A Dangerous Liaison? Ethnicity, Natural Resources and Civil Conflict Onset
Final Report Abstract
Under what circumstances the combination of ethnicity and natural resources does forms a dangerous liaison that leads to violent conflict? The project investigated this question by disaggregating the concepts of ethnicity and natural resources and by testing several characteristics of ethnicity and resources – and their combination – in terms of whether they produce violent or non-violent outcomes at three levels (macro, meso, and micro). The project first refined the theoretical concept by developing a framework that distinguished between the motive to engage in violent collective action and the capacity or opportunity to actually engage in such action. Several characteristics of resources and ethnicity were assigned to either motive or opportunity. In a second step, we theorized what combinations might be particularly problematic for peace. The most dangerous combination according to this theorizing is when ethnic groups are politically or otherwise excluded but remain a mobilization resource and natural resources revenues are not used to buy off motivations of dissent and at the same time offer opportunities to engage in (violent) rebellion. These conditions were first tested at the macro level in global samples of oil producers and all countries around the world. Results showed that ethnic exclusion in the combination with oil extraction produce more problematic results but only on the condition that countries are extremely dependent on oil but do not have huge resources that enable them to buy off or suppress opposition. Resource reserves in settlements of ethnic minorities are conflict prone in relatively oil poor, but undemocratic states. These results could be further refined in an African sample that disaggregated the location of resources as well as the settlements of ethnic groups. The results particularly showed that resources and ethnicity only form conflict risks when combined with ethnic exclusion. Once ethnic groups participate in the government, effects are reversed and peace becomes more probable. As planned, we next studied the underlying mechanisms in two country cases that shared ethnic diversity and resource endowments – but differ according to the levels of violence. In Bolivia, with contentious politics but without major civil conflict, we created a data set on the level of protest in the provinces (meso level). Matching these findings with ethnic settlements and resource locations showed that only the combination matters and that inclusion dampens the effect. Based on these findings, the comparison of three local case studies (micro level), including field work, identified organizational capacities and antigovernment collective action frames as further conditions that were not captured by the previous analysis. Similarly, we created a data set on the 36 federal states in Nigeria, especially the composition of the federal cabinets in order to assess their ethnic representativeness of the corresponding federal state (meso level). Matching this information with resource income and location, we clearly established that ethnic representation decreases the conflict risk substantially. We then selected conflict prone resource endowed states in the Niger Delta and conducted a survey (including experimental elements) in three selected communities (micro level, N = 550 respondents). Results showed that only certain motives create dangerous potentials. It is the actual personal experience with oil related problems rather than abstract goals or collective identity that motivate people to support anti-state violence. For all project parts, we succeeded in finding substantial results and managed to publish these in international peer-reviewed scholarly journals. The major contribution of the project is to have identified political exclusion of ethnic groups in combination with resource endowment as the most conflict prone combination. Otherwise ethnicity and resources do not necessarily form a “dangerous liaison” and are even a peace resource in some circumstances.
Publications
- (2018) Which Grievances Make People Support Violence against the State? Survey Evidence from the Niger Delta. International Interactions 44 (3) 437–462
Koos, Carlo
(See online at https://doi.org/10.1080/03050629.2017.1369411) - (2013): Does Uranium Mining Increase Civil Conflict Risk? Evidence from a Spatiotemporal Analysis of Africa from 1960 to 2008; in: Civil Wars, Vol. 15, No. 3, 2013, 306-331
Koos, Carlo and Matthias Basedau
- (2014): “How Ethnicity Conditions the Effect of Oil and Gas on Civil Conflict: A Spatial Analysis of Africa from 1990 to 2010”, in: Political Geography, Vol. 38, January 2014; 1-11
Basedau, Matthias and Jan H. Pierskalla
(See online at https://doi.org/10.1016/j.polgeo.2013.10.001) - (2015): Indigenous Identity, Natural Resources and Contentious Politics in Bolivia: A Disaggregated Conflict Analysis 2000-2011, in: Comparative Political Studies, 48 (3): 301-332
Mähler, Annegret and Jan Pierskalla
(See online at https://doi.org/10.1177/0010414014545012) - (2016): “Does the Success of Institutional Reform Depend on the Depth of Divisions? A Pilot Study on Thirty-Four African Countries”, in: Ansorg, Nadine/Kurtenbach Sabine (eds) 2016, Institutional Reforms and Peacebuilding, London: Routledge, 21-45
Basedau, Matthias
- (2016): “Does Violence Pay? The Effect of Ethnic Rebellion on Overcoming Political Deprivation.” Conflict Management and Peace Science. 33 (1): 3-24
Koos, Carlo
(See online at https://doi.org/10.1177/0738894214559670) - (2016): “The Effects of Oil Production and Ethnic Representation on Violent Conflict in Nigeria: A Mixed-Method Approach.” Terrorism and Political Violence. 28 (5): 888-911
Koos, Carlo and Jan Pierskalla
(See online at https://doi.org/10.1080/09546553.2014.962021) - (2017): Explaining Ethnic Mobilization against Resource Extraction: How Collective Action Frames, Motives and Opportunities Interact, in: Studies in Conflict & Terrorism
Kuhn (née Mähler), Annegret
(See online at https://doi.org/10.1080/1057610X.2017.1300758)
