Climate, Conflict and Cooperation: Evidence from Namibia

• In Event: The Politics of Disaster Policymaking: COVID-19, Climate Change, and Beyond

Abstract

Political outcomes from mass migration to violent conflict have been linked to adverse climatic conditions expected to increase under climate change. While country-level panel datasets can provide substantiation of such macro-level relationships, little rigorous evidence from developing country contexts is available to identify micro-level behavioral and collective responses that could help explain these links. Here, we explore the micro-level impact of climate change, pairing an exogenous climatic shock – a severe and spatially-varying drought – with “lab-in-the-field” behavioral games and surveyed measures of collective action, from 123 grazing areas across northern Namibia. First, we leverage repeated measurements of the same approximately 1000 individuals to test whether play in public goods games responds to drought severity. Second, we explore how measures of collective behavior, reported by the same individuals, including participation in water resource management and community grazing institutions, vary with the experience of drought. Initial results indicate that, in this context of acute vulnerability to climate change, severe climatic shocks tend not to affect or to increase people’s propensity to act pro-socially and collectively. Where present, such counter-veiling collective responses to the devastation of drought may enhance resilience in the face of climate change and limit the severity of political outcomes, from mass migration to conflict.

Authors

• Garrett Michael Albistegui Adler, Princeton University

• Dylan Groves, Columbia University