IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/jocore/v65y2021i4p701-728.html

Adverse Rainfall Shocks and Civil War: Myth or Reality?

Author

Listed:
  • Ricardo Maertens

Abstract

News reports and policymakers frequently link African civil conflicts and wars to agricultural crises caused by droughts. However, empirical studies of the relationship between rainfall and civil conflict or war remain inconclusive. I reexamine this relationship focusing on rainfall over each country’s agricultural land during the growing seasons. I also incorporate that the relationship between rainfall and agricultural output is hump-shaped, as rainfall beyond a threshold decreases output. I find a U-shaped relationship between rainfall and the risk of civil conflict and war in (Sub-Saharan) African countries. This relationship mirrors the hump-shaped relationship between rainfall and agricultural output.

Suggested Citation

  • Ricardo Maertens, 2021. "Adverse Rainfall Shocks and Civil War: Myth or Reality?," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 65(4), pages 701-728, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:jocore:v:65:y:2021:i:4:p:701-728
    DOI: 10.1177/0022002720969796
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0022002720969796
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/0022002720969796?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. Markus Brückner & Antonio Ciccone, 2010. "International Commodity Prices, Growth and the Outbreak of Civil War in Sub-Saharan Africa," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 120(544), pages 519-534, May.
    2. Antonio Ciccone, 2018. "International Commodity Prices and Civil War Outbreak: New Evidence for Sub-Saharan Africa and Beyond," Working Papers 1016, Barcelona School of Economics.
    3. Nicholas Sambanis, 2002. "A Review of Recent Advances and Future Directions in the Quantitative Literature on Civil War," Defence and Peace Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 13(3), pages 215-243.
    4. Crost, Benjamin & Duquennois, Claire & Felter, Joseph H. & Rees, Daniel I., 2018. "Climate change, agricultural production and civil conflict: Evidence from the Philippines," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 379-395.
    5. Edward Miguel & Shanker Satyanath & Ernest Sergenti, 2004. "Economic Shocks and Civil Conflict: An Instrumental Variables Approach," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 112(4), pages 725-753, August.
    6. -, 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).
    7. Mathieu Couttenier & Raphael Soubeyran, 2014. "Drought and Civil War In Sub‐Saharan Africa," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 124(575), pages 201-244, March.
      • Couttenier, Mathieu & Hofstetter, Annie & Soubeyran, Raphael, 2013. "Drought and civil war in sub-Saharan Africa," INRAE Sciences Sociales, Institut national de recherche pour l'agriculture, l'alimentation et l'environnement (INRAE), Departement Sciences Sociales, Agriculture et Alimentation, Espace et Environnement (SAE2), vol. 2013, pages 1-6, March.
    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. Antonio Ciccone & Adilzhan Ismailov, 2022. "Rainfall, Agricultural Output and Persistent Democratization," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 89(354), pages 229-257, April.
    2. David Ubilava, 2026. "Climate, crops, and postharvest conflict," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 108(1), pages 3-27, January.

    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. Ricardo Maertens, 2016. "Adverse rainfall shocks and civil war: Myth or reality?," HiCN Working Papers 212, Households in Conflict Network.
    2. Kostadis J. Papaioannou & Michiel de Haas, 2015. "Climate shocks, cash crops and resilience: Evidence from colonial tropical Africa," Working Papers 0076, Utrecht University, Centre for Global Economic History.
    3. Camille Laville, 2018. "The econometrical causal analysis of internal conflicts: The evolutions of a growing literature [L’analyse économétrique des conflits internes par l’approche causale : les évolutions d’une littérature en expansion]," Working Papers hal-01940461, HAL.
    4. Camille Laville, 2018. "The econometrical causal analysis of internal conflicts: The evolutions of a growing literature [L’analyse économétrique des conflits internes par l’approche causale : les évolutions d’une littérature en expansion]," CERDI Working papers hal-01940461, HAL.
    5. Hjort, Ingrid, 2016. "Potential Climate Risks in Financial Markets: A Literature Overview," Memorandum 01/2016, Oslo University, Department of Economics.
    6. Ishak, Phoebe W., 2022. "Murder nature: Weather and violent crime in rural Brazil," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 157(C).
    7. Fenske, James & Kala, Namrata, 2012. "Climate, ecosystem resilience and the slave trade," MPRA Paper 38398, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    8. Qian, Nancy & Iyigun, Murat & Nunn, Nathan, 2017. "The Long-run Effects of Agricultural Productivity on Conflict, 1400-1900," CEPR Discussion Papers 12457, Centre for Economic Policy Research.
    9. Sofia Castro Vargas, 2021. "Subiendo la temperatura: el calentamiento de los oc√©anos y su efecto en el conflicto armado en Filipinas," Documentos CEDE 19458, Universidad de los Andes, Facultad de Economía, CEDE.
    10. Alex Dickson & Ian A MacKenzie & Petros G Sekeris, 2018. "The role of markets and preferences on resource conflicts," Working Papers 1819, University of Strathclyde Business School, Department of Economics.
    11. Camille Laville, 2021. "Keep Off the Grass : Grassland Scarcity and the Security Implications of Cross-Border Transhumance Between Niger and Nigeria," Working Papers hal-03350202, HAL.
    12. Breckner, Miriam & Sunde, Uwe, 2019. "Temperature extremes, global warming, and armed conflict: new insights from high resolution data," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 123(C), pages 1-1.
    13. Achim Ahrens, 2015. "Civil conflicts in Africa: Climate, economic shocks, nighttime lights and spill-over effects," SEEC Discussion Papers 1501, Spatial Economics and Econometrics Centre, Heriot Watt University.
    14. Camille Laville, 2021. "Keep Off the Grass : Grassland Scarcity and the Security Implications of Cross-Border Transhumance Between Niger and Nigeria," CERDI Working papers hal-03350202, HAL.
    15. 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.
    16. Mahdi FAWAZ, 2020. "Ressources naturelles et guerres civiles au Moyen-Orient," Bordeaux Economics Working Papers 2020-09, Bordeaux School of Economics (BSE).
    17. Jean-François Maystadt & Olivier Ecker, 2014. "Extreme Weather and Civil War: Does Drought Fuel Conflict in Somalia through Livestock Price Shocks?," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 96(4), pages 1157-1182.
    18. Fenske, James & Kala, Namrata, 2015. "Climate and the slave trade," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 112(C), pages 19-32.
    19. Alex Dickson & Ian A. MacKenzie & Petros G. Sekeris, 2022. "The role of markets on resource conflicts," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 124(3), pages 677-708, July.
    20. Exenberger Andreas & Pondorfer Andreas, 2013. "Climate Change and the Risk of Mass Violence: Africa in the 21st Century," Peace Economics, Peace Science, and Public Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 19(3), pages 381-392, December.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    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:sae:jocore:v:65:y:2021:i:4:p:701-728. 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.