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Resource Rents, Institutions and Violent Civil Conflicts

Author

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  • Ibrahim Elbadawi

    (The Economic Policy and Research Center, Dubai Economic Council, UAE; and ERF)

  • Raimundo Soto

    (Dubai Economic Council and Universidad Catolica de Chile)

Abstract

Natural resources have been blamed for inducing slow growth and sparking civil conflicts and violence. This paper first develops a model to account for the hazard of armed civil conflicts as a manifestation of the natural resource curse which is mediated by the quality of both economic and political institutions. We then use recently published data on institutional quality and natural resource rents to measure the potential impact of the resource curse on violent civil conflicts using a panel of data for over 100 countries in the period 1970-2010. Our model explicitly accounts for the role of good economic and political institutions in deterring the recourse to violence as well as the extent to which they might weaken the resource rents effect.

Suggested Citation

  • Ibrahim Elbadawi & Raimundo Soto, 2013. "Resource Rents, Institutions and Violent Civil Conflicts," Working Papers 775, Economic Research Forum, revised Sep 2013.
    • Handle: RePEc:erg:wpaper:775
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    Cited by:

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    2. Ruba Abdullah Aljarallah, 2020. "The Economic Impacts of Natural Resource Dependency in Gulf Countries," International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy, Econjournals, vol. 10(6), pages 36-52.
    3. 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.
    4. Alssadek, Marwan & Benhin, James, 2023. "Natural resource curse: A literature survey and comparative assessment of regional groupings of oil-rich countries," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 84(C).
    5. Randall Morck & Masao Nakamura, 2018. "Japan's Ultimately Unaccursed Natural Resources-financed Industrialization," NBER Chapters, in: Corporate Governance (NBER-TCER-CEPR Conference), National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Carmignani, Fabrizio & Kler, Parvinder, 2016. "Surrounded by wars: Quantifying the role of spatial conflict spillovers," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 7-16.
    7. Ruba Aljarallah, 2019. "Impact of Natural Resource Rents and Institutional Quality on Human Capital: A Case Study of the United Arab Emirates," Resources, MDPI, vol. 8(3), pages 1-11, August.
    8. Elwasila Saeed Elamin Mohamed, 2020. "Resource Rents, Human Development and Economic Growth in Sudan," Economies, MDPI, vol. 8(4), pages 1-21, November.
    9. Al-Shboul, Mohammad & Al Rawashdeh, Rami, 2022. "The impact of institutional quality and resources rent on health: The case of GCC," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 78(C).
    10. Ruba A. Aljarallah & Andrew Angus, 2020. "Dilemma of Natural Resource Abundance: A Case Study of Kuwait," SAGE Open, , vol. 10(1), pages 21582440198, January.
    11. Baten, Jörg & Baier, Jessica, 2017. "Silver, Murder, and Institutions: Did the “Curse of Resources†impact on Homicide Rates? Global evidence since 1890," CEPR Discussion Papers 12397, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    12. Ruba Aljarallah, 2021. "An Analysis of the Impact of Rents from Non-renewable Natural Resources and Changes in Human Capital on Institutional Quality: A Case Study of Kuwait," International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy, Econjournals, vol. 11(5), pages 224-234.
    13. Ly Slesman & Ali Kole & Rizgar Abdlkarim Abdlaziz & Ibrahim D. Raheem, 2024. "Taming the Tides of Internal Conflicts in Sub-Saharan Africa: The Role of Political Institutions and Natural Resources," Global Journal of Emerging Market Economies, Emerging Markets Forum, vol. 16(2), pages 188-211, May.
    14. Karim Khan & Sadia Sherbaz, 2020. "Entertaining Douglass North: Political Violence and Social Order," PIDE-Working Papers 2020:174, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics.
    15. Muktad Abdalla, 2023. "Democracy, Corruption and Economic Growth Post-Arab Spring in Tunisia and Libya," Review of Middle East Economics and Finance, De Gruyter, vol. 19(3), pages 153-186, December.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • Q34 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Nonrenewable Resources and Conservation - - - Natural Resources and Domestic and International Conflicts
    • Q38 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Nonrenewable Resources and Conservation - - - Government Policy (includes OPEC Policy)
    • E02 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - General - - - Institutions and the Macroeconomy

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