Conflict and Economic Development
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ECOS3997
Conflict and Economic Development
Week 3 - Why do people fight?
Recap
▪Week 1 – Introduction to the Course and Stream
▪Week 2 – Understanding the concepts of conflict and economic development
The plan for today
In today's lecture, we will discuss a BIG question related to conflict.
"Why do people fight?"
This question is the root of everything we are studying in this Stream.
Why do you think people fight?
➢Poverty
➢Greed
➢Misallocation of resources
➢The need to conquer a resource
➢Income inequality
➢Dissatisfaction with rulers
➢Animosity with another ethnic/religious/social group
With the increasing number of conflicts in the world, understanding why
people fight is very important.
This is why this question has intrigued many social scientists over centuries.
Over the years, economists, sociologists, philosophers, anthropologists etc. have
examined this question in various contexts and using various
methodologies/estimation methods.
As a result, the academic literature provides us with many potential theoretical
and empirical explanations on what drives the human urge to fight.
Theoretical vs empirical (?)
One of the most comprehensives reviews of the academic literature on conflict is the 2010
article on the Journal of Economic Literature by Chris Blattman and Edward Miguel.
Blattman, C. and E. Miguel (2010), “Civil war,” Journal of Economic Literature 48, 3-57.
I have uploaded this article to the reading list on Canvas.
Reading through this will help you understand the concept of conflict as well as the what
academic researchers have been working on in relation to conflict.
Greed vs Grievance in conflict
One of the most prominent ideas on the drivers of conflict in the academic literature is the
"Greed vs Grievance" theory of conflict by Collier and Hoeffler (2004)
Collier, P. and A. Hoeffler (2004), “Greed and grievance in civil war,” Oxford
Economic Papers 56, 563-595.
Professor Paul Collier Professor Anke Hoeffler
These two researchers have
done lots of academic research
related to conflict.
Don't forget to check out their
websites/Google Scholar pages.
Paul Collier Webpage
Anke Hoeffler Webpage
Collier and Hoeffler (2004)
According to Collier and Hoeffler (2004), the reasons driving people to fight
can be broadly categorized under two headings.
A. Greed
B. Grievances
Note: While this is not the only theoretical explanation on why people fight, within the context of this
Stream, we will first focus on this idea, and build our knowledge thereon.
In the next slides we will discuss their ideas and methods in more detail.
Greed
What do we understand by "Greed"?
In laymen's terms, this means that people "want" things and will fight to get
what they want.
More formally, the idea of "greed" looks at a rebellion as an industry that
generates profits from looting.
Rebels consider the costs and benefits of fighting.
If,
Benefits of fighting>Costs of fighting
Then
FIGHT
Takes into consideration the opportunity cost of fighting.
In essence, the concept of "greed" provides an "economic rationale for conflict"
Consider the case of Africa:
Many conflicts in Africa are targeted at
taking control over mines.
Conflicts become more likely when the
value of minerals are higher in the
commodity market.
For example, a conflict targeted at a copper
mine is more likely to occur when the value
of copper is higher in the market.
This is because the rents/benefits
that rebels can extract from the mine are
higher in such periods.
Source: Berman et al (2017)
Grievance