Economics and Genocide: Choices and Consequences

Jurgen Brauer and Charles Anderton

No 1408, Working Papers from College of the Holy Cross, Department of Economics

Abstract: Professional economists rarely write on questions of genocide. This surprises because a workhorse tool of the economics discipline concerns the analysis of behavior that takes place under constraints. All parties in genocide—perpetrators, victims, and third parties—face cost and resource constraints subject to which they seek to achieve their objectives, be it killing, surviving, or intervening. This essay characterizes and illustrates economic thinking about objectives, costs, and resources for each of the three groups. There is potentially much that economics can contribute to genocide studies and, vice versa, much that genocide scholars may learn from welcoming an economic perspective.

Keywords: Genocide; economics; constrained optimization; rational choice (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: A12 D00 D74 H87 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 18 pages
Date: 2014-09
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-hpe
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Published in Seton Hall Journal of Diplomacy and International Relations, Volume 15, Number 2, 2014, Pages 65-78.

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Related works:
Working Paper: Economics and Genocide: Choices and Consequences (2014)
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