Abstract

Does democracy curb domestic political violence? To study this, we focus on the United Kingdom’s Representation of the People Act of 1867 - which is a critical juncture in the history of democratisation. Constructing a novel borough (‘urban centre’) level dataset on social conflict events and economic performance around the 1868 elections (the first elections where newly enfranchised citizens could vote), we exploit arguably exogenous variation in enfranchisement intensity. We find a strong and robust peace-promoting effect of franchise extension and identify as a major channel of transmission the increase of the population’s political influence (voice) and local economic growth. 

Abstract

We study the evolution of housing rents in the proximity of asylum seeker hosting centers whose populations differ by ethnic composition. Rental prices within 0.7km of an active center are found on average to be 3.8% lower than in the control group. The price response is significantly more pronounced when centers host a higher share of asylum seekers from Sub-Saharan Africa. In contrast, neither religious affiliation nor inferred crime propensity of the center populations are found to affect local rental prices significantly. Our findings are consistent with phenotype-based racial animus as a significant driver of observed market outcomes.

Abstract

How does the geography of water resources shape violent conflict? We assemble a georeferenced panel spanning the entire African continent from 1997 to 2023, combining detailed data on hydrology and conflict. Leveraging the spatial inequality in surface water resources and the structure of the river network, we show that heat shocks trigger conflict in nearby water-rich areas and that they propagate upstream along rivers, but not downstream. These effects are more pronounced when shocks cross ethnic boundaries along the river, in countries with weak national institutions, and in areas with persistent heat and declining water availability. Our findings highlight the geography of water resources as a key mechanism through which climatic shocks propagate into violence.