TY - JOUR PY - 2023// TI - The contribution of armed conflict to vulnerability to disaster: empirical evidence from 1989 to 2018 JO - International journal of disaster risk reduction A1 - Caso, Nicolás A1 - Hilhorst, Dorothea A1 - Mena, Rodrigo SP - e103881 EP - e103881 VL - 95 IS - N2 - Disasters and armed conflicts often occur together, leading to severe consequences for affected populations. While qualitative investigations have explored how conflict can influence vulnerability to disasters, there is still a lack of systematic quantitative studies that provide broader evidence on the contribution of conflict to vulnerability. Although existing qualitative work has made progress in understanding potential mechanisms, large-scale quantitative studies are crucial for comprehending the scope of this relationship and attempting to isolate associations between specific variables. This study presents a statistical model using extensive large-N, cross-country data to address this research gap and analyse the conflict-disaster relationship. Analysing data from 157 countries between 1989 and 2018, we found a strong positive correlation between armed conflict and disasters. The results remained consistent across various model specifications and robustness checks. In countries experiencing armed conflict, disaster occurrence was observed 5% more frequently, disaster-related mortality per year was 34% higher, and deaths per million inhabitants were 16% higher compared to countries without conflict. While there is evidence that conflict can occasionally intensify disaster hazards, there is a greater evidence suggesting that the relationship between conflict and disaster operates through mechanisms that negatively affect vulnerability and response capacity.

Language: en

LA - en SN - 2212-4209 UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijdrr.2023.103881 ID - ref1 ER -