New Evidence on the Economics of Climate and Conflict

Marshall Burke, Joel Ferguson, Solomon M. Hsiang and Edward Miguel

No 33040, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: We survey the quantitative research literature linking climate and conflict, a body of research that spans multiple academic disciplines and has roughly doubled in size in the last decade. It makes three main contributions. First, we carry out a meta-analysis – updating Hsiang et al (2013) and Burke et al (2015) with a far larger sample – and confirm that extreme climate is associated with elevated risk of inter-group conflict, intra-personal violence, and self-harm. The estimated average effects are smaller than the earlier estimates, although they remain meaningful in magnitude and highly statistically significant. Second, we present a methodological discussion and empirical illustration of how the use of data at different spatial and temporal scales can affect these results. Third, we discuss specific studies that present evidence on the mechanisms underlying this relationship including: (1) economic conditions, income, and agricultural productivity; (2) socio-demographic factors; (3) migration and transportation costs; (4) policy, politics and institutions; and (5) psychological and physiological factors. The chapter concludes with a discussion of policy implications and some open questions.

JEL-codes: O1 Q54 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024-10
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-env
Note: DEV EEE
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.nber.org/papers/w33040.pdf (application/pdf)
Access to the full text is generally limited to series subscribers, however if the top level domain of the client browser is in a developing country or transition economy free access is provided. More information about subscriptions and free access is available at http://www.nber.org/wwphelp.html. Free access is also available to older working papers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nbr:nberwo:33040

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
http://www.nber.org/papers/w33040
The price is Paper copy available by mail.

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc National Bureau of Economic Research, 1050 Massachusetts Avenue Cambridge, MA 02138, U.S.A.. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().