Agricultural Production Shocks, Resilience and Rural Conflict

• In Event: The Political Economy of Rural Mobilization and Threat in the Developing World

Abstract

Widespread adverse climate change effects on agricultural productivity increase the need for understanding implications of climatic shocks for security. While this topic has received considerable attention in both policy circles and academia, our understanding of the conditions under which climatic shocks affect security are limited and even in high-risk regions there is great variation in who will regard the use of violence as viable option in response to a climate-related shock. We utilize survey data of a representative sample of 1,724 households in two regions of North Kivu in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and study violent attitudes following widespread agricultural production shocks from drought. By focusing on North Kivu, where both food insecurity and violence are widespread, we provide unique insights on the variation in individual propensity to use violence from a protracted crisis perspective. We also advance the literature on the relationship between climate change and conflict by accounting for objective and subjective measures of household resilience. Preliminary results indicate that less resilient respondents, based on both objective and subjective indicators of resilience, are more likely to be supportive of violent means following agricultural production shocks, while there is no direct link between drought-related shocks and violence.

Author

• Nina von Uexkull, Uppsala University