Essays On Conflict Cooperation And Economic Development

This dissertation consists of three chapters on topics relating to conflict, social cooperation and development economics. Several studies have identified the impact of adverse economic shocks on civil conflict using rainfall variation as an instrument for income or growth. The first chapter contributes to this literature by carrying out a micro-level analysis on the relationship between climate and resource variation with armed conflict using a novel dataset on inter-tribal violence manifested through livestock raids in a pastoral-dependent region of East African called the Karamoja. Consistent with previous work, I find that across the region there is a negative relationship between resources and conflict, when resources are measured with forage. However, I also find that both decreases and increases in rainfall are correlated with conflict across the region. This bimodal relationship between precipitation and conflict persists when I analyse raid-location and tribe specific variation in rainfall, while the relationship between forage and raiding is less clear. There is some indication that forage-scarcity motivates tribes to carry out raids and forage-scarce sublocations appear to be more vulnerable to raids and livestock losses, but these results are not robust to all specifications. In the second chapter, I study the effect of Uganda's 2006 disarmament policy in the Karamoja region in East Africa. The disarmament policy greatly reduced the guns of tribes in the Ugandan districts of the region but not in the Kenyan districts. The theoretical impact of the disarmament is ambiguous, however, since guns can be used for deterrence as well as helping aggressors carry out violent crimes, such as livestock raiding. Empirically, I find that the disarmament campaign had the unintended effect of increasing the frequency of raids in Uganda by about 40%, while, consistent with the idea that disarmament reduced the costs of raiding, I find no impact on the monthly death rate. Moreover, the increase in raids in Uganda was driven by an increase in Ugandan initiated raids on other Ugandans, not an increase in Kenyan initiated raids on Ugandans, suggesting that within Uganda the deterrent effect of guns outweighs their impact as a tool of aggression. In the third chapter, written jointly with Johannes Haushofer, we study the impact of stress on social behavior by exogenously stimulating the two biological systems associated with stress: the hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal axis (HPA) and noradrenergic (NA) system and measuring behavior in interactive tasks in a laboratory experiment. Our preliminary findings suggest that the concurrent stimulation of both systems, through the administration of 60mg of hydrocortisone and 20mg of yohimbine, did not lead to statistically detectable changes to behavior in any of the social tasks. It did, however, manifest in lower opinions of the trustworthiness and fairness of other people, as well as a decrease in the value associated with helping other people, as measured through a visual analog scale survey. Given these initial results, we find preliminary evidence for a relationship between stress and anti-social behavior as revealed through lower beliefs on social standards. JEL Classification: C91, K42, Q56

This wide-ranging review of some of the major issues in development economics focuses on the role of economic and political institutions. Drawing on the latest findings in institutional economics and political economy, Pranab Bardhan, a leader in the field of development economics, offers a relatively nontechnical discussion of current thinking on these issues from the viewpoint of poor countries, synthesizing recent research and reflecting on where we stand today. The institutional framework of an economy defines and constrains the opportunities of individuals, determines the business climate, and shapes the incentives and organizations for collective action on the part of communities; Pranab Bardhan finds the institutional framework to be relatively weak in many poor countries. Institutional failures, weak accountability mechanisms, and missed opportunities for cooperative problem-solving become the themes of the book, with the role of distributive conflicts in the persistence of dysfunctional institutions as a common thread. Special issues taken up include the institutions for securing property rights and resolving coordination failures; the structural basis of power; commitment devices and political accountability; the complex relationship between democracy and poverty (with examples from India, where both have been durable); decentralization and devolution of power; persistence of corruption; ethnic conflicts; and impediments to collective action. Formal models are largely avoided, except in two chapters where Bardhan briefly introduces new models to elucidate currently under-researched areas. Other chapters review existing models, emphasizing the essential ideas rather than the formal details. Thus the book will be valuable not only for economists but also for social scientists and policymakers.

Drawing on the latest findings in institutional economics and political economy, this text offers a non-technical discussion of current thinking on these issues from the viewpoint of poor countries.

Research papers, economic policy, economic development, India - examines development policy, trade policy, balance of payments, agricultural policy, inflation, income distribution, economic planning, productivity policy, etc.; studies the repercussions on employment, basic needs fulfilment, low income families, etc; evaluates the impact on developing countries of development aid, economic aid and economic cooperation.

The State of the World Atlas is an accessible, unique visual survey of current events and global trends, highlighting the international scope and complexity of many challenges facing the humanity today. With a bold new design, this distinctive atlas presents the latest statistics on international trade and migration, the globalization of work, aging and new health risks (up to and including the COVID-19 pandemic), food and water, energy resources and consumption, literacy, gender equality, wars and peacekeeping, and more. And for the newest edition, special attention has been brought to the way that all of these issues are affected by the ongoing climate crisis. Fascinating, troubling, and surprising, this is an important resource for anyone who seeks to better understand the world around them.

Modern economics has largely ignored the issue of outright conflict as an alternative way of allocating goods, assuming instead the existence of well-defined property rights enforced by an undefined third party. And yet even in ostensibly peaceful market transactions, conflict exists as an outside option, sometimes constraining the outcomes reached through voluntary agreement. In this volume, economists offer a crucial rational-choice perspective on conflict, using methodological approaches that range from the game theoretic to the experimental. This text uses the recently developed contest success function to model conflict, examining such topics as alliance formation, regional conflicts under fiscal federalism, coups d'etat in developing countries, and the correlation between conflict and economic growth in Bolivia. This text also considers subjects that include the link between occupational choices and antigovernment activity in Afghanistan, social unrest and the IMF's Structural Adjustment Program, and the effect of Tajikistan's civil war on ex-combatants' capacity for trust and cooperation. This text shows that economics needs a theory of conflict to understand both outright conflict and transactions in the shadow of conflict. It also shows that the study of conflict also needs the rigorous, methodology-based perspectives of economics.

A collection of original research papers on economic aspects of conflict and peace, including a number of papers on developing nations.

The end of the Cold War between the United States and the former Soviet Union reassured people around the world who had lived in fear of a nuclear confrontation between the superpowers. Yet the early euphoria over "peace dividends" and a "new world order" was premature. Conflicts within and between nation-states are springing up around the globe, challenging world leaders and ordinary citizens to find peaceful means for national, group, and individual self-determination. In this book of specially commissioned essays, twenty world leaders assess the possibilities and perils of the new strategic, political, and economic interrelationships that are emerging around the world. They tackle such fundamental questions as: What is the future of the international system as we approach the twenty-first century? What will be the fate of disintegrating nation-states, and how will the international community respond? Has the nation-state outlived its usefulness? Are we beginning to witness the complete breakdown of the international system? The contributors are: Ali Alatas (Indonesia) Tariq Aziz (Iraq) James A. Baker III (United States) Benazir Bhutto (Pakistan) Boutros Boutros-Ghali (United Nations) Fernando Henrique Cardoso (Brazil) Osama El-Baz (Egypt) Eduardo Frei (Chile) Alberto Fujimori (Peru) Rachid Ghannouchi (eminent Islamic thinker) Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev (Russian Federation) Kamal Kharrazi (Iran) Andrei Kozyrev (Russian Federation) Leonid Kuchma (Ukraine) Nelson Mandela (South Africa) Nursultan Nazarbayev (Kazakhstan) Olusegun Obasanjo (Nigeria) Muammar El-Qadhafi (Libya) Fidel Ramos (Philippines) Shri P. V. Narasimha Rao (India)