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Large-scale agricultural investments, employment opportunities and communal conflict

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  • De Juan, Alexander
  • Hoffmann, Lisa
  • Lay, Jann

Abstract

We investigate whether and how large-scale agricultural investments (LSAIs) influence the risk of communal conflict. We assess a mechanism that links LSAIs to conflict through interethnic competition over access to plantation employment. Our analyses focus on rural Liberia. We measure communal conflict with joy-of-destruction experiments (JDG). We first investigate associations between access to employment and JDG outcomes---comparing villages that are located below/above a distance threshold at which travel costs to plantations equal daily wages of plantation workers. We find substantively higher levels of destruction in communities with better access to LSAI employment. We then analyze whether participants display more destructive behaviour when members of ethnic minorities interact with members of dominant groups. Contrary to expectations, we find no variation across interethnic experimental constellations. Exploratory descriptive analyses tentatively suggest a link between LSAIs, labor migration and communal conflict.

Suggested Citation

  • De Juan, Alexander & Hoffmann, Lisa & Lay, Jann, 2022. "Large-scale agricultural investments, employment opportunities and communal conflict," OSF Preprints j5vmh, Center for Open Science.
    • Handle: RePEc:osf:osfxxx:j5vmh
    DOI: 10.31219/osf.io/j5vmh
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