IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/epolit/v40y2023i2d10.1007_s40888-022-00271-x.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Climate change and armed conflicts in Africa: temporal persistence, non-linear climate impact and geographical spillovers

Author

Listed:
  • Federica Cappelli

    (Roma Tre University)

  • Caterina Conigliani

    (Roma Tre University)

  • Davide Consoli

    (INGENIO CSIC-UPV)

  • Valeria Costantini

    (Roma Tre University)

  • Elena Paglialunga

    (University of Urbino “Carlo Bò”)

Abstract

The paper focuses on the nexus between climate change and armed conflicts with an empirical analysis based on a panel of 2653 georeferenced cells for the African continent between 1990 and 2016. Our econometric approach addresses unobservable heterogeneity in predicting the probability of violent events and the persistency of conflicting behaviour over time. The proposed strategy also accounts for both changes in climatic conditions and spatial dynamics. The two main findings carry policy-relevant implications. First, changes in climatic conditions influence the probability of conflicts over large spatial ranges, thus suggesting that the design of adaptation policies to reduce climate vulnerability should account for multiple spatial interrelations. Second, the persistency of violence calls for planning adaptation strategies for climate resilience jointly designed with measures in support of peacekeeping.

Suggested Citation

  • 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.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:epolit:v:40:y:2023:i:2:d:10.1007_s40888-022-00271-x
    DOI: 10.1007/s40888-022-00271-x
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s40888-022-00271-x
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s40888-022-00271-x?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. Christopher F Baum & Mark E. Schaffer & Steven Stillman, 2003. "Instrumental variables and GMM: Estimation and testing," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 3(1), pages 1-31, March.
    2. Fernández-Val, Iván & Weidner, Martin, 2016. "Individual and time effects in nonlinear panel models with large N, T," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 192(1), pages 291-312.
    3. Dominic P. Parker & Bryan Vadheim, 2017. "Resource Cursed or Policy Cursed? US Regulation of Conflict Minerals and Violence in the Congo," Journal of the Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, University of Chicago Press, vol. 4(1), pages 1-49.
    4. Cai, Ruohong & Feng, Shuaizhang & Oppenheimer, Michael & Pytlikova, Mariola, 2016. "Climate variability and international migration: The importance of the agricultural linkage," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 135-151.
    5. Jeroen Klomp & Erwin Bulte, 2013. "Climate change, weather shocks, and violent conflict: a critical look at the evidence," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 44(s1), pages 63-78, November.
    6. Mariaflavia Harari & Eliana La Ferrara, 2018. "Conflict, Climate, and Cells: A Disaggregated Analysis," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 100(4), pages 594-608, October.
    7. Courtland Adams & Tobias Ide & Jon Barnett & Adrien Detges, 2018. "Sampling bias in climate–conflict research," Nature Climate Change, Nature, vol. 8(3), pages 200-203, March.
    8. Lambert, Dayton M. & Brown, Jason P. & Florax, Raymond J.G.M., 2010. "A two-step estimator for a spatial lag model of counts: Theory, small sample performance and an application," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 40(4), pages 241-252, July.
    9. Tamat Sarmidi & Siong Hook Law & Yaghoob Jafari, 2014. "Resource Curse: New Evidence on the Role of Institutions," International Economic Journal, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 28(1), pages 191-206, March.
    10. Ang, James B. & Gupta, Satyendra Kumar, 2018. "Agricultural yield and conflict," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 92(C), pages 397-417.
    11. Marshall Burke & Solomon M. Hsiang & Edward Miguel, 2015. "Climate and Conflict," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 7(1), pages 577-617, August.
    12. Valentina Bosetti & Cristina Cattaneo & Giovanni Peri, 2021. "Should they stay or should they go? Climate migrants and local conflicts," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 21(4), pages 619-651.
    13. 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.
    14. Jean-François Maystadt & Margherita Calderone & Liangzhi You, 2015. "Local warming and violent conflict in North and South Sudan," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 15(3), pages 649-671.
    15. King, Gary & Zeng, Langche, 2001. "Logistic Regression in Rare Events Data," Political Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 9(2), pages 137-163, January.
    16. Bodea, Cristina & Higashijima, Masaaki & Singh, Raju Jan, 2016. "Oil and Civil Conflict: Can Public Spending Have a Mitigation Effect?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 1-12.
    17. Kate Burrows & Patrick L. Kinney, 2016. "Exploring the Climate Change, Migration and Conflict Nexus," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 13(4), pages 1-17, April.
    18. Nathan Nunn & Diego Puga, 2012. "Ruggedness: The Blessing of Bad Geography in Africa," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 94(1), pages 20-36, February.
    19. 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.
    20. Millner, Antony & McDermott, Thomas K. J., 2016. "Model confirmation in climate economics," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 67122, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    21. Halvard Buhaug, 2015. "Climate–conflict research: some reflections on the way forward," Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 6(3), pages 269-275, May.
    22. Ghimire, Ramesh & Ferreira, Susana & Dorfman, Jeffrey H., 2015. "Flood-Induced Displacement and Civil Conflict," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 614-628.
    23. Burke, M. & Craxton, M. & Kolstad, C.D. & Onda, C. & Allcott, H. & Baker, E. & Barrage, L. & Carson, R. & Gillingham, K. & Graff-Zivin, J. & Greenstone, M. & Hallegatte, S. & Hanemann, W.M. & Heal, G., 2016. "Opportunities for advances in climate change economics," ISU General Staff Papers 3565, Iowa State University, Department of Economics.
    24. Almer, Christian & Laurent-Lucchetti, Jérémy & Oechslin, Manuel, 2017. "Water scarcity and rioting: Disaggregated evidence from Sub-Saharan Africa," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 86(C), pages 193-209.
    25. Manotas-Hidalgo, Beatriz & Pérez-Sebastián, Fidel & Campo-Bescós, Miguel Angel, 2021. "The role of ethnic characteristics in the effect of income shocks on African conflict," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 137(C).
    26. Jeffrey M Wooldridge, 2010. "Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 2, volume 1, number 0262232588, December.
    27. 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.
    28. Lee, Lung-fei & Yu, Jihai, 2010. "Estimation of spatial autoregressive panel data models with fixed effects," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 154(2), pages 165-185, February.
    29. Majo, M.C. & van Soest, A.H.O., 2011. "The Fixed-Effects Zero-Inflated Poisson Model with an Application to Health Care Utilization," Discussion Paper 2011-083, Tilburg University, Center for Economic Research.
    30. Vuong, Quang H, 1989. "Likelihood Ratio Tests for Model Selection and Non-nested Hypotheses," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 57(2), pages 307-333, March.
    31. Marchiori, Luca & Maystadt, Jean-François & Schumacher, Ingmar, 2012. "The impact of weather anomalies on migration in sub-Saharan Africa," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 63(3), pages 355-374.
    32. Shields, Deborah J. & Tolwinski, Boleslaw & Kent, Brian M., 1999. "Models for conflict resolution in ecosystem management," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 61-84, March.
    33. Bruce A. Desmarais & Jeffrey J. Harden, 2013. "Testing for zero inflation in count models: Bias correction for the Vuong test," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 13(4), pages 810-835, December.
    34. Solomon Hsiang, 2016. "Climate Econometrics," Annual Review of Resource Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 8(1), pages 43-75, October.
    35. 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.
    36. Arellano, M, 1987. "Computing Robust Standard Errors for Within-Groups Estimators," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 49(4), pages 431-434, November.
    37. Ole Theisen & Nils Gleditsch & Halvard Buhaug, 2013. "Is climate change a driver of armed conflict?," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 117(3), pages 613-625, April.
    38. Paul Collier & V. L. Elliott & Håvard Hegre & Anke Hoeffler & Marta Reynal-Querol & Nicholas Sambanis, 2003. "Breaking the Conflict Trap : Civil War and Development Policy," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 13938, December.
    39. Burke, M & Craxton, M & Kolstad, CD & Onda, C & Allcott, H & Baker, E & Barrage, L & Carson, R & Gillingham, K & Graf-Zivin, J & Greenstone, M & Hallegatte, S & Hanemann, WM & Heal, G & Hsiang, S & Jo, 2016. "Opportunities for advances in climate change economics," University of California at Santa Barbara, Recent Works in Economics qt4tc5d9pb, Department of Economics, UC Santa Barbara.
    40. Solomon M. Hsiang, 2016. "Climate Econometrics," NBER Working Papers 22181, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    41. 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.
    42. Tobias Ide, 2017. "Research methods for exploring the links between climate change and conflict," Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 8(3), May.
    43. Salvatore Di Falco & Jérémy Laurent‐Lucchetti & Marcella Veronesi & Gunnar Kohlin, 2020. "Property Rights, Land Disputes and Water Scarcity: Empirical Evidence from Ethiopia," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 102(1), pages 54-71, January.
    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. van Weezel, Stijn, 2020. "Local warming and violent armed conflict in Africa," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 126(C).
    2. Federica Cappelli & Caterina Conigliani & Valeria Costantini & Keti Lelo & Anil Markandya & Elena Paglialunga & Giorgia Sforna, 2020. "Do spatial interactions fuel the climate-conflict vicious cycle? The case of the African continent," Journal of Spatial Econometrics, Springer, vol. 1(1), pages 1-52, December.
    3. Emediegwu, Lotanna E. & Wossink, Ada & Hall, Alastair, 2022. "The impacts of climate change on agriculture in sub-Saharan Africa: A spatial panel data approach," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).
    4. Cristina Cattaneo & Emanuele Massetti, 2019. "Does Harmful Climate Increase Or Decrease Migration? Evidence From Rural Households In Nigeria," Climate Change Economics (CCE), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 10(04), pages 1-36, November.
    5. Olper, A. & Falco, C. & Galeotti, M., 2018. "Climate Change, Agriculture and Migration: Is there a Causal Relationship ?," 2018 Conference, July 28-August 2, 2018, Vancouver, British Columbia 277488, International Association of Agricultural Economists.
    6. Albuquerque Sant'Anna, André, 2018. "Not So Natural: Unequal Effects of Public Policies on the Occurrence of Disasters," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 152(C), pages 273-281.
    7. Francesca Marchetta & David E Sahn & Luca Tiberti, 2019. "The Role of Weather on Schooling and Work of Young Adults in Madagascar," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 101(4), pages 1203-1227.
    8. Díaz, Juan-José & Saldarriaga, Victor, 2023. "A drop of love? Rainfall shocks and spousal abuse: Evidence from rural Peru," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(C).
    9. Isabelle Chort & Maëlys de la Rupelle, 2022. "Managing the impact of climate on migration: evidence from Mexico," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 35(4), pages 1777-1819, October.
    10. Desbureaux, Sébastien & Rodella, Aude-Sophie, 2019. "Drought in the city: The economic impact of water scarcity in Latin American metropolitan areas," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 13-27.
    11. 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).
    12. Emediegwu, Lotanna Ernest, 2023. "Assessing the (a)symmetric effect of global climate anomalies on food prices: Evidence from local prices," 97th Annual Conference, March 27-29, 2023, Warwick University, Coventry, UK 334555, Agricultural Economics Society - AES.
    13. Valentina Bosetti & Cristina Cattaneo & Giovanni Peri, 2021. "Should they stay or should they go? Climate migrants and local conflicts," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 21(4), pages 619-651.
    14. Marshall Burke & Solomon M. Hsiang & Edward Miguel, 2015. "Climate and Conflict," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 7(1), pages 577-617, August.
    15. Damette, Olivier & Goutte, Stéphane, 2023. "Beyond climate and conflict relationships: New evidence from a Copula-based analysis on an historical perspective," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 51(1), pages 295-323.
    16. 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.
    17. Zapata, Oscar, 2021. "The relationship between climate conditions and consumption of bottled water: A potential link between climate change and plastic pollution," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 187(C).
    18. Charles D. Kolstad & Frances C. Moore, 2019. "Estimating the Economic Impacts of Climate Change Using Weather Observations," NBER Working Papers 25537, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    19. André Tashi Gasser & Bruno Lanz, 2023. "Climate change, temperature extremes, and conflict: Evidence from mainland Southeast Asia," IRENE Working Papers 23-05, IRENE Institute of Economic Research.
    20. Obradovich, Nicholas & Fowler, James H., 2017. "Climate change may alter human physical activity patterns," Scholarly Articles 36874928, Harvard Kennedy School of Government.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Africa; Armed conflicts; Climate change; Geographical spillovers; Spatial econometrics;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D74 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Conflict; Conflict Resolution; Alliances; Revolutions
    • O13 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Agriculture; Natural Resources; Environment; Other Primary Products
    • O55 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economywide Country Studies - - - Africa
    • 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:spr:epolit:v:40:y:2023:i:2:d:10.1007_s40888-022-00271-x. 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: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    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.