Tuesday, January 28, 2025

Sara Mitchell and Elise Pizzi, professor and associate professor, respectively, in the Department of Political Science and researcher affiliates in the Center for Social Science Innovation (CSSI), have published a study that analyzes how the Peruvian government’s response to natural disasters influenced political violence in the country.

Prior research indicates that rates of armed violence within a community and a government's disaster response can be influenced by each other. In other words, weak governmental response to natural disasters can foster political grievances and aid rebel recruitment, heightening armed violence. At the same time, armed violence can lead to poor disaster responses by increasing vulnerable populations and weakening trust between the public and government.

Mitchell and Pizzi looked to further clarify this relationship in Peru, a country victim to an abundance of both political violence and natural disasters.

“Peru is a very interesting country because of its variation in ecological zones and its periods of democratic and non-democratic governments. Within one country, we could see the variation in a lot of different factors that might shape the link between disaster events and violence,” Pizzi explains.

The researchers analyzed governmental responses to various natural disasters (e.g. earthquakes, storms, flooding, and droughts) in Peru’s provinces from 1989 to 2020.

The governments’ responses were categorized into five domains: reconstruction, regulation, relocation, restriction, and neglect for the three-year period following the disaster. Mitchell and Pizzi then linked the categorized governmental responses to violent events in the region.

Importantly, the researchers used a special model to disentangle the interdependent relationship between disaster responses and armed violence. This allowed them to isolate the effect of disaster response on violence and vice versa.

Mitchell and Pizzi discovered that subpar governmental disaster responses, particularly restricting the movement of people near disaster-affected areas, increased political violence and conflict. Conversely, beneficial governmental disaster responses, such as providing relief goods and reconstruction aid, had no effect on political violence and conflict.

They also found that armed conflicts increased the likelihood of weak governmental disaster response, while exerting no effect on positive governmental disaster response.

Altogether, their findings underscore the importance of effective and beneficial responses to natural disasters from governments to limit political grievances and decrease violence.

Mitchell and Pizzi plan to expand their project within Peru and outside its borders.

“We're going to explore additional factors that shape both disaster response and conflict, including the distance from the disaster to contested borders, non-governmental organization (NGO) activity in the region, and the role that remittances and migrant networks play in supporting disaster victims,” Pizzi says.

The study titled “Does government response to natural disasters explain violence? The case of the Sendero Luminoso and conflict in Peru” was published in Social Science Quarterly and utilizes data collected by the authors’ Disasters, Migration, and Violence (DMV) Lab, which is funded by the National Science Foundation. Other study authors include Carly Millerd and Jeongho Choi, PhD candidates in the Department of Political Science.

To receive emails about CSSI news and opportunities in support of social science research across the University of Iowa campus, within our communities, and beyond, subscribe here.