One effect to rule them all? A comment on climate and conflict

Buhaug, Halvard; Nordkvelle, Jonas; Bernauer, Thomas; Böhmelt, Tobias; Brzoska, Michael; Busby, Joshua W.; Ciccone, Antonio; Fjelde, Hanne; Gartzke, Erik; Gleditsch, Nils Petter; Goldstone, Jack Α.; Hegre, Håvard; Holtermann, Helge; Koubi, Vally; Link, Jasmin S. A.; Link, P.; Lujala, Päivi; Ο’Loughlin, John; Raleigh, Clionadh; Scheffran, Jürgen; Schilling, Janpeter; Smith, Todd G.; Theisen, Ole Magnus; Tol, Richard S.J.; Urdal, Henrik; Uexküll, Nina von

doi:10.1007/s10584-014-1266-1

Cited by 186 publications

(103 citation statements)

References 23 publications

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“…The question whether or not climate-related factors have significantly contributed to recent armed-conflict outbreaks has been heavily disputed in the scientific literature (33)(34)(35)(36)(37)(38). Although a sequence of studies has suggested that a large number of outbreaks of armed conflicts in modern as well as premodern times have been associated with climatic variability (33,36,37,(39)(40)(41), the robustness of these findings and underlying mechanisms are controversially discussed (10,37,42,43).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Armed-conflict risks enhanced by climate-related disasters in ethnically fractionalized countries

Schleußner

Donges

Donner

et al. 2016

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

276

168

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Social and political tensions keep on fueling armed conflicts around the world. Although each conflict is the result of an individual context-specific mixture of interconnected factors, ethnicity appears to play a prominent and almost ubiquitous role in many of them. This overall state of affairs is likely to be exacerbated by anthropogenic climate change and in particular climate-related natural disasters. Ethnic divides might serve as predetermined conflict lines in case of rapidly emerging societal tensions arising from disruptive events like natural disasters. Here, we hypothesize that climate-related disaster occurrence enhances armed-conflict outbreak risk in ethnically fractionalized countries. Using event coincidence analysis, we test this hypothesis based on data on armed-conflict outbreaks and climate-related natural disasters for the period 1980-2010. Globally, we find a coincidence rate of 9% regarding armed-conflict outbreak and disaster occurrence such as heat waves or droughts. Our analysis also reveals that, during the period in question, about 23% of conflict outbreaks in ethnically highly fractionalized countries robustly coincide with climatic calamities. Although we do not report evidence that climate-related disasters act as direct triggers of armed conflicts, the disruptive nature of these events seems to play out in ethnically fractionalized societies in a particularly tragic way. This observation has important implications for future security policies as several of the world's most conflict-prone regions, including North and Central Africa as well as Central Asia, are both exceptionally vulnerable to anthropogenic climate change and characterized by deep ethnic divides.climate-related natural disasters | ethnic fractionalization | armed conflicts | event coincidence analysis

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Armed-conflict risks enhanced by climate-related disasters in ethnically fractionalized countries

Schleußner

Donges

Donner

et al. 2016

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

276

168

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…According to this study, one standard deviation increase in temperature or extreme rainfall increases the frequency of interpersonal violence by 4% and increases inter-group conflict by 14% (Hsiang, Burke, and Miguel, 2013). But other studies question this research, underlining the mixed and inconclusive results from scientific research on climate change and conflict (Buhaug et al, 2014).…”

Section: Environmental Dimensionmentioning

confidence: 66%

States of Fragility 2016

2016

States of Fragility

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“…This was criticized by for three main reasons: (i) data overlap in the metaanalysis; (ii) assuming causal homogeneity across different independent and dependent variables, spatial and temporal scales, time-lags, and functional forms; and (iii) excluding replication studies and oversampling of significant results. A meta-analysis adjusting for this failed to find evidence of convergence [38]. Subsequent exchanges showed few signs of agreement, with Hsiang, Burke and Miguel (2014) pointing out that most critical points were addressed in the initial study [39], and Buhaug and Nordkvelle (2014) arguing that the original modeling strategy was inappropriate [40].…”

Section: The Climate-conflict Debate Pre-2014mentioning

confidence: 99%

Climate Change and Violence: Insights from Political Science

Theisen

2017

Curr Clim Change Rep

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Purpose of Review The aim of this review is to understand the state of the art of research related to climate change and collectively organized violence from a broad political science perspective. Recent Findings An increasing share of quantitative studies find a link between weather anomalies and violence for some forms of violence, but the directions are not always consistent and the mechanisms are not satisfactorily understood. Nonnaturalist scholars note important reservations. Summary Important improvements have been made during the last few years, but much remains to conclude that climate change will increase the risk of violence. An increased focus on the political consequences of adaptation and mitigation is needed.

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One effect to rule them all? A comment on climate and conflict

Cited by 186 publications

References 23 publications

Armed-conflict risks enhanced by climate-related disasters in ethnically fractionalized countries

Armed-conflict risks enhanced by climate-related disasters in ethnically fractionalized countries

States of Fragility 2016

Climate Change and Violence: Insights from Political Science

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