Economic Development and Conflict

Lecture 9
 Violent Conflicts
Vast literature studying conflicts establishes
that these have,
Economic and social causes and consequences

This leads to the development of

Economics of Conflicts

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 Recent and Current Conflicts

Post WWII history has witnessed change in

nature of conflicts
Interstate to Intrastate violent conflicts
Civil wars were against colonial rules until
1970s
Later conflicts occurred because of the geo-
politics of the cold war
The intensity of the conflict hardly changed
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 Violent Conflicts Today

The terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001,

drastically changed the epi-centers of the conflicts
South-Asia, sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle-East
became new battlegrounds
Conflicts are measured in different ways
Quantitative measurement (Civil war): 1000 battle
related deaths
Conflict Barometer (2016) reports 188 violent
conflicts globally

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 Conflicts by Regions
Source: Conflict Barometer 2016

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 Repercussions
About 2 billion people live in the conflict-affected
areas
World Development Report (WDR) (2011), mentions
that no conflict affected country has achieved any
one (among eight) Millennium Development Goal

Costs of conflicts, whether economic, social and

psychological are difficult to count

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 Theoretical Explanation of Violence
One approach concentrates on conflicts of ideas,
culture and religious beliefs
The clash of civilizations and re-making of world order
(1996). Samuel P. Hutington
He thinks the clash represents the development of
historical process
Ideological and economic reasons for conflicts have
fettered in post-WW11 world
Conflicts are to be cultural, among different
civilizations
Such difference are centuries old, so likely to persist

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 The other approach

This considers economic deprivations and

grievances as root causes of violent conflicts
Tedd Gurr, Amartya Sen
About clashes of civilizations, it considers there
are other better classifications for human beings,
e.g. nationalities locations classes
occupation and many more
The world has more vivid interactions, influences
and contributions of each civilization for each
other
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 There is a Conflict Trap
Countries once in conflicts hardly get rid of it
Repetition Recurrence of conflicts is the most
significant feature
Institutions, Infrastructure once destroyed is hard to
re-build
Question? If civilization is important:
Why low-income countries are the center of
conflicts?

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 Economic Development Problem

Conflict originate from economic development

failures, and
These fail the economic development process
Relative Deprivation
It occurs when significant proportion realizes
having less social and economic opportunities
Societies respond under excessive inequalities

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 Theoretical Background
Why men rebel?

Frustration Aggression Theory explains individual

acts of violence
When welfare compromises, which already is at the
minimum levels promotes hatred

When economic frustration is prolonged and intense, it

ultimately results in violence (Gurr, 1970)
Poverty, Inequality, and economic causes are where the
roots of conflicts lie. (Amartya Sen)

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 Economic Development Indicators
and Conflicts
Per-capita income has strong links with occurrence
of conflicts
Various studies find, lower the value of HDI, more
the chances of conflict in a country
Similarly, higher the HDI value, less the chances of
violence in countries
Low adult literacy links with occurrence of conflicts

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 Cont.

Infant morality rate (proxy of health status), strongly

links with the conflicts
Absence of political rights econometrically proven
links with conflicts

And
unemployment in the youth is strongly linked with
rebel activities

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 Why exceptions!
Income is not the sole reason: sometimes violent
conflicts in rich countries, Spain, Northern Ireland

In democracies: India, Turkey, Sri Lanka

Income within a country does not tell us about
Horizontal Inequalities

Equality minimises conflicts

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 Concluding Remarks

Each conflict is different as the society which

produced it

Neither there are general reasons for the origin

Nor any general solutions for the termination

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 Conflicts are imposed too!
Iraq a US $ 3 trillion war (Joseph Stiglitz, 2008)

$ 1 trillion can pay 120 million childrens school

expenses
Can insure 530 million for health care
43 million can be give 4 years university scholarship
Multiply 1 x 3 trillion and its effects

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 More generally!
Economic development failures, one way or
another create conflicts
Countries with better development and
opportunities are no more the battlegrounds
Not necessarily per-capita income is very high
Economic development indicators must be the
focus of key public policy discussions and
actions

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 This course

This course is over in this class room

However,

The search continues

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