conflict lecture 3

Question 1

what was Yanagizawa-Drott (2014) paper about?

Answer 1

there paper tried to answer the question of “what is the role of propaganda in fuelling genocide?

Question 2

what were the results of yanagizawa-drott(2014) on propaganda and genocide?

Answer 2

their study was on the rwandan genocide and the hate radio station radio television libre des mille collines which led propaganda efforts through broadcasts calling for the extermination of the tutsi. the result of 1 standard deviation increase in radio coverage was associated with a 12% increase in participation in total violence. there was also spillover effects with violence begets violence.

Question 3

what are the two approaches for policy makers thinking about the direct effect of combat and its spillover effects on local population?

Answer 3

there is the development assistence (aid in Afghanistan) and the violence approach (more bombing in Vietnam)

Question 4

how did the US try to achieve the goal of strengthen the south vietnamese government and weaken the communist insurgency(viet cong)

Answer 4

they used overwhelming firepower to try and establish control through military force by making it costly to oppose the state
they also tried to win over the hearts and minds by providing public goods, creating economic opportunities and promoting civic engagement

Question 5

how did the US air force determine which areas to bomb?

Answer 5

they determined which areas to bomb by evaluating where the risk of viet cong insurgency was greatest. data from 169 questions on security political and economic characteristics into a single hamlet security rating. the output ranged continuously from 1 to 5 however this was rounded to the nearest whole number as a result probability of being bombed jumped discontinously over two similar areas.

Question 6

what was the effect of the bombing?

Answer 6

it increased the military and political activity of the viet cong and it weakened the governance and non communist civic engagement

Question 7

what was the hypothesis of Beath et al (2011) about the effect of aid in Afghanistan>

Answer 7

aid projects will raise support for government and reduce the support for insurgents

Question 8

what was the empiracal strategy for Beath et al(2011) when studying the effect of aid on conflict?

Answer 8

they use the national solidarity program (NSP) - largest development programme in Afghanistan ( aims to deliver services and infrastructure to rural population and to build representative institutions for village governance)
they use randomised controlled trials in 500 villages across 10 districts

Question 9

what were the results of Beath et al(2011) for the effects of aid on conflict?

Answer 9

program improved perceptiosn of economic well being (subjective indicators such as expectations)
improved attitudes towards central and sub national government NGOs and foreign military forces
reduction in the number of security incidents recorded by the international security assistance force (ISAF) but no effects on the number of incidents reported by villagers in household surveys
heterogenous impacts in more insecure eastern regions: objective but not perceived well being increases. no impact on perceived or real security risk. negative impacts on attitudes toward government

Question 10

what are the multidimensional costs to conflict?

Answer 10

lost lives
destruction of capital (especially armed conflict)
lack of investment
lost human capital acquistition

Question 11

what is the ideal situation in order to evaluate the cost of being a soldier?

Answer 11

the ideal situation would be to compare the cost of being a soldier with being a non soldier

Question 12

what are the two issues which arise to find the cost of being a soldier?

Answer 12

there is a lack of data ( dangerous to collect, tracking people hard due to migration and mortality)
need valid counterfactual , identical people except being a soldier

Question 13

how did Blattman and annan try to find the effect of being a soldier?

Answer 13

they used data from uganda to examine the cost of conflict for child soldier.the unpopular rebel movement in northern Uganda the Lords resistance army was studied. the children were mostly abducted so there was no self selection so random. data confirms this

Question 14

what was Blattman and annans hypotheses and results for the effect of being a soldier?

Answer 14

disrupted education and work experience
psychological effects ( aggression, trauma etc
poor physical health
broken social ties

Question 15

how did abadie and gardezabal (2003) examine the short run effect of conflict?

Answer 15

they examined the impact of the basque conflict that began in the late 1960s .the empirical strategy exploited the synthetic control region(using places economically similiar to the pre-60 basque) and the unilateral truce declared by the ETA in 1998.

Question 16

what were the result of abadie and gardezabal (2003) on the short run effects of conflict?

Answer 16

they found a 10 % reduction in GDP per capita due to the conflict
capital destruction is limited mostly due to flight of workers and lack of investment
stocks of firms with a significant part of their buissness in the basque country showed a postive relative performance whne the truce became credible and a negative relative performance at the end of the cease fire

Question 17

what is the consensus in the literature about conflict?

Answer 17

that conflict comes with a cost ie lost economic activity and reduced human capital

Question 18

how can the solow model express the effect of conflict in the long run?

Answer 18

the solow model represetns the output by a function of capital y=f(k) , suppose people save constant fraction s of output and capital depreciates at rate δ then k_(t+1) = (1 − δ)k_t + sf (k_t). conflict can be considered as a shock on k and the net effect will be determined by the function

Question 19

what occurs if the solow modle includes a poverty trap?

Answer 19

if the solow model includes a poverty trap then a fall in the level of capital within a country may lead to a divergence between countries rather than a convergence as the growth rate of capital will be lower

Question 20

how did miguel and roland find about the long term effects of war?

Answer 20

they used the US bombings which were concentrated on certain parts - 70% of bombs were dropped in 10% of districts
empiracal strategy exploits this fact: compare heavily bombed areas to those with less bombed areas. use distance to 17th parralel - border between south and north and center of fight as IV

Question 21

what were the result of miguel and roland(2011) on long term effects of war?

Answer 21

they find no negative impacts on:
local poverty rates, consumption levels, infrastructure, literacy and population density
other studies find similar effects for the bombing of japan and germany. there is no indication of poverty traps

Question 22

what is the summary of the impact of shocks on wealth and conflict?

Answer 22

the shocks on wealth habe ambigous impacts on conflict: productive wealth shocks decrease conflict whereas unproductive wealth shocks increase conflict

Question 23

what is the impact of the time horizon on conflict?

Answer 23

short run : severe economic and human costs
in the long run the effect may be transistory

Question 24

what is the relationship between ethinicity and conflict?

Answer 24

internal social conflicts dominate inter state conflicts
the majority of internal conflicts are ethnic. societies are getting more diverse so ethnic conflicts are more likely. fearon(2006) :1945-98 100 of 700 known conflict groups participated in rebellion against the state

Question 25

why does ethnicity matter for conflict according to Esteban and Ray 2008?

Answer 25

• Prize grabbing (resources, jobs, positions etc.) is generally the essence of the conflicts both for elites and masses.* They consider social conflict as an attempt to grab budgets or policies to produce public goods. (e.g., revolution of workers)* Groups based on class or ethnicity can be formed to seize these budgets* It turns out that conflict, if it breaks out, is more likely to be ethnic in nature. Intuition: Class based groups are homogeneous economically whilst ethnic groups are heterogeneous.