ABSTRACT

Water charities and the UN development goals consider access to clean water and sanitation as transformative: improving personal dignity, quality of life and economic opportunities for individuals and the economic resilience of communities to climate stress. Can the provision of services also mitigate the conflict potential arising from climate change? If so, how broad must access be to become effective? We test how household access to improved water, sanitation, and electricity affects the probability of local conflict in nine drought-prone African countries. We use annual PRIO-GRID cells as the unit of analysis and model the probability of a grid-cell experiencing fatal armed conflict during local or proximate drought conditions. DHS data are used to calculate the percentage of households with access to specific services. We show that even relatively modest investments in reliable sanitation and water infrastructures enhance communities’ ability to avoid getting drawn into violent conflict in response to rainfall shocks.

摘要

水慈善机构和联合国发展目标认为获得清洁水和卫生设施具有变革性：改善个人尊严、生活质量和经济机会，以及社区对气候压力的经济复原力。提供服务也能减轻气候变化引起的潜在冲突吗？如果是这样，访问必须有多广泛才能生效？我们测试了家庭获得改善的水、卫生设施和电力如何影响九个易发生干旱的非洲国家发生当地冲突的可能性。我们使用年度 PRIO-GRID 单元作为分析单位，并对网格单元在当地或邻近干旱条件下经历致命武装冲突的概率进行建模。DHS 数据用于计算获得特定服务的家庭百分比。