The Economics of Social Conflict

社会冲突经济学

• 批准号: 0962124
• 负责人: Debraj Ray
• 金额: $ 27.27万
• 依托单位: New York University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2010
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2010-06-01 至 2014-05-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0962124&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Economics; Social; Conflict

This project examines the connections between economic development, the distribution of income and assets, and the emergence (or persistence) of social conflict across ethnic, geographical or economic groups. The research is informed by two basic stylized facts that characterize internal conflict in developing societies. First, economics matters. Conflicts have strong associations with economic variables such as per-capita income and natural resource revenues. Second, classical "class conflicts" --- or conflict demarcated along economic lines --- are rare: warring groups are often delineated by noneconomic markers such as ethnicity, caste, geography or religion.This project takes these facts as points of departure. A central question concerns the coexistence of economic motives and noneconomic group markers. Noneconomic markers can be used to exclude certain groups from economic progress. Indeed, the more (economically) similar the warring groups, the more such a strategy is likely to be used. Accordingly, the first part of this project constructs a theory of "group formation" in conflict, the idea being that existing social markers (such as religion) can be used to create "insiders" and "outsiders" in a variety of ways. In a world in which all sorts of sidepayments can costlessly be made, each potential conflict can, in principle, because all conflict destroys resources. However, with a multiplicity of ethnic markers, any one of which may be invoked, it may be impossible to deal with every potential threat at the same historical moment of time. It will be argued that postwar institutions, such as progressive taxation or land reform, have evolved well to deal with the specter of class conflict, but have left the door open for threats from other noneconomic markers.The second part of the project applies these ideas to an empirical study of Hindu-Muslim violence in India. If one side is socially and politically more able to use violence for economic ends, then an increase in the victim group's income should have a positive impact on conflict, while an increase in the aggressor group's income should have an insignificant effect. This sort of prediction can be tested, and the project proposes to do so. Using National Sample survey data along with a unique dataset on Hindu-Muslim conflict, preliminary results indicate that Muslim incomes are positively associated with future conflict, while Hindu incomes have no such effect. The project will build on this foundation by using additional data sources and running several different robustness checks.The third part of the project develops a theoretical model, and establishes a structural connection between conflict and well-known indices of social distribution such as inequality, fractionalization and polarization. It is shown that three particular indices determine conflict, and the relative weights on them reveal the underlying values of structural parameters in the economy.The PI also plans a full-length book manuscript on the Economics of Social Conflict. Certainly, the results from this project will form an important part of the book, but the intention is to put together, in a cohesive way, a large literature from economics, political science and sociology on the topic of conflict in developing countries.Broader Impacts: this project uses economic theory to develop testable predictions that reach beyond economic boundaries. For instance, the predicted juxtaposition of noneconomic group markers with the possibility of economic gains from conflict is a central theme. Likewise, the second part of this project, which discerns aggressor identity from economic data, exemplifies the attempt to go beyond economic boundaries. IPolitical scientists, sociologists and ethnographers will find this useful and complementary to their own work. The theory in part 3 generates a estimable relationship between conflict and various distributional indicators which will inform future empirical research in the area.Finally, from a broader social and economic perspective, the questions asked under this project are of first-order importance. Does economic growth stifle conflict, or might it exacerbate it? What is the relationship between inequality and conflict? Why might class conflict give way to ethnic conflict? Does ethnic conflict stem from some primordial hatred and mistrust, or is it carefully engineered? If so, how precisely might one write down a theory of conflict that does not presume that participants are plain irrational? While the project is firmly grounded in the logic of economic reasoning, these questions go beyond economics.

该项目研究经济发展、收入和资产分配以及跨种族、地理或经济群体的社会冲突的出现（或持续）之间的联系。这项研究以两个基本的程式化事实为依据，这两个事实是发展中社会内部冲突的特征。首先，经济问题很重要。冲突与人均收入和自然资源收入等经济变量密切相关。 第二，传统的“阶级冲突”--或者说是沿着经济界线划分的冲突--是很罕见的：交战的群体通常是由非经济的标志，如种族、种姓、地理或宗教来划分的。一个核心问题是经济动机和非经济群体标记的共存。 非经济指标可以用来将某些群体排除在经济进步之外。事实上，交战团体（经济）越相似，这种策略就越有可能被使用。因此，本项目的第一部分构建了一个冲突中的“群体形成”理论，其思想是，现有的社会标记（如宗教）可以被用来以各种方式创造“内部人”和“外部人”。在一个可以无代价地进行各种附带支付的世界里，每一场潜在的冲突原则上都可以，因为所有冲突都会破坏资源。然而，由于种族标志多种多样，其中任何一个都可以援引，因此可能不可能在同一历史时刻处理每一个潜在的威胁。有人认为，战后的制度，如累进税或土地改革，已经发展到很好地处理阶级冲突的幽灵，但也留下了来自其他非经济markers.The第二部分的项目应用这些想法在印度的印度教-穆斯林暴力的实证研究的威胁敞开大门。如果一方在社会和政治上更有能力为经济目的使用暴力，那么受害者群体收入的增加应该对冲突产生积极影响，而侵略者群体收入的增加应该没有什么影响。这种预测是可以检验的，该项目也建议这样做。使用全国抽样调查数据沿着关于印度教-穆斯林冲突的独特数据集，初步结果表明，穆斯林收入与未来冲突呈正相关，而印度教收入则没有这种影响。该项目将在此基础上，通过使用额外的数据源和运行几种不同的鲁棒性检查，建立一个理论模型，并建立冲突与众所周知的社会分配指标（如不平等、细分和两极分化）之间的结构性联系。它表明，三个特定的指数确定冲突，它们的相对权重揭示了经济中的结构参数的潜在价值。PI还计划在社会冲突的经济学的一本完整的书手稿。当然，这个项目的成果将成为本书的重要组成部分，但其目的是将经济学、政治学和社会学中关于发展中国家冲突问题的大量文献以一种连贯的方式整合在一起。更广泛的影响：这个项目使用经济学理论来发展超越经济边界的可检验的预测。例如，非经济群体标记与从冲突中获得经济收益的可能性的预测并列是一个中心主题。 同样，该项目的第二部分，从经济数据中辨别侵略者身份，证实了超越经济边界的企图。政治科学家、社会学家和人种学家会发现这对他们自己的工作很有用。第三部分的理论在冲突和各种分配指标之间产生了一种可估计的关系，这将为该领域未来的实证研究提供信息。最后，从更广泛的社会和经济角度来看，本项目下提出的问题具有头等重要性。经济增长会扼杀冲突，还是会加剧冲突？不平等与冲突之间的关系是什么？为什么阶级冲突会让位于种族冲突？种族冲突是源于某种原始的仇恨和不信任，还是精心策划的？如果是这样的话，那么，一个人如何准确地写出一个不假定参与者是明显非理性的冲突理论呢？虽然该项目是牢固地建立在经济推理的逻辑，这些问题超越了经济学。