Seminars

Does Heat Increase the Potential for Peace Events?

Neil T. N. Ferguson and Jennifer Wilhelm

Abstract

Climate change poses an increasing threat to peace. Heat is linked to escalations in conflict and concerns are raised that a warming world could create uncontrollable spirals of violence. While it is tempting to think this also undermines peaceful conflict resolution, theory on transitions out of conflict paints a more nuanced picture. Escalating violence is a predictor of the end of conflict, via military and peaceful means. Higher violence could increase the “hurting” of a stalemate and could draw the attention of the international community, encouraging peace events. Disaster diplomacy suggests renewed attention and aid could be drawn to conflict settings, increasing efforts towards peace. Yet, it is also intuitive why escalating violence might undermine potential peace events. Noting this ambiguity, we test the impact of the exogenous onset of El Niño and La Niña on the number of on-going peace events – specifically, negotiation and mediation processes. We show that El Niño is correlated with an increased number of peace events and La Niña with a reduction. Additional analyses show that these effects are not driven, solely, by escalating violence and are not, simply, the outcome of an increased number of conflicts. This suggests that heat plays a specific role in determining peace events, like negotiations and mediations. While escalating conflict in a warming world remains a risk, efforts to resolve these conflicts peacefully are not fatally undermined.