IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/apeclt/v23y2016i15p1057-1061.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Civil war and economic growth: the case for a closer look at forms of mobilization

Author

Listed:
  • Arnab Biswas
  • Colin O’Reilly
  • James T. Bang
  • Aniruddha Mitra

Abstract

This paper explores the idea that the lack of robust evidence on the growth impact of civil war could partially be a consequence of considering civil war as a unified conceptual category, regardless of the ordinate of group identity invoked in mobilizing for war. To do so, we distinguish explicitly between episodes of internal conflict where contestants mobilized along the lines of ethnicity and ones where mobilization occurred along other markers of group identity. Using alternative definitions of civil war and System GMM estimation to address the endogeneity of conflict and per capita income, we obtain a negative contemporaneous impact of non-ethnic civil war on economic growth over the period 1975–2005. By contrast, the impact of ethnic war is statistically insignificant.

Suggested Citation

  • Arnab Biswas & Colin O’Reilly & James T. Bang & Aniruddha Mitra, 2016. "Civil war and economic growth: the case for a closer look at forms of mobilization," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 23(15), pages 1057-1061, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:apeclt:v:23:y:2016:i:15:p:1057-1061
    DOI: 10.1080/13504851.2015.1133889
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/13504851.2015.1133889
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/13504851.2015.1133889?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Arellano, Manuel & Bover, Olympia, 1995. "Another look at the instrumental variable estimation of error-components models," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 68(1), pages 29-51, July.
    2. James T Bang & Aniruddha Mitra, 2013. "Civil War, Ethnicity, and the Migration of Skilled Labor," Eastern Economic Journal, Palgrave Macmillan;Eastern Economic Association, vol. 39(3), pages 387-401.
    3. Khurram Jamali & Kirsten Wandschneider & Phanindra Wunnava, 2007. "The effect of political regimes and technology on economic growth," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 39(11), pages 1425-1432.
    4. Nicholas Sambanis, 2001. "Do Ethnic and Nonethnic Civil Wars Have the Same Causes?," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 45(3), pages 259-282, June.
    5. Blundell, Richard & Bond, Stephen, 1998. "Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel data models," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 87(1), pages 115-143, August.
    6. Joan Esteban & Debraj Ray, 2008. "On the Salience of Ethnic Conflict," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(5), pages 2185-2202, December.
    7. Barro, Robert J. & Lee, Jong Wha, 2013. "A new data set of educational attainment in the world, 1950–2010," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 184-198.
    8. Laura E. Armey & Robert M. McNab, 2015. "Democratization and civil war," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 47(18), pages 1863-1882, April.
    9. Jong-A-Pin, Richard, 2009. "On the measurement of political instability and its impact on economic growth," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 25(1), pages 15-29, March.
    10. Marta Reynal-Querol, 2002. "Ethnicity, Political Systems, and Civil Wars," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 46(1), pages 29-54, February.
    11. Solomon W. Polachek & Daria Sevastianova, 2012. "Does conflict disrupt growth? Evidence of the relationship between political instability and national economic performance," The Journal of International Trade & Economic Development, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 21(3), pages 361-388, March.
    12. Nazrul Islam, 1995. "Growth Empirics: A Panel Data Approach," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 110(4), pages 1127-1170.
    13. Joakim Kreutz, 2010. "How and when armed conflicts end: Introducing the UCDP Conflict Termination dataset," Journal of Peace Research, Peace Research Institute Oslo, vol. 47(2), pages 243-250, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Ryan H. Murphy & Colin O’Reilly, 2023. "Freedom through taxation: the effect of fiscal capacity on the rule of law," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 56(1), pages 69-90, August.
    2. Colin O'Reilly & Ryan H. Murphy, 2017. "Do Institutions Mitigate The Risk Of Natural Resource Conflicts?," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 35(3), pages 532-541, July.
    3. Ines A. Ferreira, 2018. "An empirical analysis of state fragility and growth: The impact of state ineffectiveness and political violence," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2018-29, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    4. Ines A. Ferreira, 2018. "An empirical analysis of state fragility and growth: The impact of state ineffectiveness and political violence," WIDER Working Paper Series 029, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Alexandre, Fernando & Bação, Pedro & Veiga, Francisco José, 2022. "The political economy of productivity growth," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 75(C).
    2. Bove, Vincenzo & Elia, Leandro, 2017. "Migration, Diversity, and Economic Growth," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 89(C), pages 227-239.
    3. Baharumshah, Ahmad Zubaidi & Slesman, Ly & Wohar, Mark E., 2016. "Inflation, inflation uncertainty, and economic growth in emerging and developing countries: Panel data evidence," Economic Systems, Elsevier, vol. 40(4), pages 638-657.
    4. repec:ehu:dfaeii:6405 is not listed on IDEAS
    5. Bloom, David E. & Canning, David & Kotschy, Rainer & Prettner, Klaus & Schünemann, Johannes, 2024. "Health and economic growth: Reconciling the micro and macro evidence," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 178(C).
    6. Matthias Busse & Ceren Erdogan & Henning Mühlen, 2016. "China's Impact on Africa – The Role of Trade, FDI and Aid," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 69(2), pages 228-262, May.
    7. Bayraktar-Sağlam, Bahar & Yetkiner, Hakan, 2014. "A Romerian contribution to the empirics of economic growth," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 36(2), pages 257-272.
    8. Eftimoski, Dimitar, 2022. "On the inconclusive effect of human capital on growth: A new look at extended specifications," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 708-727.
    9. Docquier, Frédéric & Lodigiani, Elisabetta & Rapoport, Hillel & Schiff, Maurice, 2016. "Emigration and democracy," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 120(C), pages 209-223.
    10. Aisen, Ari & Veiga, Francisco José, 2013. "How does political instability affect economic growth?," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 29(C), pages 151-167.
    11. Brito, João Antonio, 2015. "Environmental Vulnerability and Economic Growth: Small States vs Large States," MPRA Paper 65694, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    12. Hauk, William R., 2017. "Endogeneity bias and growth regressions," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 143-161.
    13. Francisco José Veiga, 2013. "Instituições, Estabilidade Política e Desempenho Económico Implicações para Portugal," NIPE Working Papers 11/2013, NIPE - Universidade do Minho.
    14. Ulaşan, Bülent, 2012. "Cross-country growth empirics and model uncertainty: An overview," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), vol. 6, pages 1-69.
    15. Jaejoon Woo, 2020. "Inequality, redistribution, and growth: new evidence on the trade-off between equality and efficiency," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 58(6), pages 2667-2707, June.
    16. Ehrhart, Hélène & Minea, Alexandru & Villieu, Patrick, 2014. "Debt, seigniorage, and the Growth Laffer Curve in developing countries," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 199-210.
    17. Sturn, Simon & Epstein, Gerald, 2021. "How much should we trust five-year averaging to purge business cycle effects? A reassessment of the finance-growth and capital accumulation-unemployment nexus," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 96(C), pages 242-256.
    18. Kelly, Inas R. & Doytch, Nadia & Dave, Dhaval, 2019. "How does body mass index affect economic growth? A comparative analysis of countries by levels of economic development," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 58-73.
    19. Matthias Busse & Jens Koeniger, 2015. "Trade and economic growth: A re-examination of the empirical evidence," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 35(4), pages 2862-2876.
    20. Bahar Bayraktar-Sağlam, 2016. "The Stages of Human Capital and Economic Growth: Does the Direction of Causality Matter for the Rich and the Poor?," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 127(1), pages 243-302, May.
    21. E. Tsanana & X. Chapsa & C. Katrakilidis, 2016. "Is growth corrupted or bureaucratic? Panel evidence from the enlarged EU," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 48(33), pages 3131-3147, July.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:taf:apeclt:v:23:y:2016:i:15:p:1057-1061. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/RAEL20 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.