Examining the Links Between Inequality and Conflict
Understanding what causes ethnic and religious conflict is a key international policy concern. Work by the Centre for Research on Inequality, Human Security and Ethnicity (CRISE) has shown that group inequalities are a significant factor.
Religious and ethnic conflict in developing countries has increased since the end of the Cold War, but little research has been carried out into the role played by group inequalities in causing it. In fact, international policy towards developing countries has only recently begun to address the problem of inequality and has focused primarily on inequalities in income between individuals.
The aim of CRISE has been to understand what it calls “horizontal inequalities” – inequalities between groups in multiple dimensions – and how these link to conflict. These include socio-economic inequalities (for example how much access do groups have to different assets or to services such as health and education?), political inequalities (how well represented are different groups in the political hierarchy?) and inequalities in cultural status (are groups’ languages, religions and cultural practices recognized and respected?).
Combining case studies in West Africa, Latin America and Southeast Asia with regression analysis, CRISE research has found that horizontal inequalities do raise the risk of conflict. CRISE has shown that both socio-economic and political HIs independently increase the likelihood of conflict but that a combination of the two is particularly explosive. Inequalities in cultural status or recognition also contribute to the risk, and often a cultural event (an attack on a church or mosque, for example) provides a trigger to conflict.
CRISE findings have started to have a major impact on academic and policy discourse on the causes of conflict. International agencies such as the World Bank, the United Nations Development Programme, and the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development and donors such as the UK’s Department for International Development and the Japanese International Cooperation Agency have used HIs as a new framework within which to devise policies towards developing countries, particularly those affected by conflict.
For example, the UNDP’s 2008 report on Post-Conflict Economic Recovery was co-written by CRISE Director Frances Stewart and identified HIs as a key element, while the World Bank’s 2005 report Toward Conflict-Sensitive Poverty Reduction Strategy noted the role played by horizontal inequalities in sparking conflict.
At a national policy level, CRISE research has directly influenced post-conflict policies adopted by the national government and the donor community in Nepal; Professor Stewart has been advising the Government of Malaysia on policies towards HIs; and the chief economic adviser to the Kenyan government has requested a study of horizontal inequalities and policies to address them for Kenya.
