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This briefing from the Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO) examines the relationship between climate and armed conflict. While civil conflict is statistically more frequent in dry and tropical climates, the authors find little evidence that climatic variability directly causes state-based violent conflict. Instead, they argue that climate change acts as a 'threat multiplier' that can increase conflict risk indirectly through migration, food insecurity, and economic shocks, particularly in societies already characterized by poor governance and poverty.

This research paper examines the relationship between local-level environmental degradation, demographic pressures, and internal armed conflict from 1990 to 2004. Using a geospatial grid analysis of 100km x 100km squares globally, the authors find that while population density is a strong predictor of conflict, the effects of land degradation and water scarcity are relatively weak and often secondary to political and economic factors such as GDP and regime stability.

This research paper examines how economic incentives, specifically related to oil, motivate third parties to intervene militarily in internal wars. The authors develop a formal three-party model and test it against a dyadic dataset of conflict states and potential interveners from 1945 to 1999, finding that both the oil wealth of the conflict state and the oil dependence of the potential intervener significantly increase the likelihood of intervention.