Violent Conflict and Political Development Over the Long Run: China versus Europe

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Dincecco ◽  
Yuhua Wang
Keyword(s):  
Political Development ◽  
Violent Conflict ◽  
Long Run

scholarly journals Violent Conflict and Political Development Over the Long Run: China Versus Europe

2018 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 341-358 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Dincecco ◽  
Yuhua Wang
Keyword(s):  
Political Development ◽  
Political Geography ◽  
Political Representation ◽  
Violent Conflict ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Tax Revenue ◽  
Long Run ◽  
Bargaining Position ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
The Relationship

Is the traditional logic by which violent conflict fosters long-run political development universal? To help address this question, this article compares Europe with China. While historical warfare was very common across both units, representative government flourished only in Europe. We suggest that the relationship between violent conflict and political development depends on the underlying political geography context. In Europe, political fragmentation was rampant. Thus, conflict tended to be external (i.e., interstate), and attack threats were multidirectional. Furthermore, exit ability was high in this context. Elites were therefore in a strong bargaining position to demand political representation in return for new tax revenue. China, by contrast, was politically centralized. Here, conflict tended to be internal, attack threats were unidirectional, and exit ability was low. The emperor was thus powerful enough to extract tax funds without surrendering political control. In this context, violent conflict promoted autocratic re-entrenchment. We conclude by briefly analyzing the relationships between political geography, historical conflict, and political development in sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America.

scholarly journals Violent Conflict and Behavior: A Field Experiment in Burundi

2012 ◽  
Vol 102 (2) ◽  
pp. 941-964 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maarten J Voors ◽  
Eleonora E. M Nillesen ◽  
Philip Verwimp ◽  
Erwin H Bulte ◽  
Robert Lensink ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Field Experiment ◽  
Field Experiments ◽  
Violent Conflict ◽  
Time Preferences ◽  
Altruistic Behavior ◽  
Social Risk ◽  
Risk Seeking ◽  
Long Run ◽  
And Behavior ◽  
The Impact

We use a series of field experiments in rural Burundi to examine the impact of exposure to conflict on social, risk, and time preferences. We find that conflict affects behavior: individuals exposed to violence display more altruistic behavior towards their neighbors, are more risk-seeking, and have higher discount rates. Large adverse shocks can thus alter savings and investments decisions, and potentially have long-run consequences—even if the shocks themselves are temporary. (JEL C93, D12, D74, 012, 017, 018)

The Challenge of Population

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah Conly
Keyword(s):  
Natural World ◽  
Violent Conflict ◽  
Future Generations ◽  
Voluntary Action ◽  
Freedom Of Choice ◽  
Course Of Action ◽  
Long Run ◽  
Drinkable Water ◽  
Tax Benefits ◽  
To Come

According to the most informed estimates, if humans continue to reproduce as predicted, there will be a population of 9.7 billion by 2050 and 10.9 billion by 2100. No one knows exactly what sort of life these future generations will live, but the consensus is that it will be bad: There will be shortages of everything, especially food and drinkable water. There will be violent conflict over resources. And it will be devastating for the natural world in a way that will redound upon the humans who are causing the destruction. Given this, what should be done? The obligation to future generations is to produce fewer members of those generations. And this is an obligation that overrides other considerations. People do not have a right to freedom of choice when the wrong choice will be so harmful to those yet to come. That said, there are ways to influence people’s choices that allow people to choose freely the appropriate course of action. Contraception can be made free and readily available. People who have fewer children could be awarded with tax benefits. The fact that the fertility rate has already been falling consistently shows that people respond to non-coercive pressure to reduce family size. However, if, in the long run, voluntary action is not enough, certain sorts of coercion are permissible and can be introduced in ways that are consistent with equity between peoples.

scholarly journals An Analysis of the Development Impacts of Establishing Kalmunai Administrative District in Sri Lanka

2016 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 164 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohammad Agus Yusoff ◽  
Athambawa Sarjoon ◽  
Mat Ali Hassan
Keyword(s):  
Sri Lanka ◽  
Political Development ◽  
Institutional Environment ◽  
Eastern Region ◽  
Development Discourse ◽  
Administrative District ◽  
The People ◽  
Coastal Belt ◽  
Long Run ◽  
Administrative Units

Decentralizing administrative powers to locally established administrative units has been the key goal of many governments in developing counties intended to boost socio-economic development at regional level. Sri Lanka has also introduced many decentralization initiatives with development motives. New administrative districts were formed in Sri Lanka with development as part of their motive, but, no new district has been formed in the last 30 years while demands have prevailed in many corners of the country. The demand calling for the establishment of the Kalmunai administrative district has been a prolonged and politically influencing demand for the last 15 years in Sri Lanka’s political-development discourse. This study attempts to examine the development impacts of establishing the Kalmunai administrative district that has been advocated by the people living in the coastal belt of the Amparai district (referred as ‘south eastern region’), a region which has been lacking in terms of development due to the severe impacts of thirty-year civil war as well as the 2004 Asian Tsunami devastation in Sri Lanka. The findings of the study reveal that the establishment of the proposed Kalmunai district will eventually contribute to multi-dimensional development in the region in the long run, however, a conducive institutional environment needs to be built in and around the district administrative machinery in order to ensure equity and justice in service delivery and resource allocation among different ethnic groups in the district which would be the pre-condition for the sustainability of any kind of development impact in the region.

scholarly journals DETERMINANTS OF FERTILITY IN THE LONG RUN

2019 ◽  
Vol 65 (04) ◽  
pp. 781-804
Author(s):  
JONG-WHA LEE
Keyword(s):  
Panel Data ◽  
Infant Mortality ◽  
Educational Attainment ◽  
Gender Equality ◽  
Political Development ◽  
Fertility Rates ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Highly Educated ◽  
Long Run ◽  
Negative Effect

This study investigates the determinants of fertility using a panel data set for 43 countries from 1900 to 2010 at five-year intervals. The regression results show that fertility increases with infant mortality and national disasters and decreases with total years of educational attainment and political development. Fertility rates fall initially and then rise with an increase in income. Average years of schooling of females has a significantly negative effect on fertility rates, whereas that of males are statistically insignificant. A woman’s educational attainment at the primary and secondary levels has a pronounced negative effect on fertility rates. On the contrary, an increase in a woman’s tertiary educational attainment, with the level of a man’s remaining constant, tends to raise fertility rates, particularly in advanced countries, indicating that highly educated women can have a better environment for childrearing in a society with greater gender equality.

Can Polarization Be Positive? Conflict and Institutional Development in Africa

2018 ◽  
Vol 62 (1) ◽  
pp. 59-74 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adrienne LeBas
Keyword(s):  
Political Development ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Formal Group ◽  
Institutional Development ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Political Polarization ◽  
Degree Of Polarization ◽  
Institution Building ◽  
Positive Effects ◽  
Long Run

Can political polarization, typically viewed as detrimental for political development, have positive effects on institution-building and democratization in the long run? This article argues that the overall impact of polarization on a political system is determined by two factors: the character of preexisting identity cleavages and the balance of forces between groups on either side of the political divide. Where there exists a history of formal group exclusion or differential citizenship rights, political polarization is more likely to result in large-scale violence and democratic breakdown. Where power is strongly imbalanced, on the other hand, polarization is unlikely to be sustained, and the status quo ante will be retained. When these two conditions are absent, however, a relatively high degree of polarization can have surprising institution-building effects for new democracies. The article illustrates these arguments with reference to four key cases in sub-Saharan Africa.

The C-Group People in Lower Nubia

2021 ◽  
pp. 155-177
Author(s):  
Henriette Hafsaas
Keyword(s):  
Ethnic Identity ◽  
Political Development ◽  
Violent Conflict ◽  
The South ◽  
Interethnic Relations ◽  
Multiple Origins ◽  
The Impact

This article reviews the research on the C-Group people—inhabitants of Lower Nubia between 2500 and 1500 bce. The C-Group people were cattle pastoralists of multiple origins that formed their ethnic identity after contact with Egyptians. Interethnic relations between the Egyptians and the C-Group people are examined in a diachronic perspective that sorts out periods of both peaceful exchange and violent conflict. The article also emphasizes the impact that C-Group men working as mercenaries in Egypt had on political development in Lower Nubia when they returned. The C-Group people’s neighbors in the south was the Kerma people. They established a kingdom called Kush around 2000 bce, and their relations with the Egyptians affected the C-Group people. In the last phase of their history, the C-Group people were trapped between Egypt and Kush—two states rivalling for supremacy on the Nile. The C-Group people’s solution was an alliance with Egypt and acculturation to become Egyptians.

scholarly journals Pandemics and Political Development

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-48
Author(s):  
Daniel W. Gingerich ◽  
Jan P. Vogler
Keyword(s):  
Political Institutions ◽  
Political Development ◽  
Black Death ◽  
National Socialist ◽  
Loss Of Life ◽  
Long Run ◽  
Mass Politics ◽  
German Speaking ◽  
Elite Influence ◽  
Landed Elite

ABSTRACT Do pandemics have lasting consequences for political behavior? The authors address this question by examining the consequences of the deadliest pandemic of the last millennium: the Black Death (1347–1351). They claim that pandemics can influence politics in the long run if the loss of life is high enough to increase the price of labor relative to other factors of production. When this occurs, labor-repressive regimes, such as serfdom, become untenable, which ultimately leads to the development of proto-democratic institutions and associated political cultures that shape modalities of political engagement for generations. The authors test their theory by tracing the consequences of the Black Death in German-speaking Central Europe. They find that areas hit hardest by that pandemic were more likely to adopt inclusive political institutions and equitable land ownership patterns, to exhibit electoral behavior indicating independence from landed elite influence during the transition to mass politics, and to have significantly lower vote shares for Hitler’s National Socialist Party in the Weimar Republic’s fateful 1930 and July 1932 elections.

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