Climatic Stress, Internal Migration, and Syrian Civil War Onset
Abstract
Syria recently suffered a once in 500-year meteorological drought followed by one of the worst conflicts of the twenty-first century. We exploit subnational variation in drought impact to examine associations between climatic stress and Syria’s political unrest. Climatic stress may produce instability through both immediate hardship and, indirectly, internal migration. Consistent with the internal migration hypothesis, we find less severely drought-stricken Syrian regions more likely to experience protest. We employ nighttime lights as a proxy for population density to examine the association between climatic stress and internal displacement. We find climatic stress decreased nighttime light intensity during the drought period. Increases in nighttime lights from 2005 to 2010 are associated with added risk of protest in Sunni Arab areas, suggesting an influx of migrants bolstered local grievances. Our findings support the internal migration hypothesis and suggest extreme climate events may impact civil unrest via geographically and temporally indirect paths.
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Recent evidence suggests unusually low rainfall was at least one conflict driver, interacting with others, in Syria and Western Africa.
“Recent evidence suggests, however, that unusually low rainfall was at least one conflict driver (interacting with others, presumably more important) both in Syria (Ash and Obradovich 2020, Dinc and Eklund 2023) and Western Africa (Newman et al 2023).”
From The impacts of climate change on violent conflict risk: a review of causal pathways (2024) · cites this paper as Ash and Obradovich 2020
Few empirical studies seek to evaluate empirical evidence for the entire climate-migration-conflict link.
“Few empirical studies seek to evaluate empirical evidence for the entire climate-migration-conflict link (although see[88][89][90][91].”
From Vicious Circles: Violence, Vulnerability, and Climate Change (2021) · cites this paper as [91]
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Identifying and Correcting Signal Shift in DMSP-OLS Data
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Pathways from Climate Change to Conflict in U.S. Central Command
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Research on Jihadist Terrorism, Rebel Governance, and Civil Resistance
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Abbreviations of Organizations Referenced in the Book
Svensson, I., Finnbogason, D., Krause, D., Lorenzo, L. M., & Hawach, N. (2022) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/oso/9780197605608.002.0007
Civil Resistance Against Jihadists: How?
Svensson, I., Finnbogason, D., Krause, D., Lorenzo, L. M., & Hawach, N. (2022) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/oso/9780197605608.003.0004
Svensson, I., Finnbogason, D., Krause, D., Lorenzo, L. M., & Hawach, N. (2022) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/oso/9780197605608.002.0005
Civil Resistance Against Jihadists
Svensson, I., Finnbogason, D., Krause, D., Lorenzo, L. M., & Hawach, N. (2022) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/oso/9780197605608.003.0006
Civil Resistance Against Jihadists: Who?
Svensson, I., Finnbogason, D., Krause, D., Lorenzo, L. M., & Hawach, N. (2022) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/oso/9780197605608.003.0005
Civil Resistance in Jihadist Proto-States
Svensson, I., Finnbogason, D., Krause, D., Lorenzo, L. M., & Hawach, N. (2022) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/oso/9780197605608.003.0001
Svensson, I., Finnbogason, D., Krause, D., Lorenzo, L. M., & Hawach, N. (2022) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/oso/9780197605608.002.0006
When Does Civil Resistance Against Jihadists Occur?
Svensson, I., Finnbogason, D., Krause, D., Lorenzo, L. M., & Hawach, N. (2022) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/oso/9780197605608.003.0003
Svensson, I., Finnbogason, D., Krause, D., Lorenzo, L. M., & Hawach, N. (2022) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/oso/9780197605608.003.0007
Svensson, I., Finnbogason, D., Krause, D., Lorenzo, L. M., & Hawach, N. (2022) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/oso/9780197605608.002.0003
Burnt area trends in the Middle-East: evidence for the importance of recent conflicts
Majdalani, G., Koutsias, N., Adjizian-Gérard, J., Faour, G., & Mouillot, F. (2022) · Imprensa da Universidade de Coimbra eBooks · doi:10.14195/978-989-26-2298-9_154
Global Poverty: On Culpability
Glanville, L., & Pattison, J. W. (2024) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/oso/9780198892335.003.0005
Glanville, L., & Pattison, J. W. (2024) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/oso/9780198892335.002.0003
Global Health: On Disadvantage
Glanville, L., & Pattison, J. W. (2024) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/oso/9780198892335.003.0003
Glanville, L., & Pattison, J. W. (2024) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/oso/9780198892335.003.0001
Climate Change: On Diversification
Glanville, L., & Pattison, J. W. (2024) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/oso/9780198892335.003.0007
Which Atrocities? On Effectiveness
Glanville, L., & Pattison, J. W. (2024) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/oso/9780198892335.003.0002
- Authors
- Ash, K., & Obradovich, N.
- Affiliations
- University of Central Florida (US)
- MIT Media Lab (US)
- Corresponding author
- Ash, Konstantin
- Venue
- Journal of Conflict Resolution
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2019-07-25
- Volume
- 64
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 3-31
- ISSN
- 0022-0027 (ISSN-L)
- 1552-8766
- OpenAlex
- W4243351514
- Cited by
- 116
- References
- 89
- Citations by year
- 2026: 9 · 2025: 13 · 2024: 30 · 2023: 14 · 2022: 29 · 2021: 14 · 2020: 6 · 2019: 1
- FWCI
- 25.17
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Journal of Conflict Resolution (publishedVersion)
- RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Political Conflict and Governance
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Transboundary Water Resource Management
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Middle East Politics and Society
- Keywords
- climate stress, meteorological drought, internal migration, Syrian civil war, civil unrest, protest, internal displacement, nighttime lights, population density, climate extremes, political instability
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