To determine the effect of shocks on civil conflict, it is critical to tailor the empirical approach to the persistence of shocks. I illustrate my point by revisiting a cornerstone of the literature on the economics of civil conflict, Miguel, Satyanath, and Sergenti’s (2004) study of rainfall and civil conflict in Sub-Saharan Africa. I find their approach to be inappropriate and their conclusions to be incorrect. For example, they conclude that higher rainfall levels are associated with significantly less civil conflict. I show that higher rainfall levels are actually associated with significantly more (not less) conflict in their data.

Data and estimation programs are available further below. For previous versions of the paper scroll down Papers, presentations, and data. Some results have changed because the most recent version of the paper uses the latest data.

• Stata data file with Miguel, Satynath, and Sergenti data (zip)

• Stata data file with latest data for 1981-2007 (zip)

• Stata do file (zip)

• Web Appendix A and B
• Web Appendix C
• Web Appendix D

• Supplementary Appendix October 2009

The Economic Journal, May 2010. (This paper replaces Growth, Democracy, and Civil War.)

December 2009 update: Burke, Miguel, Satyanath, Dykema, and Lobell’s Warming increases the risk of civil war in Africa published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences follows my transitory shocks paper in treating rainfall (and temperature) levels as mean reverting, see their Table 1 and Methods Section.

Research Paper Transitory Economic Shocks and Civil Conflict (CEPR Discussion Paper 7081).

Revise and resubmit Econometrica (February 2009).

Recessions due to low rainfall triggered democratic change in Sub-Saharan Africa, which is consistent with the economic (window-of-opportunity) theory of political transitions. Our analysis quantifies democratic change by improvements in democracy scores as well as transitions from autocracy to democracy (an earlier (February 2008) version of the paper focused on the latter). The latest version eliminates a handful of inconsequential errors in the rainfall data that colleagues made us aware of.

October 2008 version

I examine whether civil conflict is triggered by transitory negative economic shocks. My approach follows Miguel, Satyanath, and Sergenti’s 2004 paper “Economic Shocks and Civil Conflict” in using rainfall as an exogenous source of economic shocks in Sub-Saharan African countries. But I take into account that rainfall shocks are transitory (i.e. interannual rainfall growth is lowest following good years). Miguel, Satyanath, and Sergenti do not, and therefore conclude that conflict follows negative rainfall shocks when conflict in their data actually follows positive rainfall shocks.

Supplementary figures

Presentation at “Conflicts, Globalization, and Development” CEPR/PSE Workshop Paris, 13-14 November 2008 (the program of the workshop is available here). The presentation also drew on the work Markus Brückner and I are doing on commodity prices, growth, and civil war.

July 2008 version

Supplementary Appendix

Slides 16 July NBER Macro and Productivity meeting

Revise and resubmit American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics (November 2008).

Incorporates comments of colleagues on the first version of the paper.

• Economics and the rule of law (Economist article, 13 March 2008)
• One Rule for the Rich (Economist article, 13 March 2008)
• Another interesting paper on institutions and productivity by Kauffman, Mastruzzi, and Kraay
• The seminal papers in this literature (not mentioned in Economist articles) are “Why Do Some Countries Produce So Much More Output Per Worker Than Others?” by Hall and Jones (published in The Quarterly Journal of Economics in 1999) and by “The Colonial Origin of Comparative Development: An Empirical Investigation” by Acemoglu, Johnson, and Robinson (published in The American Economic Review in 2001).
• “Trade and Productivity” by Alcala and Ciccone (published in the The Quarterly Journal of Economics in 2004). The main point of this article was to show that international trade has a strong effect on countries’ productivity. The analysis also takes into account countries’ institutional quality levels, and ends up showing that both trade and institutions matter. For the 2001 version of this article see Trade and Productivity.

Research Paper Rain and the Democratic Window of Opportunity (with M. Brückner).

My related article published on voxeu.

A Barcelona GSE research video.

A perspective from the February 2008 CEPR bulletin.

Research Paper Growth, Democracy, and Civil War (with M. Brückner).

Research Paper Growth, Democracy, and Civil War (with M. Brückner).

Research Paper Determinants of Economic Growth: Will Data Tell? (with M. Jarocinski)

• Web Appendix

We have been working on integrating some more data and using alternative measures of democracy.

A less technical summary article written for voxeu.

A perspective from the February 2008 CEPR bulletin.

• Web Appendix
• Data and Programs (zip file)

• Supplementary Appendix
• All Tables in Excel

• Supplementary Appendix

•  Supplementary Appendix
• Presentation Slides (EEA Annual Meetings, Vienna, August 2006)

Why this paper was not revised and sent to journals.

Supplementary Materials:

• Stock-Yogo weak-instrument test statistics
• EVIEWS output, Table V
• First-stage regression results for real openness in former colonies sample
• The programs used

Research Paper The Private and Social Return to Schooling in Italy (with F. Cingano and P. Cipollone)