Predicting Natural Resource Violence

Between 1949 and 2009, at least 40 percent of intrastate conflicts were linked to natural resources, according to estimates in a UN report. A growing body of research explores these links to try to explain variation across factors like time, geography, and resource type. One puzzle involves the question of why armed groups sometimes fight one another directly in resource-rich areas for territorial control, yet at other times, avoid fighting in these areas completely — even reaching cooperative arrangements to extract resource revenues.

Kaisa Hinkkainen and Joakim Kreutz investigate a theoretical framework that could help explain why patterns of fighting around natural resources vary over time. They suggest that the variation reflects strategic calculations about what is most important to an armed group at different points in a violent conflict. When armed groups expect that violent conflict will continue indefinitely, one of their top strategic priorities is to maintain capacity to carry on the war by ensuring reliable access to revenue. When this revenue comes from natural resources, groups do not necessarily need territorial control to extract revenue and may not want to disrupt their revenue streams by fighting directly around the resources.

In contrast, when armed groups expect that a violent conflict will end soon, they often want to strengthen their position in negotiations and the post-war status quoIn contrast, when armed groups expect that a violent conflict will end soon, they often want to strengthen their position in negotiations and the post-war status quo. They may try to demonstrate that they can exert territorial control over natural resources, with less concern for any short-term costs to their revenue stream. Hinkkainen and Kreutz build on this theoretical framework to propose two complementary hypotheses: first, “when belligerents expect that the conflict will continue indefinitely, most violence will occur in areas without natural resources”; and second, “when belligerents expect that the conflict is about to end, most violence will occur in areas with natural resources.”

The authors test this framework against data on African civil wars between 1989 and 2008. To explore geographic shifts in violence, Hinkkainen and Kreutz map their data to a system of grid-cells measuring 0.5 x 0.5 decimal degrees (roughly 55 x 55 kilometers at the equator) and use counts of battle-related deaths to estimate the level of violence in a given grid-cell. Expectations about conflict duration are hard to measure accurately, so the authors focus on one observable variable that is likely to impact expectations: the occurrence of peace talks. They examine the possible effects of these talks on the geographic distribution of violence by comparing years without negotiations to years with negotiations, and then reviewing month by month data around the beginning of the talks. To test the effectiveness of their model and try to isolate the effects of negotiations, they include several control variables that other studies have linked to violent conflict, ranging from the presence of external support to the distance of a grid-cell from the capital city.

If the strategic importance of demonstrating control over natural resources increases as the expected duration of violent conflict decreases, then would-be peacemakers must be prepared for actions that reflect this shift. In this investigation, Hinkkainen and Kreutz find evidence to support their first hypothesis—that less violence occurs around natural resources when armed groups expect violent conflict to continue indefinitely. In years without negotiations, violence is negatively correlated with natural resources and areas with natural resources experience lower levels of violence than those without. The story for the second hypothesis is more ambiguous. Hinkkainen and Kreutz find that in years with negotiations, the presence of natural resources increases levels of violence, but the significance of this result varies when different parameters are used for the test.

The authors also report a relative shift in violence from non-resource to resource areas when negotiations occur. But because they did not find robust evidence for increased violence around natural resources during years with negotiations, they conclude that this effect of negotiations may be relative rather than absolute. In other words, it primarily reflects a drop in violence in non-resource areas rather than an increase in violence around resources. It may be that the strategic importance of controlling natural resources as armed conflict ends does not manifest in increased battle-related deaths in those areas.

Hinkkainen and Kreutz’s insights offer important lessons for policymakers. If the strategic importance of demonstrating control over natural resources increases as the expected duration of violent conflict decreases, then would-be peacemakers must be prepared for actions that reflect this shift. Hinkkainen and Kreutz suggest that natural resource areas are likely sites for spoiler activity, and frameworks for sharing natural resource wealth are likely to be critical issues in any negotiation.

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Article source: Elliott, Kaisa Hinkkainen, and Joakim Kreutz, 2019. “Natural Resource Wars in the Shadow of the Future: Explaining Spatial Dynamics of Violence During Civil War,” Journal of Peace Research 56, no. 4: 499-513. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022343318821174

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