The Incidence of Civil War: Theory and Evidence

From:
Department for International Development
Published
1 January 2008
Document Type:
Working Paper
Theme:
Economic Growth
Authors:
Besley, T.J., Persson, T.

Abstract

This paper studies the incidence of civil war over time. We put forward a canonical model of civil war, which relates the incidence of conflict to circumstances, institutions and features of the underlying economy and polity. We use this model to derive testable predictions and to interpret the cross-sectional and times-series variations in civil conflict. Our most novel emprical finding is that higher world market prices of exported, as well as imported, commodities are strong and significant predictors of higher within-country incidence of civil war.

Citation

Besley, T.J.; Persson, T. The Incidence of Civil War: Theory and Evidence. (2008)

The Incidence of Civil War: Theory and Evidence

Updates to this page

Published 1 January 2008
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