How Inequality and Repression Affect the Link Between Food Insecurity and Urban Social Disorder

Murshed Syed Mansoob (), Gates Scott, Hasan Rashel and Badiuzzaman Muhammad
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Murshed Syed Mansoob: ISS, Erasmus University, Den Haag, The Netherlands
Gates Scott: University of Oslo and Peace Research Institute (PRIO), Oslo, Norway
Hasan Rashel: Bangladesh Bank, Dhaka, Bangladesh
Badiuzzaman Muhammad: ISS, Erasmus University, Den Haag, The Netherlands

Peace Economics, Peace Science, and Public Policy, 2025, vol. 31, issue 2, 229-257

Abstract: We examine the relationship between food insecurity and urban social disorder, featuring the degree of inequality and levels of governmental repression. We develop a formal theoretical model, and our empirical results suggest that food price volatility contributes significantly to conflict events as measured by the PRIO Urban Social Disorder data. We measure vertical inequality using the V-DEM egalitarian index, which is negatively significant; greater inequality sparks unrest. Inter-group horizontal inequality is also statistically significantly related to the risk of food riots. Government transfers are weakly associated with reducing conflict incidence. Governmental repression, in contrast, is associated with food riots across our estimations.

Keywords: food insecurity, urban unrest; inequality (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D63 D74 I (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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DOI: 10.1515/peps-2024-0059

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