Research, Peace Research Institute Oslo, vol. 55(1), pages 18-31, January.
    5. Arun S. Malik & Stephen C. Smith, 2012. "Adaptation To Climate Change In Low-Income Countries: Lessons From Current Research And Needs From Future Research," Climate Change Economics (CCE), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 3(02), pages 1-22.
    6. Eshita Gupta & Bharat Ramaswami & E. Somanathan, 2021. "The Distributional Impact of Climate Change: Why Food Prices Matter," Economics of Disasters and Climate Change, Springer, vol. 5(2), pages 249-275, July.
    7. Srinivas C. Parinandi, 2020. "Policy Inventing and Borrowing among State Legislatures," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 64(4), pages 852-868, October.
    8. Joshua Graff Zivin & Matthew Neidell, 2012. "The Impact of Pollution on Worker Productivity," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(7), pages 3652-3673, December.
    9. Mary, Sebastien, 2022. "Dams mitigate the effect of rainfall shocks on Hindus-Muslims riots," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 150(C).
    10. Duncan Webb, 2022. "Critical Periods in Cognitive and Socioemotional Development: Evidence from Weather Shocks in Indonesia," Working Papers halshs-03542607, HAL.
    11. David Albouy & Walter Graf & Ryan Kellogg & Hendrik Wolff, 2016. "Climate Amenities, Climate Change, and American Quality of Life," Journal of the Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, University of Chicago Press, vol. 3(1), pages 205-246.
    12. Emediegwu, Lotanna E. & Ubabukoh, Chisom L., 2023. "Re-examining the impact of annual weather fluctuations on global livestock production," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 204(PA).
    13. Letta, Marco & Montalbano, Pierluigi & Tol, Richard S.J., 2018. "Temperature shocks, short-term growth and poverty thresholds: Evidence from rural Tanzania," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 112(C), pages 13-32.
    14. Nicolas Berman & Mathieu Couttenier & Raphael Soubeyran, 2021. "Fertile Ground for Conflict," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 19(1), pages 82-127.
    15. Federica Cappelli & Caterina Conigliani & Davide Consoli & Valeria Costantini & Elena Paglialunga, 2023. "Climate change and armed conflicts in Africa: temporal persistence, non-linear climate impact and geographical spillovers," Economia Politica: Journal of Analytical and Institutional Economics, Springer;Fondazione Edison, vol. 40(2), pages 517-560, July.
    16. Carlo Koos, 2016. "Does violence pay? The effect of ethnic rebellion on overcoming political deprivation," Conflict Management and Peace Science, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 33(1), pages 3-24, February.
    17. Olivier Deschênes & Michael Greenstone, 2011. "Climate Change, Mortality, and Adaptation: Evidence from Annual Fluctuations in Weather in the US," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 3(4), pages 152-185, October.
    18. Arvind Magesan & Eik Leong Swee, "undated". "Is Happiness Really a Warm Gun? The Consequences of U.S. Weapons Sales for Political Violence," Working Papers 2015-09, Department of Economics, University of Calgary, revised 25 Jun 2015.
    19. Christopher Gelpi & Nazli Avdan, 2018. "Democracies at risk? A forecasting analysis of regime type and the risk of terrorist attack," Conflict Management and Peace Science, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 35(1), pages 18-42, January.
    20. Yuri M. Zhukov, 2014. "Theory of Indiscriminate Violence," Working Paper 365551, Harvard University OpenScholar.

    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:sae:compsc:v:32:y:2015:i:4:p:370-394. 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: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://pss.la.psu.edu/ .

    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.