IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ags/iaae18/275936.html

Does climate change cause conflict? Damned if you do, damned if you don’t

Author

Listed:
  • Gatti, N.
  • Baylis, K.
  • Crost, B.

Abstract

Using detailed data on conflict-related incidents in Indonesia, we exploit seasonal variation in the relationship between rainfall and agricultural production to study the mechanism linking climate change and conflict. Furthermore, we ask whether irrigation and dam infrastructure help mitigate this link. We find that wet-season rainfall decreases production while rainfall during the dry season is beneficial for production. If agriculture is the mechanism through which climate change affects conflict, then we should expect the opposite effect on conflict, but with one-year lag. Our results show that, as expected, dry-season rainfall decreases conflict in Indonesia and in agricultural regions like Java, while wet-season rainfall increases conflict. In the latter, we find that irrigation increases conflict instead of reducing it. For Indonesia, irrigation reduces the effect of conflict during the dry season and amplifies it during the wet season. A plausible explanation is that the irrigation network is not well adapted to agriculture necessities which could generate civil unrest when a weather shock occurs. A policy that aim to reducing the impact of climate change on civil conflict should consider these drawbacks.

Suggested Citation

  • Gatti, N. & Baylis, K. & Crost, B., 2018. "Does climate change cause conflict? Damned if you do, damned if you don’t," 2018 Conference, July 28-August 2, 2018, Vancouver, British Columbia 275936, International Association of Agricultural Economists.
    • Handle: RePEc:ags:iaae18:275936
    DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.275936
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/275936/files/2422.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.22004/ag.econ.275936?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. Solomon Hsiang & Marshall Burke, 2014. "Climate, conflict, and social stability: what does the evidence say?," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 123(1), pages 39-55, March.
    2. Sarsons, Heather, 2015. "Rainfall and conflict: A cautionary tale," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 115(C), pages 62-72.
    3. Barron, Patrick & Kaiser, Kai & Pradhan, Menno, 2009. "Understanding Variations in Local Conflict: Evidence and Implications from Indonesia," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 37(3), pages 698-713, March.
    4. Raul Caruso & Ilaria Petrarca & Roberto Ricciuti, 2016. "Climate change, rice crops, and violence," Journal of Peace Research, Peace Research Institute Oslo, vol. 53(1), pages 66-83, January.
    5. 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.
    6. Kleemans, Marieke, 2015. "Migration Choice under Risk and Liquidity Constraints," 2015 AAEA & WAEA Joint Annual Meeting, July 26-28, San Francisco, California 200702, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    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.
    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. Nicolas Gatti & Kathy Baylis & Benjamin Crost, 2021. "Can Irrigation Infrastructure Mitigate the Effect of Rainfall Shocks on Conflict? Evidence from Indonesia," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 103(1), pages 211-231, January.
    2. Mary, Sebastien, 2022. "Dams mitigate the effect of rainfall shocks on Hindus-Muslims riots," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 150(C).
    3. Lu, Yifan & Yamazaki, Satoshi, 2023. "Fish to fight: Does catching more fish increase conflicts in Indonesia?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 170(C).
    4. Etienne Inedit Blaise Tsomb Tsomb & Mermoz Homer III Nsoga Nsoga & Cyrille Dominick Bitting, 2024. "Climate change vulnerability and conflicts in Africa: evidence from the migrations channel," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 26(7), pages 18811-18854, July.
    5. Goyette, Jonathan & Smaoui, Maroua, 2022. "Low agricultural potential exacerbates the effect of temperature on civil conflicts," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 192(C).
    6. 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.
    7. Sara Balestri & Raul Caruso, 2024. "Vulnerability to Climate Change and Communal Conflicts: Evidence from Sub-Saharan Africa and South/South-East Asia," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 60(10), pages 1530-1556, October.
    8. van Weezel, Stijn, 2020. "Local warming and violent armed conflict in Africa," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 126(C).
    9. Hilhorst, D.J.M. & Vervest, M.-J. & Desportes, I. & Melis, S. & Mena Flühmann, R.A. & van Voorst, R.S., 2020. "Strengthening community resilience in conflict: learnings from the Partners for Resilience programme," ISS Working Papers - General Series 131291, International Institute of Social Studies of Erasmus University Rotterdam (ISS), The Hague.
    10. 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.
    11. 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.
    12. Stijn van Weezel, 2018. "Apocalypse now? - Climate change and war in Africa," Working Papers 201816, School of Economics, University College Dublin.
    13. Sara Balestri & Raul Caruso, 2021. "Vulnerability to climate change and communal conflicts: uncovering pathways," DISEIS - Quaderni del Dipartimento di Economia internazionale, delle istituzioni e dello sviluppo dis2103, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Dipartimento di Economia internazionale, delle istituzioni e dello sviluppo (DISEIS).
    14. Martin-Shields, Charles P. & Stojetz, Wolfgang, 2019. "Food security and conflict: Empirical challenges and future opportunities for research and policy making on food security and conflict," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 119(C), pages 150-164.
    15. Vesco, Paola & Dasgupta, Shouro & De Cian, Enrica & Carraro, Carlo, 2020. "Natural resources and conflict: A meta-analysis of the empirical literature," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 172(C).
    16. Erin Llwyd Owain & Mark Andrew Maslin, 2018. "Assessing the relative contribution of economic, political and environmental factors on past conflict and the displacement of people in East Africa," Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 4(1), pages 1-9, December.
    17. Christiane Fröhlich & Giovanni Bettini, 2017. "Where Next? Climate Change, Migration, and the (Bio)politics of Adaptation," Global Policy, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 8, pages 33-39, February.
    18. Ang, James B. & Gupta, Satyendra Kumar, 2018. "Agricultural yield and conflict," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 92(C), pages 397-417.
    19. Pierre E. Biscaye, 2025. "Agricultural shocks and long-term conflict risk: Evidence from desert locust swarms," HiCN Working Papers 436, Households in Conflict Network.
    20. Laville,Camille & Mandon,Pierre Jean-Claude, 2023. "Internal Conflicts and Shocks. A Narrative Meta-Analysis," Policy Research Working Paper Series 10315, The World Bank.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:ags:iaae18:275936. 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: AgEcon Search (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/iaaeeea.html .

    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.