The Political Economy of Socioenvironmental Conflict: Evidence from Peru

Over the past two decades, violence against land and environmental activists has been on the rise, besetting even stable democracies. Using a unique, fine-grained data set on social conflict events in Peru and exogenous variation in world mineral prices, I document a strong link between local mineral rents and violent state repression of socioenvironmental protests in a democratic institutional setting. I show that the increase in the use of excessive force cannot be explained by changes in protester behavior. Empirical findings highlight the role of local authorities: the election of a pro-mining mayor is associated with a higher prevalence of state repression and corruption in the constituency. The legal and democratic accountability of local authorities is, however, found to be limited. The reported increase in corruption does not translate into more investigations against pro-mining mayors for corruption offenses nor are reelection results of incumbents found to be negatively affected by state violence against protesters. Finally, I show that violent state repression is successful in forestalling conflict resolution agreements that acknowledge protesters’ demands.